1 Mr Lim Biow Chuan asked the Minister for Health in the light of the new COVID-19 cases involving Singaporeans who have not been to China, what other measures can Singaporeans take to protect themselves from being infected by the coronavirus.
2 Ms Rahayu Mahzam asked the Minister for Health (a) whether there are any new insights on how COVID-19 is spread in light of the recent announcement of the cluster of local transmission; and (b) whether there are heightened concerns now of a community spread of the virus in Singapore.
\tThe Minister for Health (Mr Gan Kim Yong): Mr Speaker, Sir, may I have your permission to take the first two questions together?
\tMr Speaker: Yes, please.
\tMr Gan Kim Yong: Thank you. I think it will be useful for me to give a quick update of the situation. The COVID-19 situation continues to evolve globally and locally. As of 17 February 2020, based on World Health Organization’s report, globally there are 70,548 confirmed cases in mainland China with 1,770 deaths, and 881 confirmed cases outside of mainland China with five deaths.
Locally, as of 17 February 2020, we have 77 confirmed cases of COVID-19. Twenty-four cases have fully recovered from the infection and have been discharged from hospital. Of the 53 cases still in hospital, most are stable or improving. Four are in critical condition in the intensive care unit. Contact tracing has helped us to identify five clusters and investigations on these clusters are on-going. Contact tracing is underway for the other seven locally transmitted cases to establish any links to previous cases or travel history to mainland China.
Since early January, we have progressively put in place precautionary measures to detect and limit the transmission of the virus. These include travel controls, contact tracing and placing identified close contacts under quarantine. Today, we activated the Public Health Preparedness Clinics to strengthen our defenses at the primary care front to better detect and manage COVID-19 cases.
The Public Health Preparedness Clinics (PHPCs) will provide subsidised care for patients with respiratory illnesses in the community. We observed that several of the locally confirmed cases had remained in the community or gone to work, even when they were ill. MOH has therefore given guidance to doctors to provide medical certificates (MC) of five days for patients with respiratory symptoms so that they can and should stay home to rest and recover quickly. We urge individuals with respiratory symptoms – such as fever, cough, sore throat and runny nose – to seek medical treatment at the PHPCs or polyclinics early and stay home throughout their MC period. Let me take this opportunity to once again thank our healthcare workers who courageously rose to the call of duty and in particular our PHPC doctors who had just started up the PHPC clinics today.
I am also heartened to see many ground-up initiatives to support our front line healthcare workers, the needy and vulnerable groups, as well as the affected patients and their families. This whole-of-society spirit is essential in building a resilient nation. When we stand united, we will prevail and I am glad to see Members wearing this SG United button. Let us stay united as we battle this disease.
Knowledge of COVID-19 is still evolving as scientists around the world work to better understand the virus. MOH studies the latest reports, consults international infectious diseases experts and keeps in touch with other health authorities to gain greater knowledge of the virus and how it is transmitted. The current medical assessment still points to COVID-19 spreading mainly through droplets and physical contact from an infected person. Based on evidence available in China, an expert from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention has said that there is currently no evidence that the virus can be transmitted through aerosol.
Individually, we can each play a part to curb the spread of disease through socially responsible practices. Observing good personal hygiene, such as washing our hands with soap and water regularly, and not touching our face and eyes, remains the key means by which individuals can protect themselves and reduce the risk of transmission. Each person should also monitor his or her health closely, take temperature twice daily, see a doctor when unwell and stay home to rest, and if they must go out – for example, to see a doctor – wear a mask.
We expect to see more cases in Singapore, partly as a result of enhanced surveillance we put in place recently. We must be prepared for the possibility of wider community spread. We will continue to monitor the situation and prepare for different scenarios I sketched out during the Ministerial Statement at the last sitting. We will also fine tune and adjust our measures accordingly as the situation evolves. Together, with everyone playing our part and staying united, we are confident that we will overcome this outbreak and emerge stronger as a nation.
\tMr Speaker: Mr Lim Biow Chuan.
\tMr Lim Biow Chuan (Mountbatten): Thank you, Sir. I just wanted to check with the Minister for Health, when Prime Minister Lee made his speech to the nation on 8 February, he said, there is no need to panic, carry on with our lives. But of late, some of the activities seem to suggest that people are reacting in a slightly different manner. When DBS had a case, they evacuated people from the whole of the floor at Marina Bay Financial Centre (MBFC). And the Catholics have stopped Mass. I am just wondering what is the advice from MOH to the rest of the people? Do we carry on with our lives or should we react whenever a case comes out? Should buildings evacuate the buildings' occupants when they find that there is someone who had been in contact with an infected person?
\tMr Gan Kim Yong: I thank the Member. This is a very important question. In fact, we have been briefing those who have been affected, including corporations, entities, organisations. As I had mentioned, last week, I met the religious leaders, church leaders to explain to them what are the precautions they can put in place. As the Prime Minister said, life must go on. We have to continue as normally as possible while taking the necessary precautions.
For church organisations, for example, we have advised them to continue with their services, minimise unnecessary social interactions so as to minimise contact to prevent transmission within the church and to also continue to take temperature and remind members that if they are unwell, they can stay at home and rest rather than to come to church. These are the types of advice we have given to the churches. Depending on the situation, different organisations may adopt different measures where practical and if they are in doubt, we have also invited them to contact us. We will provide the necessary advice. We have done the same to the other religious organisations – the Buddhist organisation, the Taoist organisation, the Hindu organisation. We are reaching out to them and any organisations that have questions or are uncertain as to what they should do, they can contact us.
When a case is identified as positive, we will also inform the organisation to do the necessary cleaning and disinfection and so on. Sometimes, organisations may over-react and take upon themselves to do things that may not be necessary and may cause misunderstandings. Therefore, we advise organisations that when there is a confirmed case, if they are not sure, to consult us or to consult NEA which oversees the environmental cleaning processes. This way, we will then be able to react calmly and respond effectively to any confirmed cases. I would advise organisations that are uncertain to please contact us. We will provide the necessary guidance and advice.
\tMs Rahayu Mahzam (Jurong): Mr Speaker, I thank the Minister for the update. I just have one specific question on the effectiveness of temperature screening because this has caused a lot of surge in the demand for thermometers. More importantly, whether it is actually effective because some of the patients that have been discovered, showed very mild symptoms. It also uses a lot of manpower. I am really not sure if it is the best way. The other thing is, there have also been reports about how there were some faulty infra-red thermometers that were not very accurate. So, I just want the Minister's thoughts on this and the guidelines that can be given to the organisations on this matter.
\tMr Gan Kim Yong: Temperature screening remains one of the very important part of the measures that we have put in place to prevent people who are ill from joining activities and participate in mass gatherings. That is very important. Individually, it is also important for you to take temperature regularly so that you know whether you are well or unwell. But very often, you also find that individuals know that they are unwell even if you do not have a temperature. It is also evidenced from the studies that shows that for COVID-19, sometimes, the high temperature comes much later, in the later part of your illness. In the beginning part, when you are in the initial phase, your symptoms may be very mild but you do carry viral load and you can still be infectious.
Therefore, we encourage Singaporeans who feel unwell, especially with the symptoms that I had mentioned, respiratory symptoms – coughing, running nose and so on – to please consult a doctor, particularly with the PHPC, now that we have activated them. Or come to our polyclinics for a proper assessment. Once we have made the assessment, if we find that you are at risk, we will then refer you to the hospitals for assessment and testing. If not, doctors are given guidance to give you five-day MCs so that you can rest at home. If your symptoms recover within that five days, well and good. If not, please go back to the same doctor. If you go to a different doctor, they may not know the history and you have to repeat all over again, and you may have missed out certain indications. We encourage you to go back to the same doctor so that there is a continuity of care. This way, we will help to minimise transmission.
To answer the Member's question, temperature-taking is an important part of our precaution measures. But if you do not have a temperature, it does not mean that you are perfectly well. We still have to make an assessment, whether you feel well or unwell.
For organisations, we also advise them. Even after they have taken the temperature, observe the individual. If he does not look well, please advise him to go back and rest, rather than rely solely on temperature taking.
\tDr Chia Shi-Lu (Tanjong Pagar): I thank the Minister for the update. I just have two clarifications about the DORSCON level – the acronym of the year, so far! First, some clarification about how this DORSCON is arrived at – is it by independent committee that makes this decision and recommends to Minister? Or is it through any other process? The second question which, I think, many Singaporeans would be interested in is, what are the parameters by which the DORSCON level may be adjusted? In this case, specifically, what are the parameters under which they would consider lowering it from Orange to Yellow?
\tMr Gan Kim Yong: The conditions for DORSCON levels are published on our website. These are guidelines. At the end of the day, we would need to make a judgement. In making the judgement, we have to take into account inputs from the professionals, input from the community and make an assessment of the situation. So, there are multiple factors that need to be considered. It is not just counting the numbers and ticking the boxes, before we decide to switch either way.
Currently, we have a Ministerial Taskforce. The Taskforce will assess and recommend, and eventually, the Minister for Health is the one who declares the DORSCON level. Just for avoidance of doubt, let me repeat this. We have no plans to go to DORSCON Red. Whenever I hold a press conference, rumours will fly around that we are going to go to DORSCON Red. Every time, we would have to spend resources and efforts to address the rumours. So, please help us not to spread rumours that are untrue. Well, rumours are by nature untrue!
Again, as we continue to monitor the situation, there may be a time when we will have to adjust the DORSCON level downwards to Yellow or to Green. Again, we will take into account multiple factors – the number of infections that we are seeing, the severity of the diseases and whether or not the viral transmission is able to be controlled. So, there are many factors that we will consider; including outside Singapore, what is the situation globally. Therefore, it is not a straightforward answer. It is eventually a judgement, taking into account all the various relevant factors.
Mr Speaker: Mr Pritam Singh – who is sitting next to a Member in red.
\tMr Pritam Singh (Aljunied): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I just have a few follow-up questions on the announcement yesterday with respect to the transition from the Leave of Absence regime to the new Stay-Home Notice for individuals, residents, long-term pass-holders returning from mainland China. That takes effect tonight, at midnight. My first question is how many individuals does the Government expect to be transitioning into this Stay-Home Notice regime. Because a lot of these individuals, as Members know, would be living in the community, in households, in HDB flats and so forth.
The second question is, there would ostensibly be a higher chance of community spread, in view of these returnees. To that end, what are the enforcement resources that the Government has at its disposal, to ensure that returnees actually comply with the requirements of the Stay-Home Notice?
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\tMr Gan Kim Yong: I thank the Member. We do not have an estimated total number of people returning because it depends on the decision of the individuals, whether or not they intend to return. Many of these who are on Stay-Home Notices are required to stay at home and we are leveraging on technology as well, to monitor them. We call them, we have video calls as well and we also track their location, where they are. This will help us to reduce the manpower resources that we need to ensure that they stay at home. This is a step-up from the Leave of Absence (LOA), that we have introduced, where they were allowed to go out occasionally for meals and so on. For the Stay-Home Notice, they are required to stay home all the time and we will do spot-checks on them through telephone calls and so on, to make sure that they are at home. I think this is the enforcement regime, which was explained yesterday.
Mr Speaker: Miss Cheryl Chan.
\tMiss Cheryl Chan Wei Ling (Fengshan): Thank you, Speaker. I have to first commend MOH for putting up a lot of timely information and good information for people's use. But, as Minister rightly pointed out, rumours and also misinformation can create unnecessary fear and panic. There are, of course, a lot of closed chat groups now. I just wonder if Minister can shed some light to whether any actions will be taken against those who intentionally spread some of the information that creates the panic that goes around. I was actually asked to evacuate my building the other day because the office building apparently had an ambulance that came by. But what we found out was that there was no COVID-19, the person actually was choked. If the Minister could shed some light.
\tMr Gan Kim Yong: This is a very difficult challenge because they are, by nature, closed chat groups, it is very difficult for us to monitor. We encourage Members or members of public, if you come across any of these closed chat groups. If the information does not look real, please check with us, go to gov.sg, wait for the notices to be sent to you through WhatsApp, those are accurate, official information. And we have been sharing as much as we can. All that we know, we share with the public. We have daily press briefings and occasional press conferences by Ministers and regular updates from time to time, even within the day. So, rest assured that we will provide as much information as possible, once we obtain it. There is no need to second guess what the situation is.
If you do come across messages or statements that look suspicious, that cannot be verified, please do not forward them to your friends. You may find that amusing or entertaining, but please refrain from forwarding because this will then multiply. You can also help us, if you find that they are suspicious and you are not sure, do forward it to us and we will check on whether they are correct or not and let you know the details. So, we have to deal with it one by one, there is no easy solution, but each of us can play our part by not forwarding unverified information and informing the authority if you come across any of them.
\tMr Speaker: Mr Yee Chia Hsing.
\tMr Yee Chia Hsing (Chua Chu Kang): Thank you, Speaker. I would like to ask the Minister, there are quite a lot of cases where the person that has it, he goes to the GP or polyclinic a few times and only on the third or fourth visit, then he is referred to the acute hospital for the test. Does it make sense to make the test kits available at least at the polyclinics or some of the GPs so that they can test earlier. Because, in one case, the person, from the onset of symptoms and until he went to NUH, it was almost 10 days. So, throughout that period he could be spreading to a lot of people.
\tMr Gan Kim Yong: I thank the Member. Let me just put in context. Every day, we have about 30,000 people down with flu-like symptoms – running nose, cough, cold and so on. So, it is not possible to test all 30,000 of them. In the end, every day we find about five to 10 cases as you have seen in the past. So, to find this five to 10 cases every day by testing 30,000, is not going to be very helpful. On top of that, you may have a lot of false positives that you have to chase around. And therefore, the best way for us is for the doctors to make a clinical judgement as they see the patients. If they find that you have signs of pneumonia, then they will refer the patient to the hospital for assessment. If not, our strategy is to encourage the individual to please stay at home, for the first five days so that your body will be able to recover. If it is the normal common cough and cold, you are likely to have recovered within these four or five days. This will reduce the amount of noise in the system to allow us to identify cases that are more likely to be problematic.
Even for those who do not recover within these five days, it does not mean that you have COVID-19 because there are still a lot of other possible infections that you may be suffering from. In fact, a very small number everyday will be COVID-19 positive. So, therefore, if you are asked to stay home with five-day medical certificate (MC), do not panic, it does not mean you definitely have COVID-19. The vast majority would not have. This is a means for you to stay at home to rest, to minimise transmission. This will also help by reducing the normal cough and cold transmission, if you stay at home and recover, rather than move around in the community. I also encourage individuals when you are sick, if you have not recovered within these five days, please go back to the same doctor, rather than to move from doctor to doctor and then we have less ability to track the history.
This is the advice I would give to individuals: if you are ill and not well, see a doctor. If the doctor gives you an MC, stay at home throughout the MC period, do not go around and do not go and queue up to buy toilet paper and so on. Please stay home and if you need help, there is always the MOH hotline that you can call if you need some help. If you are very ill and you need the ambulance, you can always call for the ambulance and we will convey you to the hospital. When you finish your MC, if you are still unwell, go back to see the same doctor and the doctor will then be in a position to make a clinical judgement, whether or not you should be sent to the hospital.
Our doctors are well trained and they are familiar with the assessments they need to do on the ground. But it is also not appropriate to ask our primary care doctors to do the test because it requires swabs and special techniques. Some of the doctors may not be familiar with how to do that and it also exposes the doctors unnecessarily to potential infection because swabbing can be quite a hazardous process. It is better done in a hospital environment so that our trained professionals will be able to do it properly. Some private hospitals are planning to do that because they are also trained and they also have the equipment and the facilities to do so safely. We are working with the private hospitals to also allow the private hospitals to do some of these testing in order for us to share the patient load.
\tMr Speaker: Prof Fatimah Lateef.
\tProf Fatimah Lateef (Marine Parade): Thank you, Speaker. I would like to ask the Minister for Health, pertaining to the guideline on the five days MC. We understand the reasoning behind the five days recommendation and also how we will assess in giving this MC. However, there has been many misinterpretation perhaps and spin-offs from these five days and I am asking this question on behalf of frontline healthcare workers. Because people are now coming and demanding, \"Why is it just three days and not five days? MOH says it is compulsory for you to give us five days\".
So, therefore, we make the decision based on clinical judgement and case-by-case basis. Can we just get clarification and reinforcement that it is really not mandatory, but it is a guideline, a recommendation, but it is really up to the doctor and the frontline healthcare personnel as to how many days we want to give. We understand the five days and we understand that if you do have upper respiratory tract symptoms with fever and all that, and even with no travel history, the five days is definitely justifiable. But for others who may not have all the components of the symptoms, but there are other problems, I hope that the Minister can reinforce that it is really up to us on a case-by-case basis to decide on this.
\tMr Gan Kim Yong: I thank the Member. It is important to read the footnote of our guidelines. And the footnote does say that \"doctors are to exercise judgement and to decide how many days to be given\". For example, the patient might have already been ill for four days, and so, there is no need to give another five days. So, it is the clinical judgement of the doctor. We said five days and this is a guideline given to the doctors. We encourage doctors to exercise their judgement and we also want Singaporeans to know, to trust the doctors' judgement. Our doctors are well-trained and they know what to do.
At the same time, we also want to take this opportunity to appeal to employers to allow the patient – your employees – to go on the five-day MC if he is given five days MC. Please do not ask him to come back to work, because by coming back to work, if he has the virus, it may actually be exposed to your other employees and your whole company may be affected. So, it is in the interest of the employees to rest at home so that they can recover quickly and it is also in the interest of the employers to ensure that their employees, the workers, stay at home and rest rather than come to work.
I also want to take this opportunity to seek the support of our employers to allow us to implement these guidelines so as to minimise the transmission in the community.
\tMr Speaker: Ms Joan Pereira.
\tMs Joan Pereira (Tanjong Pagar): Thank you, Speaker. Minister, I have noticed during my walkabouts in my constituency, in some GP clinics, the receptionists wear masks and the nurses wear masks. But in some GP clinics, it could be just next to the one where the nurses wear masks, they do not don masks at all. So, are there some guidelines for the GP clinics to follow?
\tMr Gan Kim Yong: I thank the Member. I think that the clinic managers and the GPs know exactly what to do. For those who are patient-facing and potentially have a risk of exposure to potential COVID-19 or other infectious diseases, they would usually wear masks. And sometimes, if their clinics are more for health screening and so on, they are less likely to encounter patients with these illnesses or infectious diseases, they may not need to wear a mask. So, we leave it to the clinics to make a judgement, but we would encourage them that where they have a risk of facing patients who potentially have infectious diseases, including COVID-19, they ought to wear a mask to protect themselves as well as to protect the patients because they may inadvertently pass on the disease to the patient as well.
\tMr Mohamed Irshad (Nominated Member): I thank the Minister for the update. In the recent press conference, Minister Lawrence Wong said that COVID-19 is less deadly, more infectious and it is more like H1N1 than SARS. I have got some feedback asking if this means we have to prepare for the long haul and how long is long; and whether we will get back to normal day-to-day life.
\tMr Gan Kim Yong: Maybe I should ask Minister Wong to answer this question, but let me try to answer the Member's question. I think what Mr Wong intended to say is that, in terms of statistics, based on today's evidence, that transmissibility seems to be much faster, much higher, quite close to H1N1. And therefore, we do expect a significant number of cases both globally as well as in Singapore in time to come. In terms of fatality, the numbers today show that in the whole of China, it is about 2% to 3%. Outside Hubei, it is about 0.5%. Whereas SARS was closer to 10%. And therefore, it is quite different in terms of fatality compared to SARS. This is the nature of the disease and the knowledge of the disease is still evolving – as I had mentioned in my reply – and the scientists are still discovering new things about the disease.
These numbers may change over time. We are watching them, but this is as it stands today. Therefore, it looks more like H1N1, we do need to expect to live with it for quite a long time. H1N1 has infected more than 400,000 Singaporeans in Singapore alone, within a year. And H1N1 is still with us today; occasionally, we still see cases of H1N1. We may have to learn to live with it. That is why even today, we are encouraging Singaporeans to live life as normal as possible. Life must go on, take the necessary precautions, but we can continue to live normally as much as possible so that there is no need to have drastic shifts from one way to the other. But precautions like temperature taking, see a doctor when unwell, these are normal precautions, which in fact, even without COVID-19 or H1N1, we should be practising. This is also an opportunity for us to reinforce these socially responsible practices – ensure that when we are sick, see a doctor and observe personal hygiene practices, wash your hands frequently. It does not mean that once COVID-19 is over, if it is ever over, we stop washing hands. So, I think it is a habit that we should inculcate today and live life as normally as possible and take necessary precautions.
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\tMs Denise Phua Lay Peng (Jalan Besar): Mr Speaker, I am glad to hear the Minister saying we should try to live life as normally as possible. I want to ask about the more vulnerable groups, such as the elderly, whom I understand, of course, the state is trying to protect. The Senior Activity Centres (SACs) which actually serve many of the elderly, especially in rental estates, are instructed to wind down many of their activities in order to protect the elderly. Some of us on the ground find that many of these elderly residents are loitering around and they are no more exercising. Maybe they will queue up to get food packages, but they do not get to sit down to have meals together anymore.
So, I am wondering if there is an alternative to this while protecting them, for example, splitting them so that there are not more than a hundred in a group and maybe have some part-time activities so that they can actually continue to have a platform where they can be educated and updated on the latest news and be encouraged to exercise or maybe co-clean some shared facilities and so forth.
I wonder if Minister's message to live life as normally as possible could be extended to the beneficiaries of the SACs.
\tMr Gan Kim Yong: Indeed, Mr Speaker, we do want SACs to continue as much as possible. But it is also important that some SACs and organisations have temporarily suspended some of the activities in order for them to put in place some precautionary measures. Some of the measures may need time for them to set up. Some organisations may need time to work out exactly how to manage some of these activities. Therefore, I assure Ms Denise Phua that we do want to work with the organisations which are overseeing these activities to put back as many of these activities as possible and practicable while taking necessary precautions, particularly all the health promotion activities and exercises. In times like this, exercise is important to keep ourselves healthy and resilient. So, we do want to encourage the activities and exercises to continue with the necessary precautions.
HPB as well as the various VWOs may take some time to study the situation, put in place the necessary appropriate precautions and we encourage them to restart as soon as possible. And instead of coming to the SACs, some of them may congregate in the coffeeshops, which has the same effect of mixing. So, rather than being in the coffeeshops, we might as well organise them in the SACs so that we are able to manage them to prevent transmission.
We take the Member's point fully and will work with the various organisations to do that.
\tMr Lim Biow Chuan: Mr Speaker, may I just bring the Minister back to his answer to these Stay-Home Notices. Supposing a worker who has just came back from China has been issued with a Stay-Home Notice and he breaches his Stay-Home Notice in that he deliberately ignores the notice and he goes out, what is the risk to the community that he may carry the COVID-19 virus and spread it to the community at large? What is MOH's assessment of the risk to the people who may meet up with him in the community?
\tMr Gan Kim Yong: First, let me explain that there are different categories of people who are served certain notices and orders. For those who are ill with COVID-19, confirmed cases, all of them are in the hospital. So, once they are confirmed, they are treated in the isolation wards in the hospital. They are not running around in the community.
But at the same time, once we have identified a positive case, we identify the contacts of these positive cases. These are the people who have been with the confirmed cases for an extended period of time and they are potentially exposed. These people are served with what we call quarantine orders. For quarantine orders, there are strict rules for compliance and there are staff and officers who will do surveillance and make sure that they are in our quarantine centres. Some are served home quarantine orders. They are also very strict orders under the Infectious Diseases Act and they have the full force of the law to ensure that they stay under the home quarantine orders.
But I also need to emphasise that these people who are served quarantine orders are not sick. They are exposed to persons who are sick but they themselves are not down with COVID-19. Once they have symptoms, because they are under close surveillance, they will be immediately conveyed to the hospital for treatment and follow-up. So, again, if they become one of the confirmed cases, they will be treated in the hospital. So, they are all in isolation.
There will be a group of people like those returning from China. They were exposed in the community but they do not have direct contact with a potential case. So, their risk level is significantly lower than the close contacts of confirmed cases. Therefore, they are served these Stay-Home Notices to allow them to stay at home, minimise contact with the outside community to minimise the risk of spread. These are generally healthy people and they do not have immediate known contacts with confirmed cases. So, as a precaution, we want them to stay at home. We want to minimise the risk of exposing them to the community and, therefore, we have this Stay-Home Notice which is enforceable and requires them to be at home all the time until the notice period is over. This is a precautionary measure.
So, there are actually three different levels: (a) those who are confirmed cases, they are in hospitals; (b) those who have close contacts with confirmed cases, they are of a higher risk and they are served quarantine orders; and (c) those who are returning from China, have been exposed in China, but no direct contact with known cases and these are served with Stay-Home Notices.
\tAssoc Prof Walter Theseira (Nominated Member): Mr Speaker, it seems that many cases of COVID-19 will not progress to pneumonia. They will be quite mild. So, it suggests that a mild case seen by a general practitioner and told to stay at home and rest, that case will progress, the person will recover but it will never be detected. So, I wonder whether this could actually be a good thing because, internationally, we have been called the \"gold standard\" in detection. That is a good thing normally. But, now, it is perhaps giving us an undue reputation for risks when actually we may not have that many real cases compared to many other countries.
\tMr Gan Kim Yong: I think the conclusion is the other way around. The cases that we have determined as confirmed are real cases. But other countries may have more cases than what they have reported. That is what the reports say.
The Member is right that some of the cases may have mild symptoms. But, generally, they may last quite some time and, therefore, after five days, if you have not yet recovered, then we are suspicious of you. Even then the doctors have to make a clinical judgement. It does not necessarily mean that once you have pneumonia, you will be referred and, if you do not have pneumonia, they will rule it out. The doctor will make a clinical judgement based on your condition and history, whether you have been in contact with multiple groups of people that have been exposed, for example. They also want to take your history, whether you have indirect contacts. The doctors are well-trained and very experienced in making clinical assessments. So, we will leave it to the doctors to make their ground assessments.
But the Member is right that it is not possible to detect 100% of the cases. We are doing the best we can. Usually, it is not done like that. We do proactive surveillance, meaning we look at all possible cases of pneumonia and some non-pneumonia cases we also investigate to see whether we are able to pick up cases. We also have a sentinel surveillance programme, which means we actually randomly pick patients in the community to test for potential respiratory infections, including COVID-19. This will allow us to pick up cases that would otherwise have gone totally unnoticed. It is a surveillance. So, it is not 100% testing everybody. As I have said, we cannot test 30,000 cases every day. It is just not possible. So, we do sampling. This will allow us to have a sense of what is happening on the ground in reality and give us a sense of judgement of how the situation is evolving. This is a useful approach.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Efforts to Combat Spread of COVID-19 on Public Buses and Trains","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"OA","content":"3 Mr Png Eng Huat asked the Minister for Transport what are the measures and efforts to combat the spread of COVID-19 in our public buses and trains under DORSCON yellow, orange and red framework.
\tThe Senior Minister of State for Transport (Dr Janil Puthucheary) (for the Minister for Transport): Mr Speaker, the Disease Outbreak Response System Condition (DORSCON) is a colour-coded framework that categorises the prevailing situation during the outbreak of an infectious disease. The framework provides general guidelines on what needs to be done to prevent and reduce the impact of infections, but does not prescribe specific measures for various sectors at the different alert levels. The Government will develop relevant measures, taking into account the unique characteristics of the disease based on the latest available information and the requirements of each sector.
Since the start of the outbreak of COVID-19, MOT has worked closely with our bus and rail operators and the National Transport Workers’ Union (NTWU) to implement relevant precautionary measures. For example, since 28 January 2020, all public transport workers returning from mainland China have not been deployed to frontline duties. This measure was put in place ahead of the mandatory 14-day leave of absence to be served by all workers returning from mainland China from 31 January 2020.
Operators have also implemented more frequent cleaning of public surface areas and high commuter touch points, placed hand sanitisers at MRT stations and bus interchanges for use by staff and commuters, and conducted twice-daily temperature screening for all staff.
Messages on maintaining public hygiene have also been frequently shared with public transport workers. These measures seek to give commuters peace of mind to continue with their regular daily journeys.
Commuters are also reminded to practise good personal hygiene. Commuters who are unwell should avoid public transport and crowded places.
We will continue to work with MOH, our public transport operators and NTWU to introduce appropriate measures and efforts to combat the spread of COVID-19 as the situation evolves.
\tMr Png Eng Huat (Hougang): Sir, would the Ministry be looking into instituting, say, staggered school or working hours, to ease the concerns of parents, students and workers travelling during rush hours even under the current DORSCON level when more infection cases start to surface? At least, the trains will not be so crowded, travelling will be a lot safer with at least some social distancing implemented.
\tDr Janil Puthucheary: Mr Speaker, the issue about changes to work patterns or school closures is not something that falls under the purview of MOT. But in a broader context, the information we have so far is that there is very limited community transmission link in clusters. Currently, as I understand the postures of the other Ministries, there are no plans for those types of measures to be instituted at this point in time. Our public transport systems are serving the public well and there is no reason to believe that we should not continue to use them to get to work, to get to school and to go about our usual daily business.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Economic Impact from COVID-19 on Singapore","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"OA","content":"4 Mr Desmond Choo asked the Minister for Trade and Industry in view of the global spread of COVID-19 (a) what is the estimated economic impact on Singapore's GDP; (b) whether there has been a decrease in capital inflows; and (c) whether adjustments to forecasts on job creation are expected.
\tThe Senior Minister of State for Trade and Industry (Mr Chee Hong Tat) (for the Minister for Trade and Industry): Mr Speaker, Sir, the COVID-19 outbreak in China, Singapore and many countries in the region will adversely impact our economy.
First, it has led to a sharp fall in tourist arrivals, particularly from China. This affects our tourism, transport, retail and F&B sectors.
Second, domestic consumption in Singapore has declined as locals cut back on activities, such as shopping and eating out.
Third, the outbreak will dampen economic growth in several of our key markets, especially China. This affects export-oriented sectors, including manufacturing and wholesale trade. These sectors are also affected by supply chain disruptions due to factory closures and labour shortages in China, due to the lockdowns and travel restrictions imposed by the Chinese government to contain the outbreak. Regional financial markets, including Singapore, have seen greater volatility amidst heightened uncertainty and concerns over the spread of COVID-19. In Singapore, prices for equities and bonds denominated in Singapore dollars have fallen and the nominal exchange rate of the Singapore dollar has eased, in line with weaker economic conditions. Fortunately, these movements happened in an orderly manner and MAS has not observed any unusual declines in short-term capital inflows.
\tAs a result of the outbreak, MTI has downgraded Singapore's GDP growth forecast for the year from the original \"0.5 to 2.5%\" to \"-0.5 to 1.5%\". The current baseline view is that GDP growth for 2020, as an entire year, will remain positive, but reduced to around 0.5%. However, we know the COVID-19 situation is still evolving, and the total impact on our economy will depend on the length and severity of the outbreak. We will continue to monitor the situation closely.
Sir, MTI's assessment is that the outbreak is unlikely to affect the number of jobs created from new investments and projects, as these are long term in nature. However, there will be an impact on our companies and workers in the near term, especially in the more badly affected sectors.
The Government will work together with employers and our unions to support our companies and save jobs for our workers during this difficult period. This is what our tripartite partnership is about. We stand together with our brothers and sisters, and we help one another through thick and thin.
I was glad to receive a message from a business leader who owns a chain of restaurants in Singapore and the region. He had advised other employers in his industry that, \"Most important, keep the team intact for you will need them to be ready for the recovery.\" When we met the Singapore Hotels Association – as you know hotels are one of the sectors that are badly affected – the hotel owners and general managers fully supported working with the Government and unions to keep their workers employed. I witnessed the same solidarity and support from our union leaders at a recent dialogue at NTUC. These examples and many others give me the confidence that as a nation, we can and we will, overcome this crisis together.
The Government has announced some measures to help those who are most affected by the outbreak, such as tourism and transport sectors. More details on how we will further support our companies and workers will be announced by the Minister for Finance in the Budget Statement.
\tMr Desmond Choo (Tampines): I thank the Senior Minister of State for his clarification and reassurance that workers should be taken care of. I have three points for clarification. The first is on the packages of support for affected workers. It has been very warmly received by our workers in the transport sector, especially our taxi drivers. We do expect some impact on the manufacturing sector. Would there be support for this group of workers with some immediacy. The second one is on the delays in new investments. With the current situation in China and regional areas, do we expect new investments in Singapore to be delayed? While they are not or going to be cancelled, but do we expect the delays resulting in job creation, only coming down, further down the line, rather than in the coming few months? The third one is with the Singapore dollar easing and with exports of materials coming slower from China, do we expect then to have some inflationary pressure in the coming few months?
\tMr Chee Hong Tat: Sir, the package to help companies and workers, some have already been announced. For other measures, the Minister for Finance will address these in the Budget Statement. The second question by Mr Choo with regard to new investments – because these are long term in nature – the current assessment is that they will not be affected. In fact, I would make an argument that how we deal with the current situation will affect how investors see Singapore in time to come. If we can deal with this calmly, cohesively, and show the world that Singapore, we have what it takes to inspire confidence and to deal with the situation in a professional manner and to bounce back and emerge stronger. I think then, we can turn this crisis into an opportunity to differentiate ourselves from our competitors.
Sir, the third question on the Singapore dollar, I think this depends on which sector we are talking about. And it actually brings the point to bear that is why we need to ensure that our supply sources are diversified. That is why we need to ensure that our supply chains are resilient. And that is why we also need to diversify our economic structure, our sectors and our markets. This is a very useful reminder to, not just for companies in Singapore, but companies throughout the world, that diversification, supply chain resilience, are all very important medium to longer term considerations. We should, even after we deal with this crisis, continue to press on with our restructuring efforts to improve our competitiveness to upgrade the skills of our workers, to transform our enterprises.
\tMr Liang Eng Hwa (Holland-Bukit Timah): China is a country where many Singapore companies have successfully internationalised into. Given the grim situation in the Chinese economy now, can I ask the Senior Minister of State what does he see the impact to our Singapore companies in China, and whether there are ways and means that we can also assist them?
\tMr Chee Hong Tat: Sir, it depends on the sector they are in. For tourism, for example, Chinese tourists currently make up about one-fifth of our total tourist arrivals. So, definitely there is an impact. For companies that rely on China for supplies or parts, there will be an impact. Companies that have workers who are currently in China, they have to come back in batches, because we need to make sure that we are able to protect public safety when these workers come back. All these will affect our companies.
Companies that have businesses in China are also being affected by the measures that are implemented in China to contain the outbreak.
If we look beyond the near-term, the prospects for companies to invest overseas, to expand their operations overseas including in China, I think that still remains an attractive market.
But going back to my earlier point, in my response to Mr Desmond Choo, we should not just put all our eggs in one basket. So, it is important that while we look at expanding our presence in China, our companies should also consider other markets including ASEAN, including India and even further away, Middle East, Africa and Latin America. This approach of having a diversified supply chain, diversified market is still the best medium to longer term strategy to develop our economy and to grow our businesses.
Mr Speaker: Er Dr Lee Bee Wah.
\tEr Dr Lee Bee Wah (Nee Soon): Thank you, Sir. I have one question. Yesterday, several contractors told me that they have Bangladeshi workers who wanted to go home to leave the work site and go back because some of the cases involved Bangladeshi workers. So, I would like to ask whether our Ministry is going to take any action to educate the workers to share with them so that they will continue to work in Singapore. Because this contractor says that if all these workers decide to leave Singapore, they cannot operate.
\tMr Chee Hong Tat: Sir, I thank the Member for her feedback. I am sure this is something which the Government agencies will continue to work closely with employers to raise awareness, to educate our workers that the work environment that they are in will be safe and therefore, there is no need for them to worry.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Loans Offered to Private-hire Drivers by Transport Start-up without Moneylender Licence","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"OA","content":"The following question stood in the name of Miss Cheng Li Hui \t—
5 To ask the Minister for Law (a) whether a transport start-up without a moneylender licence is allowed to offer loans to their pool of drivers at a high admin fee; (b) how can the drivers be assured that they will not be locked-in unfairly to the transport start-ups after obtaining the loans; and (c) whether there will be Government regulation on start-ups offering similar services operating within the grey area of the law.
\tMr Lim Biow Chuan (Mountbatten): Question No 5, Sir.
\tThe Senior Minister of State for Law (Mr Edwin Tong Chun Fai) (for the Minister for Law): Under the Moneylenders Act, all entities, including start-ups, can only carry on the business of moneylending if they are authorised to do so by licence, or if they have been granted an exemption, or are excluded moneylenders.
Start-ups that run schemes or programmes that constitute moneylending are subject to moneylending regulations. We understand that the Member in this Parliamentary Question (PQ) may be referring to Grab's Upfront Cash Programme, or the UCP, which offered cash advances to selected drivers and delivery partners. We understand, too, that Grab has discontinued granting new cash advances under the UCP.
Mr Speaker: Assoc Prof Walter Theseira.
\tAssoc Prof Walter Theseira (Nominated Member): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I thank the Senior Minister of State for that reply. I wonder if the Ministry would consider reviewing regulations covering consumer lending from non-financial institutions in general. Because this also covers hire purchase from electronic stores. This is just to balance the needs of borrowers and businesses because there are many sources of credit other than moneylenders and the banks. Those are tightly regulated but these other sources are not. All of these sources ultimately often target the same group of vulnerable borrowers.
\tMr Edwin Tong Chun Fai: Mr Speaker, Sir, as the Member knows, the substance of each transaction will have to be looked at to determine the exact nature of the transaction, whether it is moneylending, whether requires licensing, or whether you can get an exemption. And the substance requires one to look at the specifics of the transaction – what are the terms, what is the context in which the transaction has taken place – to assess if the activity constitutes moneylending, in which case then licensing would follow.
Where they fall outside the scope of the Moneylenders Act, nonetheless, in such transactions, very often you would find also other pieces of legislation applying to regulate the relationship between the two parties or three parties; and that includes a Sale of Goods Act as well as the Consumer Protection Fair Trading Act. But to the extent that there remain gaps in the manner which the Member has identified, then, certainly, my Ministry will work with the agencies to identify those gaps and to look at what the necessary regulations, if at all, might be useful to deal with those gaps.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Complaints to Traffic Police about Noisy Vehicles in Last Three Years","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"OA","content":"6 Er Dr Lee Bee Wah asked the Minister for Home Affairs (a) in the last three years, how many complaints has the Traffic Police received about noisy vehicles; (b) how many of these pertain to Nee Soon South; (c) whether there are adequate speed cameras installed in the areas; and (d) whether the Traffic Police will step up enforcement along Yishun Avenue 1 and Yishun Street 51 especially on Friday and Saturday nights.
\tThe Senior Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Home Affairs (Ms Sun Xueling) (for the Minister for Home Affairs): From 2017 to 2019, the Traffic Police (TP) received 147 pieces of feedback on noise generated by speeding vehicles. Of these, 11 pertained to Nee Soon South.
In response to feedback on speeding in Nee Soon South, including along Yishun Avenue 1 and Yishun Street 51, TP have stepped up its enforcement operations. Also, there are now three speed cameras in the area; the latest was installed in March 2019 towards Yishun Avenue 8. The TP will continue to monitor the situation in Nee Soon South, and further adjust their operations as needed.
\tMr Speaker: Er Dr Lee Bee Wah.
\tEr Dr Lee Bee Wah (Nee Soon): Thank you, Sir. I have three supplementary questions. It seems like the Senior Parliamentary Secretary only mentioned CCTV or speed camera. I would like to ask these three supplementary questions. A Swedish report published in 2009 found people who were regularly exposed to traffic noise in excess of 50 decibels, were 40% more likely to suffer a heart attack than those who live in quieter neighbourhoods. So, my question: is there a cap on the upper limit of decibel or noise emitted by vehicles in Singapore?
The second question is there are many other technologies used in other countries. For example, the United Kingdom uses automatic number plate recognition technique to dish out fines to drivers over excessive noise. Calgary, a Canadian city, is using sound camera and fine motorists with excessively loud vehicles. And similarly, Abu Dhabi police has invented noise-measuring cameras, which will help officers take action against abnormally loud cars and also intelligent speed bumps flattened when you are driving slowly.
So, is Singapore exploring some of these new technologies instead of just depending on speed cameras? They may not speed, but then it is very noisy and wake the residents up.
And the last question is, will there be any action taken against workshops who illegally modify or do the modification to the motorcycles or the cars?
\tMs Sun Xueling: I thank the Member for her questions. Noise pollution from roads could be due to a number of factors including speeding and illegal modification of vehicle exhaust systems, which can generate excessive noise. So, motor vehicles that ply Singapore's roads are required to comply with the noise emission limits stipulated under the Environmental Protection and Management regulations. New vehicles must meet the set noise admission standards before they can be registered for use in Singapore. In-use vehicles are also required to comply with the stipulated in-use noise emission standards during the mandatory periodic inspection and vehicles that do not meet the in-use noise standards will not have their road tax renewed and cannot be used on the roads.
So, I have talked about speeding as well as the illegal modification of vehicle exhaust systems. The Traffic Police and LTA work together to address these issues. When there is feedback received, TP and LTA can conduct enforcement operations together. TP will look out for speeding offences and when they come into contact with vehicles that may have illegally modified their exhaust systems which lead to excessive noise, they refer these to LTA who then conducts the checks as to whether or not there was illegal modification done.
On the Member's point about the new technologies, I will have to find out more from her. If the Member does not mind and surface those reports to me, and I will have my TP and LTA colleagues take a closer look at them.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Industries that Find It Difficult to Hire PMET Singaporeans","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"OA","content":"7 Mr Pritam Singh asked the Minister for Manpower (a) which industries find it difficult to attract or hire PMET Singaporeans; (b) what has been the success of initiatives of Singaporeans and local employers to address or improve the status quo in these industries; and (c) for PMET jobs held by foreigners and PRs arising from the lack of qualified Singaporeans to fill these positions, how does the Government monitor and track the skills transfer to, and the skills acquisition by, Singaporeans from PRs and foreigners over time.
\tThe Minister for Manpower (Mrs Josephine Teo): Mr Speaker, based on MOM's survey, sectors with higher proportions of PMET vacancies that employers indicated were hard-to-fill by locals include information and communications, built environment, including construction, professional services and manufacturing.
Under the Growth Sectors Initiative that we started in 2017, MOM works closely with sector agencies to place locals into PMET jobs in sectors with good growth potential. A key thrust under this initiative is to reskill locals through our Professional Conversion Programmes (PCP) to take up good job opportunities. The Growth Sectors Initiative covers the four sectors which I mentioned earlier, as well as finance and insurance services, wholesale trade and healthcare. Locals comprise around 75% of employed PMETs in these growth sectors.
Mr Singh asked about the success of our efforts. Over the past three years, the Adapt and Grow initiative has helped more than 48,000 local jobseekers get placed in PMET roles. As a result of more focused efforts under the Growth Sectors Initiative, Workforce Singapore and sector agencies have placed over 10,000 mid-career locals into PMET jobs in the growth sectors. We have helped locals take up a wide range of jobs, including data analysts, digital advertising professionals and technical sales engineers. Over nine in 10 PCP participants remained in employment two years after placement. Around seven in 10 PCP participants earned higher salaries than before.
PCP participants, such as Effandi Sajari, often have inspiring stories. Effandi spent close to two decades in the energy and power sector, managing projects that involved installing low voltage power network equipment across the island. In his 40s, he wanted a change in environment and to challenge himself. Last year, through the PCP for Electronics Assistant Engineer, he joined GlobalFoundries as a Senior Associate Engineer. He manages clean-room equipment to ensure optimal levels of humidity, temperature and pressure for wafer fabrication. He now earns about 10% more than at his previous job. Every day, we continue to help jobseekers like Effandi secure good jobs.
On the Member's last question, the employment outcomes of our University and Polytechnic graduates are a good indicator of whether we are helping Singaporeans acquire skills for PMET jobs in demand. Based on the latest Graduate Employment Survey, around nine in 10 University and Polytechnic graduates who entered the labour force were employed within six months after graduation or completion of their full-time National Service. This figure has remained stable over the past decade.
Mature workers who have been in the workforce for some time have also made good progress. This is evident when we compare the education and employment profile of local workers aged 40 and over. About one in four of them joined the workforce with a local diploma or degree and could have been expected to perform PMET jobs. But, in fact, about double, or one in two of these workers, are today holding PMET jobs. This is itself quite remarkable.
Overall, the number and the share of employed locals in PMET employment have risen steadily over the years. The number of local PMETs grew from about 960,000 in 2009 to 1.3 million in 2019, while the PMET share of employed locals increased steadily from 51.4% to 58.3% over the same period. If we look at Singapore citizens only, the trend is very similar.
These employment outcomes were not easily achieved. To sustain them, we must be able to continue the momentum of good job creation, motivate individuals to upskill or reskill, promote employer commitment to fair hiring and progression, and sustain Government investments in education and training.
To help Singaporeans, we must make every effort to keep up these efforts instead of focusing narrowly on displacing PRs and foreigners in our workforce. That would be a zero-sum game which will cause companies to rethink locating their high value activities in Singapore. The end result will not serve Singapore and Singaporeans' best interests.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Medical Insurance for Gig Economy Workers","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"OA","content":"8 Ms Foo Mee Har asked the Minister for Manpower what plans are in place to help gig economy workers access group medical insurance as well as save for retirement and home ownership.
\tThe Minister for Manpower (Mrs Josephine Teo): Mr Speaker, over the past decade, the share of persons who were engaged in self-employment as their main source of income has remained stable at 8% to 10% of our resident workforce.
In 2017, the Government set up a Tripartite Workgroup on self-employed persons (SEPs). Since March 2018, we have been implementing the Workgroup's recommendations to address SEPs' challenges.
Today, all SEPs are already covered under MediShield Life against large hospital bills. SEPs' concerns were more about their loss of income when they fall sick for prolonged periods. To mitigate this, we worked with insurers to make available Prolonged Medical Leave (PML) insurance products. Today, major intermediaries, like Grab and Gojek, provide PML insurance coverage at no additional cost to their regular drivers. The National Instructors and Coaches Association also offers discounted PML insurance for their members. We encourage more service-buyers and associations to support their SEPs with such insurance coverage.
In addition, Government agencies have taken the lead to implement the \"Contribute-as-you-Earn\" (CAYE) pilot, where SEPs contribute to their MediSave accounts as they receive payment for their services. Like regular employees, SEPs can save for home ownership and retirement through the CPF system. They can do so by making voluntary CPF contributions and benefit from the higher-than-market interest rates.
Lower income SEPs receive additional support through the Workfare Income Supplement (WIS) scheme. WIS encourages lower income workers to stay employed and strengthen their retirement adequacy. Each year, more than 40,000 SEPs receive WIS. We have recently enhanced WIS for SEPs by increasing the qualifying income ceiling from $2,000 to $2,300, and the maximum annual payouts from $2,400 to $2,667.
\tMr Speaker: Assoc Prof Walter Theseira.
\tAssoc Prof Walter Theseira (Nominated Member): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I thank the Minister for the explanation of how the Government is trying to help SEPs with their medical needs. I wonder if the Ministry will consider studying a Government-led mandatory medical benefit system for the self-employed that will cover things like paid medical leave as well as co-payments for outpatient care. That is because it might be more efficient than relying on private provision of these systems because there are issues with adverse selection and also gaps in coverage outside the sectors that the Ministry has worked on.
\tMrs Josephine Teo: Mr Speaker, there are really three parts to this. The first is that, if you look at our MediShield Life system, it already covers everyone, including the SEPs. So, there is one layer of protection that an SEP will already have.
The second is that, we are very mindful that in some instances, what is considered a self-employment arrangement may, in fact, be a mis-classification. Then, in those instances, the right thing to do is to rectify or regularise that arrangement so that the employer rightly provides for the individual in terms of medical benefits.
The third is really people whose nature of work involves them contracting with multiple service buyers. Under those circumstances, if we were to say that each one of those service buyers would be responsible for some part of the medical provision, I think there are complications in terms of implementation. I accept the fact that, indeed, on a system basis, it may be more efficient to get the individual covered but that is really the whole purpose MediShield Life to begin with.
\tMr Speaker: Ms Foo Mee Har.
\tMs Foo Mee Har (West Coast): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I thank the Minister for quite a number of measures that seem to be in place. I think the most fundamental worry that we all have with SEPs is their savings for retirement and, to a large extent, also towards housing. So, would the Minister consider launching a matched retirement savings scheme, a scheme where perhaps the Government can contribute when they put some money in to save towards housing needs and also their retirement?
\tMrs Josephine Teo: The short answer is, yes. All good things will be considered.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Percentage of Grassroots Advisors who are Members of Political Party ","subTitle":"Risk that disbursement of public funds may be considered political in nature","sectionType":"OA","content":"9 Ms Anthea Ong asked the Minister for Culture, Community and Youth (a) what percentage of Grassroots Advisors (GRAs) appointed by the PA are members of a political party; (b) since GRAs are empowered to appoint members of the Citizens' Consultative Committees (CCC) and the Community Development and Welfare Fund (CDWF) Committees, whether there are risks that the disbursement of these public funds may be considered political in nature; (c) what are the measures to ensure that GRAs who are political party members are not associated in the distribution of these funds; (d) whether civil servants will be allowed to administer these funds; and (e) what are the policies to ensure that all elected MPs can tap on these funds to serve their residents.
\tThe Minister for Trade and Industry (Mr Chan Chun Sing) (for the Minister for Culture, Community and Youth): Mr Speaker, Sir, the People's Association (PA) is a Statutory Board under MCCY. Its role is to promote social cohesion, and to act as a bridge between the Government and the people. The PA appoints grassroots advisors (GRAs) to guide its grassroots organisations (GROs) in communicating and implementing the policies and programmes of the government of the day. These include difficult and unpopular policies which are necessary for the good of Singapore, such as CPF cuts during the 1986 recession, the increase in retirement age and the Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act (POFMA).
Hence, in appointing grassroots advisors (GRAs), the PA's principal consideration is that the advisor shares the Government's objectives and convictions and can be relied upon to carry out his role faithfully. Membership of a political party is neither a qualification nor a disqualification for the purpose of being appointed a grassroots advisor (GRA).
I would like to clarify that it is the PA and not the grassroots advisors (GRAs), that appoints all of its grassroots leaders, including volunteers who serve on the Citizens' Consultative Committees (CCC). Among other things, the CCCs help to administer Government and local schemes such as the Community Development and Welfare Fund (CDWF).
The CDWF supports community bonding programmes and welfare assistance for needy residents. The CDWF Committee manages and oversees the disbursement of funds, according to established criteria. In addition to receiving some funding from PA, the CDWF Committee also raises funds to supplement ground efforts.
Ms Anthea Ong appears concerned whether the disbursement of CDWF may be politicised and perhaps whether any resident might be denied access to welfare assistance under the CDWF. I would like to assure Ms Ong and this House that no resident who meets the qualifying criteria will be denied welfare assistance, regardless of the constituency that they may be residing in.
In addition to the CDWF, there are also other Government assistance schemes to help Singaporeans, such as the CCC ComCare Fund and various localised assistance schemes. Anyone who needs help and meets the eligibility criteria may apply for assistance. Members of this House can also apply for assistance on behalf of their eligible constituents.
\tMr Speaker: Ms Ong.
\tMs Anthea Ong (Nominated Member): Thank you, Speaker. I thank the Minister for the response. Could I ask if the Ministry or PA would consider having this fund, the Community Development and Welfare Fund (CDWF), be managed by relevant Ministries like MCCY and MSF, so that these Government funds are neutral in nature? And also, this adds to the advantage of having these funds be better managed and coordinated in terms of support and assistance rendered to the citizens especially the low-income ones.
\t
\tMr Chan Chun Sing: Mr Speaker, Sir, I do not really understand Ms Anthea Ong's question. If I may check with the Member, all our schemes are administered by MSF, MOH. For all the respective schemes, they work with the grassroots organisations to reach out to the residents. The Member's question is?
\tMs Anthea Ong: So, my question is, are we looking at this fund being disbursed and managed by civil servants instead of grassroots advisors, or the same way as how MSF manages ComCare and so forth.
\tMr Chan Chun Sing: Mr Speaker, let me take some time to explain to Ms Ong how the system works. When residents need help, they are generally referred to the respective agencies, for example, the SSOs, the Social Service organisations or the SGO, AIC in the past. These are Government agencies. The role that the grassroots volunteers play is to help bridge this, linking up the residents with the respective agencies. So, the Government agencies already do what exactly the Member described.
In addition, the grassroots organisations sometimes help to raise funds for their localised programmes. Sometimes, they do it themselves; sometimes, they work with other VWOs; sometimes, they work with the Government agencies. These are the networks of help on the ground. What the Member is describing is actually already happening on the ground.
Mr Speaker: Assoc Prof Walter Theseira.
\tAssoc Prof Walter Theseira (Nominated Member): Thank you, Mr Speaker. I thank the Minister for the reply. I do understand, of course, the policy is the Government does not believe Opposition Members can support Government policies. That is one of the reasons for the current situation. But would the Government consider allowing elected Opposition Members to advise on the use of some of these community welfare funds with the proviso, of course, it must be clearly communicated that these funds are from the Government; they are not from a political party. The Opposition Members, of course, can decide whether they are willing to work under those restrictions or not.
\tMr Chan Chun Sing: Mr Speaker, Sir, all the schemes to help the residents are public schemes. They are made available to all residents who qualify. So, I do not think there is any politicisation of the application of help. The Member is right. As I have mentioned in my reply, the People's Association (PA) selects, appoints, the grassroots leaders because we need them to execute and explain policies, often, difficult ones. And that is why they must share the same objectives and the conviction as the government of the day.
The PA is a Statutory Board. It serves the government of the day, just like any other Statutory Boards from SportSG to other equivalent organisations. I think it is best that Government functions continue to work in a way which allows us to serve all residents regardless of which constituency they stay in.
Mr Speaker: Ms Anthea Ong.
\tMs Anthea Ong: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Could I ask the Minister on my last question? What are the policies or guidelines that are already in place to ensure that all elected Members, including Opposition Members, can tap on these funds to serve their residents?
\tMr Chan Chun Sing: Mr Speaker, Sir, there is no difference in the guidelines between any elected Member of Parliament, referring the help to the respective agencies for their respective residents. There is no difference. No matter where you live in Singapore, if the resident is eligible for help according to the national guidelines, everyone is helped equally. It can be referred to by their respective Members of Parliament; it can be referred to by the VWOs; it can be referred to by the grassroots advisors. Everyone. All of us can play a part to refer needy residents to the agencies for help. And I do not think there is any discrimination based on that. The qualifying criteria are the same.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Individuals and Organisations Prosecuted for Illegal Shipment of Elephant Ivory and Pangolin Scales in 2019","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"OA","content":"10 Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang asked the Minister for National Development (a) how many individuals and how many organisations have been prosecuted in relation to the shipments of elephant ivory and pangolin scales seized at our border checkpoints in 2019; and (b) if there are none, whether an update on the investigations can be provided.
\tThe Senior Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for National Development (Ms Sun Xueling) (for the Minister for National Development): In 2019, three shipments of pangolin scales, two of which also contained elephant ivory, were seized in Singapore en route from Africa to Vietnam. As the cases involve entities outside of Singapore, NParks has been working closely with the source and destination countries, as well as sharing information with international organisations such as the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), as well as INTERPOL.
China was established to be the intended final destination country for these shipments. Our collaboration with China in relation to these cases has led to the arrests of 14 suspected criminals by Chinese authorities. NParks will continue to assist with international investigations into these cases.
\tMr Louis Ng Kok Kwang (Nee Soon): Mr Speaker, two clarifications. One, whether NParks is also following the money; so, not just follow where the products are coming from or going to, but really follow the money trail. Only then, we can get to the kingpins rather than always catching the runners involved in the wildlife smuggling network. The second clarification is whether we can follow the British and work with our banks and financial institutions so that we can track these suspicious transactions that are linked to the wildlife smuggling network and halt the transactions in the first place. I think only then can we effectively address and wipe out this trade.
\tMs Sun Xueling: I thank the Member for his questions. As I had mentioned, NParks is helping with the international investigations into these cases. As and when they pick up any clues – the Member mentioned money trails – if they come across any evidence that would help the Chinese authorities, in this case, get better inputs into who the criminals behind this are, they will surface it to the Chinese authorities. So, yes, there is collaboration and when we come across evidence, we will surface to the relevant international authority that is looking into it.
\tMr Louis Ng Kok Kwang: What about the second part of the question, so that we can be more pre-emptive? We can get our banks and financial institutions to track all these suspicious transactions. Somebody paid for the shipments to be sent through Singapore. Can we audit and go to the money trail and find out who actually has been paying? And then, finally, we can get the kingpin. Otherwise, we are always arresting the runners who are already the low-level criminals. Let us go high up the food chain.
\tMs Sun Xueling: I thank the Member for his question. If there are monies that are related, be it money laundering or trafficking, this indeed would be surfaced by our financial institutions to aid investigations.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Help for HDB Owners in Financial Hardship Who Are Unable to Sell Flats Due to Ethnic Integration Policy","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"OA","content":"11 Mr Lim Biow Chuan asked the Minister for National Development whether the Government will consider some form of financial aid to HDB owners who are unable to sell their flat due to the ethnic racial quota but need to sell their flat due to financial hardship.
\tThe Second Minister for National Development (Mr Desmond Lee) (for the Minister for National Development): Mr Speaker, HDB's experience is that most owners are able to sell their flats in the open market from eligible ethic groups, but some may need more time to do so. Hence, for those who face difficulties, HDB will, in the first instance, grant them an extension of time to market and sell their flat. Beyond that, if they face any financial issues, HDB will also look into reducing or deferring the monthly mortgage instalments temporarily to ease their cash flow. For those with exceptional circumstances, HDB will consider exercising flexibility in administering the Ethnic Integration Policy (EIP).
More generally, households in financial hardship can avail themselves to the broader suite of Government assistance schemes and community schemes, and consider other measures to put their finances on a more stable footing. So, HDB will refer them to the Social Service Office for financial counselling and for other means of financial support.
\tMr Pritam Singh (Aljunied): I thank the Minister. Just a quick clarification. Beyond just an extension of time to sell the flat for the affected minority – it does not matter what race that individual or that household is classify under – has it been the Ministry's experience that these households have had to reduce the selling price of their unit vis a vis the valuation of their neighbouring units so as to secure a buyer, given the extension of time that the Ministry allows?
\tMr Desmond Lee: Some of the sellers may have themselves bought the flat off the market and the flat would perhaps at that point in time, have already been impacted by the Ethnic Integration Policy. As for whether every flat is sold lower relative to the neighbours, that depends again on the attributes of the flat, the location, the height, the facing and its linkages to other amenities.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Government’s Response to Recommendations from Institute of Policy Studies Report on Stay-at-home Fathers","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"OA","content":"12 Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang asked the Prime Minister whether the Ministry will consider implementing recommendations from the \"Stay-at-home Fathers\" study conducted by an Institute of Policy Studies researcher, especially the recommendation that exclusive, non-transferable paternity leave should be increased.
\tThe Minister for Manpower (Mrs Josephine Teo) (for the Prime Minister): Mr Speaker, fathers play an important role in their children's development. International studies have shown that when fathers are more involved, their children have better physical, cognitive and emotional developmental outcomes. Greater paternal involvement in the home also helps mothers to stay active in the workforce. Local research has shown that Singaporean fathers are playing a more active role in care-giving and family responsibilities. This is encouraging.
We have progressively increased parental leave for fathers over the years to better support working parents and help fathers to play an active role in caring for their children.
In 2017, we increased paternity leave and shared parental leave to two and four weeks respectively. This took into account feedback from some parents that shared parental leave was helpful in allowing fathers and mothers to decide flexibly how best to care for their child, based on their own family circumstances. Today, fathers can tap on eight weeks of leave in their child's first year, almost double the amount compared to five years ago.
We are glad to see that more fathers are using their paternity leave, with take-up rates increasing from 25% in 2013 to 53% for recent cohorts. Our priority should therefore be to encourage and enable more fathers to take their paternity leave before considering further enhancements. We are also mindful of the need to carefully balance the needs of parents with the concerns of employers over the needs at the workplace.
The Government will continue to identify ways to better support parents in managing their work and family responsibilities, such as by promoting the adoption of flexible work arrangements, and working with employers and community partners to strengthen attitudes and norms in support of fatherhood.
The study by the Institute of Policy Studies recognised that fathers' roles are also shaped by societal norms. MSF partners non-profit organisations such as the Centre for Fathering to promote the \"Dads for Life\" and \"Mums for Life\" movements in schools, workplaces and the wider community. These movements go a long way in driving mindset shifts among employers, colleagues, friends and families, to give greater recognition and support to the important roles fathers and mothers play in the lives of their children. The Government will continue to work with business and community partners to promote greater paternal involvement.
\tMr Louis Ng Kok Kwang (Nee Soon): Can I just get the Ministry's response to the IPS study, which said that our policies actually continue to signal that childcare is a woman's responsibility and that they reinforce this gender stereotype. Two, whether we are going to review the Shared Parental Leave policy as well, which was one of the IPS recommendations? Third, the IPS was a very small scale study. I am wondering whether PMO or MSF can do a larger scale study to really look into this issue?
\tMrs Josephine Teo: Thank you, Mr Speaker. I think the IPS researchers have done a serious piece of work. They are entitled to putting forward a point of view. We do not necessarily agree or disagree with them. But we can look specifically at their proposals and in that regard, the policies are never static. They are continuously being reviewed and continuously being enhanced where there are opportunities to do so. But at different junctures, we would have to look at what is of greater priority. And for these, the Government itself conducts surveys; the Government itself engages with different groups.
What the groups have told us very clearly is that in addition to all the things that we are doing on parental leave, it is also important to address workplace norms, and actually, more importantly, we have to make alternatives available to the families. The alternative that is available in today's context of nuclear families, smaller families and also because grandparents are working, is, \"Please do more with regard to pre-school\". And that is what we have put a lot of emphasis on.
As to what could change in the future, can we perhaps even strengthen it more, I think that would be a relevant question for further review.
Mr Speaker: Order. End of Question Time.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Public Utilities (Amendment) Bill","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"BI","content":"[(proc text) \"to amend the Public Utilities Act (Chapter 261 of the 2002 Revised Edition)\", (proc text)]
[(proc text) presented by the Minister for the Environment and Water Resources (Mr Masagos Zulkifli B M M) read the First time; to be read a Second time after the conclusion of the proceedings on the Estimates of Expenditure for FY2020/21, and to be printed. (proc text)]
Mr Speaker: Order. I propose to take a break now. I suspend the Sitting and will take the Chair at 3.00 pm. Order, order.
Sitting accordingly suspended
at 2.31 pm until 3.00 pm.
Sitting resumed at 3.00 pm
[Mr Speaker in the Chair]
The Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance (Mr Heng Swee Keat):\tMr Speaker, Sir, before I move the Motion, allow me to share the journey of what you are about to hear.
For the last four Budget speeches, I have used two files and taken up slightly over two hours. Colleagues had been very patient, thank you.
This time, the major changes that we have to respond to – economic slowdown, climate change and growing uncertainties – added many pages. Then, the global climate across the world – psychological, economic – was hit by the sudden storm of a virus outbreak. So, over the past few weeks, my colleagues in Cabinet, in MOF, have been managing various fronts.
To support our national efforts, the Budget file grew and grew. So, today, I have three files instead of two. So, please be patient.
Mr Speaker, Sir. I beg to move, \"That Parliament approves the financial policy of the Government for the Financial Year 1 April 2020 to 31 March 2021.\"
This year, we usher in a new decade – one marked by tectonic shifts in our operating environment and major uncertainties.
Singapore's economy grew by a modest 0.7% in 2019. This is the weakest growth since the 2008 Financial Crisis.
Just as the global economy was beginning to recover, the Coronavirus Disease 2019, or COVID-19, outbreak hit us.
The outbreak will certainly impact our economy. The tourism and aviation industries are most directly affected. Visitor arrivals to Singapore and air traffic through Changi have declined, and with it, hotel occupancy rates. The virus outbreak has also disrupted supply chains and created ripple effects on other sectors, especially now that our economy is so much more integrated with China's.
MTI has downgraded the GDP forecast from between 0.5% and 2.5%, to between -0.5% and 1.5%. However, the duration and severity of this outbreak and the impact on the global economy are still unclear. While MTI's baseline is for GDP growth to come in at 0.5% for the full year, we must be prepared that the economic impact may be worse than we projected.
Our immediate concern is to protect you and your families. We will put in every effort to slow down the spread of the virus.
Our frontline agencies have been fighting and containing the outbreak. I will set aside an additional $800 million in this Budget to support these efforts. The bulk of this will go to MOH. This is on top of the substantial resources already committed each year to public health.
Let me, on behalf of the Government, express our gratitude to all our frontline officers who have been working tirelessly, day and night, over weekends, in our fight against the outbreak. [Applause.] You have exemplified the resilience and indomitable spirit of our people. But please take care of yourselves.
I am confident that together, we will stay strong and get through these trying times.
With these uncertainties, I know Singaporeans are understandably very concerned about the impact on our businesses and jobs.
I will introduce two special packages, with a total budget of $5.6 billion.
The first is the Stabilisation and Support Package. This will stabilise the economy and support our workers and enterprises, by helping workers to stay in their jobs and enterprises with cash flow. I will give additional help to sectors more directly affected by the outbreak.
Households will be impacted by the slowdown too. In every Budget, we always provide support to families. But in view of the current situation, we will have a special Care and Support Package, to provide additional, timely help to more households with cost of living. The less well-off will get more help.
First, let me elaborate on how we will help our workers and enterprises to weather the near-term economic uncertainties.
Our foremost concern is jobs. We want to help our workers retain their jobs, and use any lull period to upgrade their skills, and be ready when the upturn comes. As NTUC Secretary-General Ng Chee Meng and his union leaders said, \"Every worker matters\".
I will therefore provide a Stabilisation and Support Package, amounting to $4 billion.
To help our workers stay employed, I will support enterprises by defraying their wage cost, through two schemes.
I will introduce a Jobs Support Scheme to help enterprises retain their local workers. For every local worker in employment, I will offset 8% of the wages, up to a monthly wage cap of $3,600, for three months. This payment will be given to employers by the end of July this year. With over 1.9 million local employees in Singapore, this will cost the Government $1.3 billion and benefit all enterprises and their local employees.
For enterprises that have invested in raising productivity, I urge them to continue to upgrade and to share the gains with their workers. Hence, I will enhance the Wage Credit Scheme to support wage increases for Singaporean employees.
Currently, the Wage Credit Scheme co-funds wage increases for Singaporean employees earning a gross monthly wage of up to $4,000. I will raise the monthly wage ceiling from $4,000 to $5,000, for qualifying wage increases given in 2019 and 2020, so that more Singaporean employees will benefit.
I will also raise the Government co‑funding levels for 2019 and 2020 qualifying wage increases by five-percentage points, to 20% and 15% respectively.
With these enhancements, another $1.1 billion will go to about 90,000 enterprises, to benefit more than 700,000 Singaporean employees.
The Stabilisation and Support Package will also provide economy-wide support to help enterprises with cash flow.
First, I will grant a Corporate Income Tax Rebate for Year of Assessment 2020, at a rate of 25% of tax payable, capped at $15,000 per company. This rebate will benefit all tax-paying companies, and cost about $400 million.
I will also enhance several tax treatments under the corporate tax system for one year. For instance, I will allow enterprises a faster write-down of their investments in plant and machinery, and renovation and refurbishment, incurred for Year of Assessment 2021. This will put more cash in the hands of our enterprises.
For example, hotels can now take advantage of this lull period to carry out upgrading work, and be better prepared for the upturn.
To help enterprises access working capital more easily, I will also enhance the Enterprise Financing Scheme's Working Capital Loan component for one year. I will raise the maximum loan quantum from $300,000 to $600,000, and increase our risk-share on these loans to 80%, from the current 50% to 70%. With the large part of the risks taken up by the Government, I trust that our financial institutions will do their part to support viable SMEs.
We will also support tenants and lessees of Government-managed properties, including those under JTC, HDB, SLA, STB, and SDC. They can approach our agencies to discuss options for more flexible rental payments such as instalment plans. Each request will be assessed individually, taking into account the enterprise’s circumstances.
Sectors directly affected by COVID-19 will get additional support. These five sectors are: tourism, aviation, retail, food services and point-to-point transport services.
To help employers in these sectors retain and reskill workers, we will enhance support under the Adapt and Grow initiative for this year, specifically through redeployment programmes in the tourism, aviation, retail and food services sectors. For these sectors, we will extend the funding period for reskilling from three months to a maximum of six months.
Together with the Jobs Support Scheme, we will support employers in these sectors to retain and train more than 330,000 local workers. These workers can make full use of the down time for training and upskilling, to prepare for the recovery.
We will also help affected sectors with their operating costs and cash flow. For the tourism sector:
I will grant a Property Tax Rebate of 30% for the year 2020, for the accommodation and function room components of licensed hotels and serviced apartments, and prescribed Meetings, Incentives, Conventions and Exhibitions (MICE) venues. International cruise and regional ferry terminals will receive a 15% Property Tax Rebate and the Integrated Resorts will receive a 10% Property Tax Rebate.
For enterprises in the tourism sector, we will be working with Participating Financial Institutions to introduce a Temporary Bridging Loan Programme for a year, with a loan quantum of up to $1 million and interest rate capped at 5%. The Government will take on 80% of the risk of the loan. This will provide more cash flow on top of the enhanced working capital loan I announced earlier.
For the aviation sector, we will implement a suite of measures, comprising rebates on aircraft landing and parking charges, assistance to ground handling agents, and rental rebates for shops and cargo agents at Changi Airport.
I will also grant a 15% Property Tax Rebate for Changi Airport.
To support commercial establishments in the food services and retail business, the Government will take the lead. NEA will provide a full month of rental waiver to stallholders in NEA-managed hawker centres and markets. Other Government agencies, like HDB, will provide half a month of rental waiver to its commercial tenants.
To support establishments that operate in private property, I will also grant a 15% Property Tax Rebate for qualifying commercial properties. I strongly urge landlords to pass this on to their tenants by reducing rentals.
MOT has announced a Point-to-Point Support Package. I am heartened to know that many taxi and private hire car operators have come out strongly to support the initiative by matching the Government’s contribution. This spirit of partnership is what we need to weather this challenging period together.
Details of the Stabilisation and Support Package are in the Annex. [Please refer to Annex A-1.] The Ministers-in-charge of the various measures will share further details in due course.
We will continue to monitor the situation closely. If needed, we can and are prepared to do more.
I will speak about the Care and Support Package for households later in my speech.
The COVID-19 outbreak is a stark reminder of the continued importance of maintaining a sound fiscal footing to deal with surprises and unexpected scenarios. In particular, we are able to mount a decisive response to support Singaporeans and workers through uncertain times only because of good long-term planning.
I announced in 2018 that we plan to raise the GST by two percentage points, to 9%, sometime from 2021 to 2025. This is to raise recurrent revenues to meet our recurrent spending, particularly for healthcare.
After reviewing our revenue and expenditure projections and considering the current state of the economy, I have decided that the GST rate increase will not take effect in 2021. In other words, the GST rate will remain at 7% in 2021.
However, we will not be able to put off the increase indefinitely. In fact, this outbreak has reinforced the importance of continued investment in our healthcare system, including the capability to deal with outbreaks. And we will still require recurrent sources of revenue to fund our recurrent spending needs in the medium term.
Thus, the GST increase will still be needed by 2025. We will assess carefully the appropriate time for the increase. But rest assured we will provide Singaporeans sufficient lead time.
I want to assure everyone that when we raise the GST rate, we will ensure that our taxes and transfers system remains progressive.
We will continue to absorb GST on publicly-subsidised healthcare and education. And just as we have done in the past, we will provide an Assurance Package when the GST rate is raised. This will be a $6 billion package for Singaporeans, to cushion the increase as we transition to the higher GST rate.
GST is paid by all in Singapore, including foreigners working and visiting here. But the Assurance Package will benefit Singaporeans.
The majority of Singaporean households will receive offsets to cover at least five years’ worth of additional GST expenses incurred. So, the majority of Singaporean households will receive offsets to cover at least five years' worth of additional GST expenses incurred.
Lower income households will receive much more. Those living in 1- to 3‑room HDB flats will receive offsets equivalent to about 10 years’ worth of additional GST expenses incurred.
Under the Assurance Package for GST, every adult Singaporean will receive a cash payout of $700 to $1,600 over five years.
To illustrate, a family of four with a combined income of $6,000 living in a 4‑room HDB flat can receive about $7,000 in offsets over five years in total. This includes cash of about $4,000.
Over and above the transitional support, we already have the permanent GST Voucher or GSTV scheme. It defrays GST for lower- to middle-income Singaporeans. When the GST is raised, I will enhance the permanent GST Voucher scheme. I will maintain the Government’s public commitment to (a) fully offset the GST for the lower half of retiree households; (b) significantly offset the GST for the upper half of retiree households; and (c) offset about half of the GST for lower income households with no elderly persons.
This is the Government’s way of ensuring our system of taxes and transfers remains progressive and supports Singaporeans through the change, while enabling us to fund our future needs in a sustainable way.
To meet this commitment, I will set aside $6 billion for the Assurance Package in the GSTV Fund in this year’s Budget.
Even as we navigate our near-term challenges, we must maintain our focus on the longer term, and on Singapore’s future.
I have spoken about the accelerating structural shifts in the world in my previous Budget speeches: first, the decline in support for globalisation; second, the shift in global economic weight towards Asia, which brings new opportunities; third, the rapid advancement of technology, and more recently, the risk of a technologically bifurcated world; and finally, our own transition to an ageing society, which presents challenges and opportunities.
We must understand these shifts and their deep implications as we chart our future together as one Singapore.
After the Second World War, nations experienced several decades of growth and prosperity. Trade barriers fell, and global trade grew rapidly. Technological advances transformed people’s lives beyond recognition.
Prosperity gave governments the resources to establish comprehensive safety nets and welfare programmes. These included unemployment benefits, pensions and healthcare, among others.
But at the same time, globalisation and technology created winners and losers, and widened income inequalities between the skilled and unskilled. There are growing sentiments that globalisation and the multilateral system have failed. As a result, nations are turning inwards. Protectionism and nativism are on the rise.
An ageing population, disruption to jobs and slowing economic growth are adding to fiscal pressures. Yet it is politically untenable to cut back on social benefits.
When governments issue debt to fund social spending, they impose a growing debt burden on the next generation. This is happening at a time when the global economy is experiencing weaker growth and dampened sentiment.
Central banks have lowered interest rates to unprecedented levels. In addition, asset purchases by central banks have resulted in abundant liquidity and raised concerns over the formation of asset bubbles.
In fact, with limited fiscal space and ultra-low or even negative interest rates, governments and central banks are much less able to mount stabilisation measures.
On the strategic front, the friction in the US-China relationship is a major source of tension and uncertainty, affecting global economic growth.
The recent Phase 1 trade deal between them has headed off an immediate escalation. But it will not resolve the underlying strategic competition. This involves political systems, ideologies and values, and goes beyond trade and technology.
On present trends, US-China tensions will recreate geopolitical fault lines and portend a bifurcated global order.
I have sketched out the global structural shifts, economic uncertainties, and strategic tensions. I trust Members will see that we are entering a very challenging time. But we can, and we will pull through.
To deal with these major shifts, we need a capable government, working closely with our people and a good plan.
As a city-state, we are small, but nimble. We are a trusted node for trade and investment between Asia and the world. This is because of our political stability, commitment to rule of law and multilateralism, ease of doing business and strong intellectual property protection regime, among others.
As a multi-cultural society, we have welcomed diversity and embraced openness. Our diversity has made us stronger and more valuable to the world.
Our biggest asset is our exceptional people. We have come together and weathered many past storms, like the Global Financial Crisis, SARS, and now, the on-going COVID-19 outbreak.
Budget 2020 is our strategic financial plan to prepare Singapore and Singaporeans to meet these challenges and seize new opportunities.
This Budget, I will lay out our plans in four areas.
First, to grow our economy, transform our enterprises, to create opportunities for our people.
Second, to care for and nurture Singaporeans at every stage of their lives, to build a caring and inclusive society, where no one is left behind.
Third, to build a liveable and sustainable Singapore in the face of climate change, secure our sovereignty as an independent nation and ensure our fiscal sustainability.
And fourth, to mobilise Singaporeans to work together in this journey, to build a nation and a home we will always call our own.
Let me start with growing our economy and transforming our enterprises.
The structural changes I described earlier bring both opportunities and challenges. Technology and innovation will drive our productivity and our next phase of growth.
Amidst declining support for globalisation, most of Asia remains committed to free trade and economic integration. The Asian economies have strong growth drivers and are projected to account for half of global GDP by 2040.
Singapore is well-positioned to make the most of these structural changes. We recognised these changes early and made an early start on economic transformation. We set up the Future Economy Council, or FEC, in 2017 and we now have 23 Industry Transformation Maps, or ITMs.
Our restructuring is bearing fruit. In the last three years, overall productivity, as measured by real value‑added per actual hour worked, rose by 2.6% per year. This is an improvement over the 2.2% per year growth in the preceding three-year period.
Our enterprises are entering new markets and doing business globally. Singapore Business Federation’s 2019 National Business Survey shows that eight in 10 enterprises have an overseas presence, up from seven in 10 the previous year, despite global uncertainties. Their spirit of enterprise augurs well for the future.
Overall, these efforts at enterprise transformation have translated into good wage growth. Between 2016 and 2019, real median income for Singaporeans grew by 3.7% per year, up from 3.2% per year in the preceding three years.
Two years ago, I set out our vision of Singapore as a Global-Asia node of technology, innovation and enterprise.
Our economy will be one driven by innovation and digitalisation. Singapore will serve as a launch pad for multi-nationals and regional corporates to access Asia, and for Asian enterprises to go global. Our enterprises will compete on value and reach new customers. And these enterprises will be powered by a skilled, adaptable and Asia-ready workforce.
To support this vision, in this Budget, I will introduce a set of measures to drive our Transformation and Growth strategy. There are three key thrusts: first, enabling stronger partnerships; second, deepening enterprise capabilities; and third, developing our people.
Including sums allocated in previous years, I am allocating a total of $8.3 billion over the next three years to enable Transformation and Growth.
Let me begin with the first thrust of our Transformation and Growth effort, which is to enable stronger partnerships: (a) with the world, to expand our economic space, and (b) within Singapore, to build on our work through the FEC and ITMs.
As a small, open economy, we must continue to strengthen partnerships with the world. We have an extensive network of economic linkages, including Free Trade Agreements, International Investment Agreements and Avoidance of Double Taxation Agreements. For example, Minister Indranee signed our latest Avoidance of Double Taxation Agreement with Indonesia earlier this month.
Beyond economic connectivity, we are enhancing our digital connectivity to create new value. Singapore Customs is connecting our Networked Trade Platform with the customs portals of our trading partners. Just last month, we concluded our first Digital Economy Agreement with Chile and New Zealand. It will foster interoperability, and address frontier issues like artificial intelligence governance, to enable more trade.
The digitalisation of finance will also open up new ways of doing business. Between 2015 and 2019, annual investments in FinTech (Financial Technology) have risen six-fold to over $1 billion. Players from different domains and around the region are coming together to bid for the MAS' digital banking licences.
To make the most of our global links, we must strengthen partnerships within Singapore to bring good ideas to global markets.
Under our Research, Innovation and Enterprise 2020 Plan, we are sustaining investment into promising ideas. These include artificial intelligence, industrial robotics, urban solutions and sustainability, and the biomedical sciences, among others.
Through partnerships among the Government, industry and the research community, we are turning these ideas into new businesses with global potential.
For instance, Singapore was one of the first cities to allow autonomous vehicle, or AV, testing on public roads. Many AV players have set up here, testing their technologies with the National University of Singapore (NUS) and Nanyang Technological University (NTU), seeking to win the global race.
In the biomedical industry, the number of start-ups has doubled from 2014. More than 300 biomedical start-ups are now bringing discoveries from bench to bedside and looking to export them to the region.
In fact, our research institutes are part of the global fight against COVID-19, developing diagnostic kits already in use here and sent to China. This is one of the fruits of our long-term investments in research and innovation.
Within each industry, we need to strengthen partnerships to deepen industry-wide capabilities. Even as our enterprises compete to differentiate themselves, they must come together to solve common challenges.
Trade Associations and Chambers, or TACs, play an important role. For example, the Container Depot and Logistics Association (Singapore) is developing an electronic payment system that can help depot operators and transport companies save time and cost. Details are in the Annex. [Please refer to Annex B-4.]
To sustain the good progress, we will enhance our support for TACs to scale up and raise the capabilities of their industries.
Enterprise Singapore will launch a pilot Executive‑in‑Residence programme, to fund more than 10 TACs covering all sectors of the economy, to hire experienced executives and provide expert advice to enterprises in their industries.
Likewise, Merchants’ Associations play a critical role in upgrading heartland enterprises, such as what the Chong Pang City Merchant and Hawker's Association has done.
This year, Enterprise Singapore will launch a new Heartland Enterprise Upgrading Programme to support Merchants' Associations to drive transformation of heartland enterprises. [Please refer to Annex B-1.]
I have covered how we are deepening partnerships. The second thrust of our Transformation and Growth is to deepen capabilities, at every stage of an enterprise's growth. From starting up, to growing, to transforming further.
Our enterprises must be the incubators of innovation, the crucibles for skills upgrading and the creators of good jobs for our people.
Many of our enterprises are deepening their capabilities – by innovating, digitalising, and venturing overseas. These include smaller companies like Yong Leng Trading Company, a local provider of sealing solutions for industrial customers, and PDS International, a developer and distributor of personal protective equipment. By adopting digital platforms, they have accessed new markets, raised revenues and reduced costs.
Larger local companies are also transforming. Goldbell Group, an industrial vehicle leasing company, launched an in-house accelerator, while Moveon, an optics manufacturer, partnered our research institutes to develop enhanced production technologies for micro-optical systems. More details are in the Annex. [Please refer to Annex B-4.]
We will enhance our support to enterprises, at each stage of their growth, to deepen their capabilities in an enterprise-centric way.
Let me begin with start-ups. Our start-up eco-system is vibrant. There are about 3,800 technology start-ups in Singapore and about 150 venture capital funds investing in start-ups here and in the region. Our start-up eco-system is ranked in the top 15 globally in the Global Startup Ecosystem report.
Startup SG helps start-ups get their ideas off the ground. It provides holistic support, including co-investments, mentorship and physical space. Through co-investment schemes like Startup SG Equity, we have catalysed over $560 million in private sector funding over the last four years.
This year, we will improve support for deep-tech start-ups. Deep-tech start-ups are those in emerging technology areas such as pharmbio and medtech, advanced manufacturing and agri-food tech. They have high potential to be competitive and stimulate innovation in their sectors.
But these start-ups need larger investments, longer gestation periods and face higher risks. Investors are hence less prepared to invest in deep-tech start-ups.
To catalyse investment into deep-tech start-ups, I will set aside an additional $300 million under the Startup SG Equity. We expect this to draw in more than $800 million of private funding over the next 10 years. This will give deep-tech start-ups better access to capital, expertise and industry networks. [Please refer to Annex B-1.]
Beyond start-ups, many enterprises, both new and established, are seeking to grow. We have been supporting them, through schemes such as the SMEs Go Digital programme; and the Market Readiness Assistance grant.
This year, we will enhance support for these enterprises through an Enterprise Grow Package. This Package aims to help enterprises identify business needs, adopt pre-approved digital technologies and take the first steps to enter new markets.
First, we will launch the GoBusiness platform, a single touchpoint for enterprises to transact with Government digitally.
Second, we will drive greater adoption of digital technology. We will expand the SMEs Go Digital programme. Across all 23 ITM sectors, we will have Industry Digital Plans or equivalents, and enable enterprises to access pre-approved digital solutions.
Third, to help more enterprises enter new markets, we will enhance the Market Readiness Assistance grant by expanding the funding support and coverage, to include, for example, FTA consultancy. [Please refer to Annex B-1.]
We must continue to support the growth of our enterprises and as they mature, drive deeper transformation.
Today, through the Enterprise Development Grant, or EDG, Enterprise Singapore provides integrated support for enterprises to innovate and internationalise. For enterprises to transform, they need to strengthen their leadership and management capabilities.
This year, we will introduce an Enterprise Transform Package, with a focus on leadership. Enterprise Singapore will launch the Enterprise Leadership for Transformation Programme, to support business leaders of promising small and medium enterprises in achieving the next bound of growth.
Over the next three years, we aim to support business leaders of 900 enterprises in business transformation, with training and mentorship.
We will work with Institutes of Higher Learning or IHLs, banks, and industry experts, and facilitate collaboration. In tandem, we will continue to broaden transformation through the EDG, by expanding its reach. In FY2020, we expect to support about 3,000 projects through the EDG, an increase of more than 10% from the number today.
The third thrust of our Transformation and Growth effort is to develop our people, so as to enable our people to access good jobs, earn good wages and stay employable. Economic growth is a means to creating a better life for our people.
We must nurture every Singaporean to their fullest potential.
The Government's promise to Singaporeans is this: regardless of your starting point, as long as you are willing to learn, we will support you to learn throughout life – in pre-employment, in your working years and as we pursue lifelong learning and employability.
We will bring in different partners, including IHLs, enterprises and the Labour Movement to help you do so.
Let me begin with the role of our IHLs. Our IHLs provide a strong foundation in learning and have partnerships with industry. IHLs and the industry have distinct roles, and by aligning these to keep learning relevant, students can secure good jobs.
Employment rates are high and starting salaries have increased. We develop Singaporean talent in partnership with enterprises under the Singapore-Industry Scholarship scheme. Many of them have graduated and are developing their careers with leading enterprises like ST Engineering and Micron.
Our local students are well-prepared to thrive in other countries and cultures, including in Asia. About half of all local IHL students today gain experience abroad, through programmes such as internships, exchanges and service learning or study trips.
In my pre-Budget dialogue with youth leaders, I was struck by their understanding of the importance of learning new skills and exploring new opportunities. They look forward to overseas exposure and postings in the region.
To support our local students to acquire cross-cultural skills and understand our region better, we will set ourselves a \"70-70\" target – 70% of local IHL graduates to have an overseas experience, and 70% of this group to have exposure to ASEAN, China, or India.
To achieve this target, we will introduce a new Asia-Ready Exposure Programme to support local youths' visits to cities in ASEAN, China or India. We will also enhance support for internships under the Global Ready Talent Programme.
Beyond pre-employment education, we must also support our people who are already at work. With shorter technology cycles and more intense global competition, skills acquired when we are young need to be constantly refreshed. Career transitions will be more common, even the norm.
Our SkillsFuture movement seeks to enable our people to learn, develop new skills and stay employable.
Five years after the launch of SkillsFuture, we have made good progress. The training participation rate has risen, from 35% in 2015, to 49% in 2019. As of end 2019, the SkillsFuture Credit has helped more than half a million Singaporeans pick up new skills and develop new interests. This includes Mr Koh Wui-Tek, a FinTech executive who applied his learning in project management to serving his clients, as well as Mdm Juriah Jahaya, a certified trainer who deepened her people development skills.
Singaporeans are also upskilling and accessing good jobs in growth sectors with the support of employers. Younger Singaporeans are undergoing on-the-job training while getting a qualification. Singaporeans who have been working for some time have adapted and grown their skills.
One good example is Ms Nur Hidayah Binte Abu Bakar, whom I met at WSG last year. After leaving the electronics industry, Ms Hidayah joined AETOS Holdings as an Auxiliary Police Officer. She went through the tough training as part of the Professional Conversion Programme. Today, she not only earns more, and has a clearer career pathway, but she is also helping to keep Singapore safe. [Please refer to Annex B-4.]
I am very encouraged by the efforts made by Singaporeans to acquire new skills, in the midst of the major structural changes in the global economy. To further support them in this journey, the Government will invest in the Next Bound of SkillsFuture. There will be three elements to this: first, enabling the individual; second, enhancing the role of our enterprises; and third, a special focus on mid-career workers.
First, to support Singaporeans to continue learning, I will provide a one-off SkillsFuture Credit top-up of $500 for every Singaporean aged 25 years and above. The top-up will be available for use from 1 October 2020.
Unlike the earlier $500 credit which had no expiry date, this top-up will expire in about five years, by end-2025. This is to encourage Singaporeans to take action early to learn new skills and to make the best use of this period of economic slowdown. [Please refer to Annex B-2.]
Second, we want to enhance the role of enterprises in developing their staff.
Enterprises know best the skills needed for their business to transform, and can play a key role in helping their workers learn and apply new skills. By investing in their staff, they build a stronger workforce, which can in turn help enterprises succeed. So, we must strive to achieve this virtuous cycle.
A good example is Containers Printers, a local food packaging company. It has adopted digital technology and trained its workers to take on higher value-added roles like real-time monitoring of production.
In our unique tripartite model, the Labour Movement plays a crucial role. We cannot keep jobs, enterprises, or even industries that are no longer viable. Instead, we refresh, retrain and rejuvenate for the long term.
For example, the United Workers of Electronics and Electrical Industries and Thales, a French technology leader, have set up a Company Training Committee. Management staff and union members are working together to develop training plans and deepen skills, so that workers can take on better jobs. On my visit to Thales, I was very heartened to hear how its employees are upskilling and contributing to Thales’ transformation. This is a good example of how unions and enterprises can work together to keep workers up to date as enterprises transform. [Please refer to Annex B-4.]
Let me outline five measures to enhance the role of our enterprises in the Next Bound of SkillsFuture.
First, I will introduce a new SkillsFuture Enterprise Credit to encourage employers to embark on the transformation of their workforce and enterprise in tandem. Employers can use this enterprise credit to defray 90% of out-of-pocket costs of business transformation, job redesign and skills training. The SkillsFuture Enterprise Credit, at $10,000 per enterprise, will benefit over 35,000 enterprises, most of which will be SMEs.
Second, we will also provide more support for job redesign. The Productivity Solutions Grant supports enterprises to adopt pre-approved digital solutions and equipment. We will expand the Productivity Solutions Grant to include job redesign consultancy services.
Third, we will work with large anchor enterprises to support training for their sectors and value chain partners. Anchor enterprises are supported by many SMEs. By helping to raise the skills of workers in these SMEs, the entire supply chain benefits. We aim to partner up to 40 of such anchor enterprises to benefit 4,000 SMEs over the next five years.
Fourth, our IHLs will work with more enterprises to enable local students to learn in a real work setting, through SkillsFuture Work-Study Programmes. We will now more than double the capacity of these programmes by 2025. Our aim is to make this a mainstream pathway, with 12% of each cohort going through these pathways, up from 3.5% today.
Fifth, as more enterprises train their workers, we will deepen workplace learning capabilities. MOE launched the National Centre of Excellence for Workplace Learning, or NACE, at Nanyang Polytechnic in July 2018. MOE will expand NACE to two more IHLs over the next few years and aim to benefit over 1,200 enterprises, especially our SMEs.
In line with our focus on the role of industry in SkillsFuture, we will also recalibrate Government funding towards training providers and courses with a stronger link to job and wage outcomes.
The third element in the Next Bound of SkillsFuture is a special focus on mid-career workers currently in their 40s and 50s. Born in the 1960s and 1970s, they grew up in a time when our economy was just starting to take off. When they started work, it was normal, even celebrated, to stay with one job, in one company, for life. As enterprises restructure, the nature of jobs has changed. Many have adapted to these changes, picked up new skills, and even switched careers.
Ms Ng Lee Chun, 50, is one of them. After leaving her previous job, WSG helped her to secure a logistics role with ST Logistics. Through the Professional Conversion Programme for Supply Chain Professionals, ST Logistics sent her for training for this role.
Some workers in their 40s and 50s have not seen any job or career changes since leaving school, or had the chance to upskill earlier. But, they are now facing greater competition, from younger workers and workers overseas. I understand their anxiety.
At the same time, with broader global shifts, exciting jobs will emerge. Our mid-career workers can seize these opportunities and do better for themselves and their families. The Government will do more to support them.
We will introduce a new SkillsFuture Mid-Career Support Package for locals in their 40s and 50s, to help them stay employable and move on to new jobs or new roles. We aim to double the annual job placement of locals in their 40s and 50s, to around 5,500, by the year 2025. To reach this goal, we will increase the capacity of reskilling programmes. These will include the Professional Conversion Programme under the Adapt and Grow initiative, career transition programmes delivered by Continuing Education and Training Centres, or CET Centres, like IHLs, and sector-specific programmes like the TechSkills Accelerator Company-Led Training for ICT jobs.
In tandem, our employers must step up to recruit, retain and retrain our local mid-career workers. We will support them to do so. I will provide a hiring incentive to employers who hire local jobseekers aged 40 and above through a reskilling programme. For each eligible worker, the Government will provide 20% salary support to the employer for six months, capped at $6,000 in total.
In parallel, we will streamline our manpower schemes, including support for hiring and retention, to maximise their impact.
To improve access to reskilling programmes, I will also provide a special SkillsFuture Credit top-up of $500 to every Singaporean aged 40 to 60 in 2020. This will be over and above the top-up that I announced earlier.
This additional credit can be used for selected reskilling programmes at CET Centres.
Like the broad-based top-up, this additional credit will expire in about five years, to encourage early action.
Apart from Government support, we will assemble a group of volunteer Career Advisors from professional communities. These advisors will provide peer-level support and career guidance to local workers in navigating professional pathways.
We hope that all these initiatives will provide meaningful support to those in their 40s and 50s to further their careers with confidence. Lifelong learning and contribution does not stop at the 40s and 50s. As the Chinese say, \"活到老，学到老\". You are never too old to learn.
As our people live longer, we will provide more support to help them remain active and contribute to our society and economy. Many seniors have told us that they want to continue working and learning. Besides saving more for retirement, it is about a sense of agency and purpose, and staying active and connected.
The Government has strongly supported enterprises that employ our seniors through the Special Employment Credit or SEC, the Additional SEC or ASEC and WorkPro.
For our seniors who wish to work longer, earn more and save more, the Prime Minister had announced at last year’s National Day Rally that we are raising the Retirement and Re-employment Ages. We are also increasing the CPF contribution rates for workers aged 55 to 70.
To ease in these changes for employers and workers, I will introduce a Senior Worker Support Package comprising four measures.
First, I will refashion SEC and ASEC into a Senior Employment Credit, which will take effect from 2021. Like SEC and ASEC, this Senior Employment Credit will provide employers with wage offsets when they hire Singaporean workers aged 55 and above, with the support levels tapering down over time as the Retirement and Re-employment Ages are gradually raised.
Second, when employer CPF contribution rates go up in 2021, we will provide employers with a CPF Transition Offset for the year, to offset half of the increase in employer contributions.
Third, we will introduce the Senior Worker Early Adopter Grant to support enterprises that raise their own Retirement and Re-employment ages ahead of the legislated changes.
Fourth, we will introduce the Part-Time Re‑employment Grant to support and encourage enterprises to formalise part-time re-employment provisions. [Please refer to Annex B-3.]
In short, even as we support workers' aspirations to work longer, we hear employers' concerns. As part of our unique tripartite system, the Government has stepped up to support both our workers and our enterprises.
Even for seniors who choose to retire, but wish to continue to learn and stay active, the $500 SkillsFuture Credit top-up that I just announced will support this. Retirees can use this to deepen their interests, or even to explore a whole new area – be it cooking or coding.
For many years now, foreign workers have been part of our workforce. With our declining local labour force growth, foreign workers are a necessary complement. But we must regulate the inflow carefully, in a way that creates opportunities for our locals.
One area of particular concern is S Passes. These are skilled jobs, many of which can be done by locals, such as Polytechnic diploma holders. We created the S Pass category because despite our best efforts, we are not producing enough of such skilled locals. S Passes enable enterprises to top up their workforce with more skilled workers and to recruit workers with particular skills that locals may lack. But S Passes should not be a means by which enterprises hire low‑cost foreign workers, when qualified locals are available.
Last year, we announced cuts for the Dependency Ratio Ceiling, or DRC, and S Pass sub-DRC thresholds for the Services sector. This was to manage manpower growth, and encourage our enterprises to restructure and reskill our local workers.
We have been monitoring the manpower growth closely. The number of S Pass holders in the Construction, Manufacturing, Marine Shipyard, and Process sectors is growing, by 3.8% per year over the last two years. The number could increase significantly over the next few years, as the Construction and Marine Shipyard sectors recover and the Process sector begins work on projects in the pipeline.
However, the growth in S Pass holders must be sustainable. The Government has been working closely with industry and educational institutions to build up a pipeline of local manpower, including mid-career workers. We want them to have fair opportunities to grow, while supporting the manpower needs of enterprises.
Therefore, this year, we will take further steps. We will reduce the S Pass sub‑DRCs of the Construction, Marine Shipyard and Process sectors from 20% to 15%.
We will phase in the cuts in two steps. The first step from 20% to 18% on 1 January 2021 and subsequently to 15% on 1 January 2023. We are announcing the changes about a year ahead, to give time for enterprises to adapt.
Given the economic uncertainties, we will not reduce the S Pass sub-DRC for the Manufacturing sector at this point. But, we do want manufacturing companies to make the effort to recruit local skilled workers and technicians too. Therefore, when conditions allow, we intend to tighten the S Pass sub-DRC for Manufacturing too.
At the same time, we recognise potential concerns of enterprises about the availability of skilled manpower in these sectors.
To help you find skilled local graduates looking to embark on their careers and older local professionals looking for new careers, SSG and WSG will work with you to improve matching.
Enterprises that have specific needs can continue to apply for additional manpower flexibilities in exceptional cases, through schemes such as the Lean Enterprise Development Scheme.
In view of the economic conditions, I will maintain the foreign worker levy rates for all sectors for 2020. [Please refer to Annex B-2.]
Mr Speaker, Sir, the Government appreciates the concerns of our workers and enterprises. In the immediate term, we are facing headwinds with the shocks and uncertainties. But in the medium term, we are facing deep structural shifts in the global economy. We have to tackle both challenges head-on.
The Government will support our enterprises and workers with the near-term challenges, through the Stabilisation and Support Package for workers and enterprises.
To tackle medium-term challenges, our Transformation and Growth strategy will support efforts to deepen enterprise capabilities, develop our people and forge stronger partnerships, through our tripartite structure.
By positioning Singapore as a Global-Asia node of technology, innovation and enterprise, we can ride on the next wave of structural changes resolutely. The respective Ministers will provide more details of the schemes I have mentioned in this section later.
Mr Speaker, Sir, a vibrant economy provides good jobs and opportunities for Singaporeans, and allows families to do well. It also gives us the resources to support our people with their needs, to build a caring and inclusive home.
Our tax and spending policies reflect our values. Over the past decade, we have significantly increased our social spending. Between 2010 and 2019, we tripled our healthcare expenditure from $4 billion to about $12 billion a year, to meet the growing needs of our seniors and to ensure that every Singaporean has access to affordable and quality healthcare.
We increased our investments in education, from $10 billion to about $13 billion, so that all Singaporeans will have the best chance to fulfil their fullest potential.
We increased the expenditure on national development from $2.4 billion to $3.6 billion, with the bulk of this going into subsidies on public housing, so that every Singaporean household can have a home to call their own.
Last year, we gave out about $1.1 billion in cash to Singaporeans who need more help. The payouts were provided through structural schemes such as ComCare for the vulnerable, Workfare Income Supplement for lower-wage workers, GST Voucher – Cash for lower income Singaporeans and Silver Support for the vulnerable elderly.
This social spending reflects our commitment to invest in our people, to give every citizen a stake in our society, to care for our seniors and to provide more help to those with less.
This Budget, we will continue to care for Singaporeans in the following ways: first, we will build on our efforts to support our families; second, we will support and enable our seniors in their retirement years; and third, we will promote a stronger giving culture.
I will first touch on how we will further support our families.
Good education provides a strong foundation for children to grow, realise their aspirations and continue a journey of lifelong learning. We have committed to decisive shifts in the Government’s support for early childhood development. We are determined to give every child, regardless of circumstances, a good start in life.
As the Prime Minister announced at the National Day Rally last year, we will step up efforts to improve the affordability, accessibility and quality of pre-school services. We have significantly enhanced pre-school subsidies and made them available to more families from this year. We will also increase the share of Government-supported pre-school places from just over 50% today, to 80% by around 2025.
Overall, we are doubling our support for our young in their pre-school years. In 2018, the Government spent about $1 billion on the early childhood sector. Within the next few years, this will double to over $2 billion per year.
In the Primary to pre-University school years, education is already heavily subsidised for Singaporeans. Primary school is free for all Singaporeans, while the Secondary school fee is $5 a month. Students pay only a few dollars of miscellaneous fees.
For students from lower income families, we will provide further help. We will enhance the MOE Financial Assistance Scheme by raising the annual bursary quantum for pre-university students, from $900 to $1,000. We will also increase transport subsidies for all students and school meals subsidies for Secondary school students. The enhanced Financial Assistance Scheme will cost an additional $9 million per year, or a total of $52 million per year.
We announced that we would enhance bursaries for diploma and degree holders last year. These bursaries are on top of subsidies that are provided to all Singaporeans.
Starting from Academic Year 2020, students from lower and middle income families in the Polytechnics and Autonomous Universities can benefit from higher bursaries.
We will also enhance bursaries for full-time ITE students from Academic Year 2020. Students from households who qualify under the lowest income tier for the bursaries will now receive 100% fee subsidy on top of the cash bursary. Students from low- and middle-income households will also benefit from an increase in the cash bursary quantum by up to $200 a year.
The cost of bursaries for higher education will rise from $148 million per year to $198 million per year.
A good education lays a strong foundation for a better future. This is why this Government has been providing significant education subsidies for each child. A Singaporean child will receive over $180,000 of education subsidies in total by the time he turns 16. This includes about $50,000 in Government subsidies over five years when they enrol in a full-day childcare programme with one of the Anchor Operators.
For those who come from less-privileged backgrounds, there are additional subsidies for pre-school, bursaries and other financial assistance schemes. This substantial investment is how we maximise every child's potential, regardless of family circumstances. This is a promise that I, as a former Education Minister and now Finance Minister, am committed to keep.
When Singaporeans are ready to start a family and own a home, we make sure that there is good access to quality and affordable housing. Last year, MND consolidated existing housing grants into the Enhanced CPF Housing Grant. With the Enhanced Housing Grant, first-time flat buyers can now enjoy up to $160,000 in housing grants. The monthly household income ceilings for subsidised flats and executive condominiums were raised to $14,000 and $16,000 respectively. We expect around 16,000 HDB households to benefit from these enhancements each year.
The Government has made significant moves to help Singaporeans manage major expenditures in life, through structural subsidies in education, healthcare and housing.
This year, with the economic slowdown and the uncertainties of the COVID-19 outbreak, we are mindful that many families are facing greater pressures.
During my fellow Members of Parliament and my own walkabouts, people often tell us that they are worried about job security and rising expenditures.
To help all Singaporeans with their household expenses during this period of uncertainty, I will provide a comprehensive Care and Support Package for households, amounting to about $1.6 billion. All Singaporeans aged 21 and above in 2020, will receive a one‑off cash payout of $300, $200 or $100, depending on their income.
The annual GST Voucher – U-Save provides rebates to help HDB households with their utilities expenses. This year, I will double the amount of U-Save rebates through a one-off GST Voucher – U-Save Special Payment to all eligible HDB households. This will help to free up cash for other household expenses.
In addition, I will extend the Service and Conservancy Charges Rebate by another year. Eligible HDB households will receive rebates of between one and a half and three and a half months.
Lower income Singaporeans will get additional help with their daily living expenses. In October 2019, we announced the Workfare Transport Concession Scheme and the Public Transport Voucher to help cushion the transport fare increases for lower income households. To further offset daily living expenses for lower income workers, I will provide a Workfare Special Payment. Singaporeans on Workfare will receive 20% more for work done in 2019, with a minimum payment of $100. This will be given in cash.
I will also help needy Singaporeans more directly. They will receive Grocery Vouchers worth $100 each year in 2020 and 2021, for use at major supermarkets. This directly helps needy households with one of their major cost of living items – food.
There will be additional help for families taking care of children and elderly parents. I will provide a further $100 cash payout for every adult Singaporean with at least one Singaporean child aged 20 years and below this year.
I will provide an additional GST Voucher – U‑Save rebate for larger households with five or more members, to help them with their utilities bills. Together with the U-Save Special Payment I mentioned earlier, larger households can receive a total of 2.5 times their regular U-Save rebates this year. These households can receive up to $1,000 in U-Save rebates, depending on their flat type.
I will also provide a $100 top-up to the PAssion Card to all Singaporeans aged 50 years and above this year, including the Pioneer Generation and Merdeka Generation seniors. This can be used to pay for groceries, activities and facilities at Community Clubs and more. Those who do not currently have a PAssion Card can get one for free to receive the top-up.
Our Self-Help Groups have also been working closely with the community to help needy families and children. To enable them to do more, I will provide a $10 million grant to them over two years so that they can help more families.
The Community Development Councils or CDCs have also played an important role in partnering the community to strengthen bonds and help vulnerable groups.
Each CDC has its set of local assistance schemes to meet local needs and programmes that allow community members to help those with extra needs.
I will provide $20 million for the CDCs to do more and better meet the needs of their residents through local initiatives.
Together, the Care and Support Package will provide a young family with about $1,300. A 3-Generation family can receive more – about $1,800. More details are provided in the slide and in the Annex. [Please refer to Annex C-1.]
Let me now move on to the second area, which is to support and enable our seniors.
Singaporeans are living longer. Our life expectancy at birth is close to 85 years, the longest in the world. This is a good thing!
Singapore will not just be a great place to raise a family, but a great place for seniors to live a life of purpose, dignity and contribution.
The Community Networks for Seniors is now a national programme, with 650 active ageing nodes to engage our seniors. We must see ageing as a positive force and turn this phase of life into a time of opportunity. Ageing with confidence includes having financial assurance in retirement. This can be achieved through a combination of individual effort, family, community and Government support.
Over the years, we have strengthened the four pillars of our social security system – home ownership, CPF, healthcare assurance and income from Workfare and Silver Support. We have also been enhancing the ComCare schemes, which support Singaporeans who are unable to work and have little or no family support.
The CPF is a major scheme to enable Singaporeans to save enough for their retirement years. We need to keep on updating and improving our CPF policies over time, so that they remain appropriate for each cohort.
We have been adjusting the Basic Retirement Sum, or BRS, regularly, in line with rising income levels. Since 2017, household incomes per capita have risen by an average of 4.1% per year in nominal terms, while the BRS has increased by 3% per year. The BRS is currently $90,500 for the cohort turning 55 this year.
We will continue to adjust the BRS by the same 3% per year for the next two cohorts. The BRS will be $93,000 for cohorts turning 55 in 2021 and $96,000 for those turning 55 in 2022. These modest continuing adjustments are necessary for the payouts to keep up with basic retirement expenses.
With continuing wage growth, each successive cohort has been able to save more. We expect seven in 10 actively employed persons from these two cohorts to be able to set aside their BRS, significantly more than four in 10 about a decade ago. More details are in the Annex. [Please refer to Annex C-2.]
Even as more seniors are prepared for retirement, one group of current seniors may not be able to meet their retirement needs.
When they were younger, they earned less than working Singaporeans do today, even after adjusting for inflation. Some may have earned lower wages for most of their working lives. Others may have stopped working early to take care of family members. We are in a fortunate position that most of our seniors have housing assets that they can use to support their retirement, if they wish.
We will do more to help Singaporeans tap their housing assets for retirement by enhancing the Silver Housing Bonus and the Lease Buyback Scheme. The Minister for National Development will provide more details.
The CPF is a good retirement scheme, based on personal savings. It provides Singaporeans with very favourable, risk-free interest rates on their savings. Many Singaporeans want to top up their own, their spouse’s, or parents’ CPF accounts. In 2019, such voluntary cash top-ups added up to about $1 billion. We would like to encourage more to do so, particularly those whose CPF balances are on the low side.
To help those with less CPF savings to save more, I will introduce a Matched Retirement Savings Scheme from 2021 to 2025.
Lower to middle income Singaporeans aged 55 to 70 who have not been able to set aside the prevailing BRS will be eligible. Under this scheme, the Government will match every dollar of cash top‑up made to their CPF Retirement Account, up to an annual cap of $600. This is a way of encouraging and augmenting family support for our seniors with fewer means in retirement. About 435,000 Singaporeans will be eligible.
While the CPF is a good scheme, for a small segment of the elderly population, it will not be enough. Some had low incomes during their working years and currently have little or no family support. We created the Silver Support Scheme to complement the CPF for this group and give them more financial security in retirement. The scheme is now almost five years old and a review is timely.
Silver Support currently provides cash payouts to the bottom 20% of Singaporeans aged 65 and above, with some support for those slightly above the bottom 20%.
I will raise the quarterly cash payouts by 20%. For individuals living in smaller flats, this means that the cash payouts will increase from $750 to $900 per quarter.
I will also broaden the eligibility criteria of Silver Support. I will expand the threshold for lifetime wages and per capita household income to cover more seniors. There will also be a new payout tier to provide a smaller payout to seniors whose monthly household incomes per person are above $1,300 but not exceeding $1,800 – these seniors do not receive Silver Support today. There is no need to apply – eligible seniors will be notified by CPF Board and start receiving payouts under the enhanced scheme from December 2020.
Overall, we expect about 100,000 more seniors to benefit from the enhanced Silver Support in 2021. The cost of Silver Support will nearly double, from today’s $330 million, to around $620 million in 2021. More details are provided in the Annex. [Please refer to Annex C-3.]
Here is an illustration of how the matched savings, right-sizing and enhanced Silver Support can add up to help a retired 65-year-old couple to more than double their retirement income. I will pause here for Members to take a look at the example and details are in the Annex. [Please refer to Annex C-4.]
These enhancements underscore the Government’s commitment to provide seniors with greater assurance in retirement and reflect the values we hold dear, such as taking care of our parents and seniors. They will also complement the other schemes for our seniors, such as the Pioneer Generation Package and Merdeka Generation Package.
We will also help seniors stay active and contribute to the community. Many senior volunteers find that volunteering gives them purpose, keeps them socially connected and promotes active ageing. The community also benefits from their wealth of experience and skills.
There is Mr Victor Lim, a 70-year-old retiree, who spent 40 years in the Medical Imaging and IT industry and now volunteers at IMDA's Digital Readiness programmes. There is also Mdm Leong Su Yin, one of the oldest members of RSVP, who has been volunteering for over 20 years.
Our success in taking care of every Singaporean, from pre-school to retirement, is only possible with the support of our community partners. This brings me to the third strategy – Strengthening the Giving Culture.
When we harness and rally greater participation and resources from the community, we can better support those in need. The Government will continue to support the community in building a stronger giving culture.
Last year, I announced the Bicentennial Community Fund, which provides dollar-for-dollar matching for donations made to Institutions of a Public Character. This is on top of the 250% tax deduction provided for donations made to IPCs.
One of the potential beneficiaries is the Daughters Of Tomorrow Limited, which helps disadvantaged women gain new skills and find employment. The organisation plans to use the Bicentennial Community Fund to develop staff and volunteers and build their in-house fundraising capabilities.
This year, MSF and the National Council of Social Service (NCSS) will set up the Community Capability Trust to fundraise and support our social service sector partners in enhancing their capabilities and capacities to serve the community.
For a start, together with Tote Board, we will provide $200 million to the trust in FY2020 and match up to $150 million in funds raised over the next 10 years. In total, we will commit up to $350 million for the Community Capability Trust.
This will provide a pool of funds that our Social Service Agencies can tap on to transform themselves for the future. I hope they will make good use of this to strengthen their organisational capabilities, become more productive and enhance their service infrastructure, in partnership with MSF and NCSS.
Just like how our efforts in the Industry Transformation Maps have positioned our enterprises and economy for the future, the Community Capability Trust will equip Social Service Agencies to bring the social sector forward. Details are in the Annex. [Please refer to Annex C-5.]
There is much value to be gained when a community comes together in support of a cause. I am happy to see the success of movements like The Purple Parade, The Purple Symphony and Runninghour. These are ground-up initiatives that support inclusion and celebrate the abilities of persons with special needs, through activities like music and sports. Everyone can play a part to build an inclusive society from their hearts, in ways big and small.
Many enterprises have also built inclusive workspaces for persons with disabilities (PwDs). To support the employment of PwDs, the Special Employment Credit (SEC) and the Additional Special Employment Credit (ASEC) schemes provide wage offsets for employers hiring Singaporean PwDs earning below $4,000 a month. At the last Budget, we extended the SEC and ASEC until the end of 2020.
We have received good feedback on the schemes in supporting PwD employment. In 2018, more than 5,700 employers hiring over 8,600 Singaporean PwDs benefited from SEC.
This Budget, we will introduce the new Enabling Employment Credit, or EEC, to provide stronger support for employers of PwDs. The new EEC will replace the current SEC and ASEC schemes for PwD employment. It will be available for five years, from 2021 to 2025, at a cost of about $31 million per year. To ensure that the EEC remains helpful for PwDs to find employment and remain in the workforce, the Government will review the EEC after two years and make adjustments if necessary.
This Budget, I will also top up three funds that provide targeted help for the elderly and the lower income. I will provide top-ups of $750 million to the ElderCare Fund, $500 million to the ComCare Fund and $200 million to the MediFund. These funds provide a safety net for the low-income by helping them to meet their daily expenses and healthcare fees.
The respective Ministers will provide more details of the schemes I have mentioned in this section later.
Mr Speaker, Sir, Budget 2020 supports the Government’s long-term strategy of building a caring and inclusive society.
We will continue to support our families through the enhancements to our education and housing schemes, and the Care and Support Package for households. We will enable our seniors by promoting active ageing and providing financial assurance in their retirement years. We will also partner the community to build a stronger giving culture so that we can better support those in need.
This is our continued effort to improve the lives of our people and our future generations. We must continue to work together to build a society where opportunities are available to every Singaporean, at every stage of life.
Let me move on to how we can sustain Singapore’s success for generations to come.
Our Pioneers set out to build a high quality living environment, even when they had to attend to pressing economic and security challenges. They left us a legacy of a clean, green and liveable environment. As the Chinese saying goes, \"前人种树，后人乘凉\". The generation that planted the seeds does not fully benefit from their toil, but they care to do this, for future generations to reap the fruits. In the same spirit, we must plant the seeds to secure a better future for generations to come.
By thinking long term, by confronting major challenges and by investing for our future, we have beaten the odds. Three major challenges we must continue to confront are: climate change, security and fiscal sustainability.
To build a liveable and sustainable home, we must address climate change. As a low-lying island nation, rising sea levels threaten our very existence. So, what can we do as a small island nation?
First, we must continue to support global efforts to combat global problems. Singapore must continue to do our part as a responsible member of the international community. Singapore plays an active role at the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. Besides representing our interests, Team Singapore is regarded as an honest broker, helping to build bridges and consensus.
This year, we will update our commitment to the Paris Agreement and take a further step to chart our vision for a low-carbon, sustainable future Singapore. The Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office will elaborate on this later.
Second, we must manage our transition to a low-carbon, low-emissions economy. We must turn our carbon constraints into a strength, just like how we have turned our water vulnerabilities into an area of strength with radical innovations in NEWater and desalination. Today, Singapore is a global hub of water research and innovation.
The circular economy – turning waste into a resource that can be reused in the production cycle – is one way we can reduce our carbon footprint and open up new opportunities. NEA will soon begin a field trial to use NEWSand, made from incineration ash, in road construction along Tanah Merah Coast Road.
We will do more to develop new ideas and solutions. We are committing close to $1 billion for research in Urban Solutions and Sustainability. The research will focus on renewable energy, cooling Singapore and carbon capture, among others.
As climate change is global, innovative solutions created here can be commercialised, turning our constraints into a strength. More broadly, we have to manage our greenhouse gas emissions, by putting in place the right incentives, tax structures and regulations.
We introduced a carbon tax in 2019 and supported enterprises in improving energy efficiency. We introduced and enhanced the Minimum Energy Performance Standards to raise the energy efficiency of energy-intensive household and industrial appliances.
The domestic transport sector contributes a significant amount of greenhouse gas emissions. Vehicles with internal combustion engines (ICEs) also contribute to pollution, adversely affecting our health and quality of life.
Many major cities have already set ambitious goals to phase out ICE vehicles and shift to cleaner technologies. Car manufacturers are actively developing cleaner engine technologies, such as hybrids and electric vehicles, or EVs, and are exploring new areas, such as hydrogen fuel cells.
As a small city-state, we are able, and have strong reason, to stay abreast of these major technological changes. For both public health and climate change reasons, we should progressively phase out the use of ICE vehicles towards cleaner alternatives, such as hybrids and EVs. We will set a long-term strategic goal for Singapore to achieve this.
Our vision is to phase out ICE vehicles and have all vehicles run on cleaner energy by 2040. To promote this, we will have three measures in this Budget.
First, we will enhance incentives to encourage the adoption of cleaner and more environmentally friendly vehicles.
In 2018, we introduced the Vehicular Emissions Scheme for cars and taxis. Under the scheme, car buyers and taxi operators who choose cleaner car models can receive an upfront rebate of up to $20,000 and $30,000 respectively. We have seen promising results from the scheme. More car buyers and taxi operators are choosing environmentally friendly engines, such as electric hybrids. Therefore, we will introduce a similar scheme called the Commercial Vehicle Emissions Scheme for light goods vehicles. The Minister for the Environment and Water Resources will announce the details at the Committee of Supply (COS).
For cars and taxis, I will provide an additional EV Early Adoption Incentive. Those who purchase fully electric cars and taxis will receive a rebate of up to 45% on the Additional Registration Fee, capped at $20,000.
We will also revise the road tax methodology for cars to better reflect the current trends in vehicle efficiency from January 2021. This will lead to an across-the-board reduction in road tax for EVs and some hybrids. [Please refer to Annex D-1.]
Second, we will expand the public charging infrastructure for EVs. Today, there are about 1,600 charging points island-wide. We will work with the private sector to step up the deployment of chargers in public carparks. By 2030, we aim to deploy up to 28,000 chargers at our public carparks island-wide.
Lastly, the Government will take the lead. We will progressively procure and use cleaner vehicles to do our part for the environment. Here, we are placing a significant bet on EVs and leaning policy in that direction because it is the most promising technology. It also requires a significant increase in demand to justify the infrastructure investment. This is a significant undertaking involving multiple agencies.
The transition towards EVs will have a major impact on tax revenues. Fuel excise duties today yield around $1 billion per year and are significant contributors to Government revenues. They are also a form of mileage tax, which discourages excessive driving, especially in private cars, and thus helps to reduce road congestion.
But EVs do not pay fuel excise duties. Therefore, we will need to update our vehicular tax structure to preserve these two considerations.
Ideally, we would like to implement a usage-based tax on EVs as an alternative to fuel excise duties. But the technology to do this properly on EVs is the Next Generation ERP System, and distance‑based charging using ERP is still several years away. In the interim, we will impose a lump-sum tax that will be built into the road tax schedule for EVs to partly account for the loss in fuel excise duties.
This lump-sum tax will be phased in over three years starting from January 2021, with the full quantum implemented by January 2023. [Please refer to Annex D-1.]
Total road tax, after the revision in methodology and the new lump-sum tax, will be higher for some EV models. However, EV buyers can expect to enjoy substantial cost savings because of the significant EV Early Adoption Incentive.
I spoke about policy measures that the Government will put in place to reduce emissions. But the Government alone cannot address the threat of climate change. Therefore, mobilising all of us in this effort is the third thrust of our climate change strategy.
Robert Swan, the first person to have walked to the North and South Poles, once said, \"The greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it.\"
To deal with climate change, we have to foster a climate of change in our community – where everyone, whether as an individual, as a business leader or as a community leader, makes conscious decisions to lower our carbon footprint.
One such decision by individuals is our choice of household appliances. To encourage households to purchase energy-efficient household appliances, we will introduce incentives to help lower income households with the cost of these appliances.
Outside our homes, we earlier announced plans to add more greenery to our HDB estates. New housing developments will have around 45% to 60% green cover.
Residents are contributing through the community garden movement. Today, more than 36,000 gardening enthusiasts are nurturing over 1,500 community gardens island-wide. These gardens keep our shared neighbourhood vibrant and bring people closer together.
To make sustainable living a key feature of our HDB estates, we will have a new HDB Green Towns Programme. It will have three key focus areas: reducing energy consumption, recycling rainwater and cooling our HDB towns.
I spoke about how we are committing to global efforts, managing our carbon constraints and building a sustainable Singapore, together. We must try hard and we will do our part. But the course of climate change depends on the commitment of all nations. The risk of rising sea levels remains significant. So, our fourth strategic thrust is to prepare our island for rising sea levels.
The Minister for the Environment and Water Resources will elaborate on our immediate plans at the COS.
The Prime Minister mentioned at the National Day Rally last year that climate change adaptation might cost $100 billion or more over 100 years. This is a major fiscal outlay in the coming years. So, it is right and prudent that we set aside resources for this.
I will set up a new Coastal and Flood Protection Fund, with an initial injection of $5 billion. I will top it up subsequently whenever our fiscal situation allows.
We must have the resolve to deal head-on with the existential threat of rising sea levels. Just as our pioneers planted the trees for us to enjoy today, we must protect our island for future generations to come.
Our food security may also come under threat, as imported supplies come under strain from climate change or geopolitical tensions. To improve our food resilience, the Minister for the Environment and Water Resources will provide more details of our \"Grow Local\" strategy at the COS to pursue our \"30/30\" aspirations.
Sir, you see, MOE has a \"70/70\" goal and MEWR has a \"30/30\" goal. So, together we have 100/100! [Laughter.]
In uncertain times, there are many calls on our Budget. However, we cannot take our peace, prosperity and stability for granted. As a small city-state, we are particularly vulnerable to volatilities in our external environment. Securing our home remains a high priority in our Budget and must be funded adequately. It is imperative that we continue to invest in our external, internal, cyber and data security, to keep Singapore and our families safe and secure.
Diplomacy and deterrence are the twin pillars of maintaining Singapore's sovereignty. We strive to build good relations with our neighbours and international partners and to promote a rules-based world order. A strong Singapore Armed Forces supports our diplomatic efforts and ensures that other countries take Singapore seriously. We must be ever-ready to defend our interests should negotiations fail.
We must continue to draw a credible deterrence, by maintaining our military and technological edge, in a prudent manner that stretches every defence dollar.
Back home, we are committed to protecting our safety and our way of life. Our Home Team agencies will continue to enhance the operational readiness of their officers, leverage technology and build partnerships with the community. Singaporeans share a strong conviction to look out for each other and to partner the Home Team to prevent and deal with terror threats and crisis, through the SGSecure movement.
We must also be prepared to deal with cyber threats, as digitalisation becomes more pervasive. Our cyber capabilities have been raised significantly, with the setting up of the Cyber Security Agency, or CSA, in 2015 and the passing of the Cybersecurity Act in 2018.
CSA is preparing measures for the next level of cybersecurity, as we adopt more advanced technologies, such as Artificial Intelligence, Cloud and the Internet of Things. All of us, in the Government, enterprises and as individuals, will need to stay vigilant and strengthen our cyber and data security capabilities.
Data security is also a vital prerequisite and key enabler of Singapore's Digital Economy. It is key to preserving trust in a digitally-connected world.
We enacted the Personal Data Protection Act in 2012 and the Public Service has adopted comprehensive measures to secure and protect citizens’ data. As we embark on initiatives to realise our Smart Nation ambitions, we must continue to enhance our cyber capabilities.
I will set aside $1 billion over the next three years to build up the Government's cyber and data security capabilities to safeguard citizens’ data and our critical information infrastructure systems.
The respective Ministers will provide more details of the schemes to confront the challenges of climate change and security.
As we lay out our plans for our economy, people and environment, we must ensure these plans are fiscally sustainable, so that we have the resources to deal with future needs and challenges. We must continue to plan our finances based on long-term structural drivers.
Revenue flows are difficult to project accurately – we can end up having more, or less. In this term of Government, we happen to have more, mainly due to exceptional Statutory Board contributions from MAS and increased stamp duty collections. We used some of the unexpected surpluses to save ahead for anticipated needs and shared some of the surpluses with Singaporeans.
But we must not count on such revenue surprises to keep happening. We must anticipate long-term spending needs and be disciplined to raise revenues ahead of time, so that we can continue to provide quality public services to all Singaporeans. At the same time, we must be mindful of the uncertainties and downside risks to our revenue. There are on-going discussions to revise international tax rules under the Base Erosion and Profit Shifting project and we are actively participating in them.
Our fiscal strategy must also be equitable. Major long-term infrastructure is lumpy and requires hefty upfront investments. But once built, they benefit many generations of Singaporeans. Borrowing for such developments allows us to distribute the cost equitably across current and future generations, without the need for sharp increases in taxes.
However, we must remain disciplined about our use of borrowing. We should continue to pay for recurrent needs, like healthcare expenditure, through recurrent revenues such as taxes. Our fiscal discipline has helped us to be among a select group of countries with a triple-A credit rating. This in turn lowers the borrowing costs of enterprises and households, and promotes a virtuous cycle of economic growth.
We must also maintain our fiscal posture and leave enough to deal with unexpected shocks and longer term challenges.
The Constitution requires us to run a balanced budget over each term of Government. We are being prudent to preserve fiscal buffers, to ensure that we have the wherewithal to stand our ground and bounce back quickly if the tide turns against us. This is how we have been able to respond decisively to fight the COVID-19 outbreak and support Singaporeans and our workers. And at the same time, to be able to set aside an Assurance Package for GST to help Singaporeans in the years ahead.
The accumulated surpluses at the end of the term of Government becomes part of our past reserves, which are invested. Today, the Net Investment Returns Contribution from our reserves is the biggest component of our revenue. This is remarkable for a country with no natural resources of any kind.
I am making further changes to our tax system to strengthen its resilience while maintaining competitiveness. The details are in the Annex. [Please refer to Annex D-1.]
Let me summarise our overall Budget position.
For FY2019, we expect an overall budget deficit of $1.7 billion, or 0.3% of GDP. This deficit is $1.8 billion lower than the $3.5 billion deficit forecasted a year ago. This is due mainly to lower-than-expected expenditures arising from unforeseen project delays.
When we exclude the Government’s top-ups to funds and Net Investment Returns Contribution from our reserves, we expect a basic deficit of $5.1 billion, or 1% of GDP.
In the coming year, the Singapore economy faces considerable uncertainty, because of heightened risks in the global economy, and the rapidly evolving COVID-19 outbreak. Hence, for FY2020, our budget position will be more expansionary, with a larger basic deficit of $12.3 billion. This, together with the Stabilisation and Support Package, will impart a considerable fiscal boost to the economy to address near-term concerns.
On the whole, we expect an overall deficit of $10.9 billion or 2.1% of GDP. [Please refer to Annex D-2.]
With our fiscal prudence since the beginning of this term of Government, we have sufficient accumulated fiscal surplus to fund the overall deficit in FY2020. There is no draw on past reserves.
Members have been very patient and this is my third file. It is almost two hours now, so, thank you very much. Before I start on the third file, some good news. My very dedicated Staff in MOF who worked day and night with me, over the weekends and Chinese New Year, managed to trim and trim the speech and grow and grow the substance. So, the substance has grown, but, the speech is more concise now. We have moved all the details to the Annexes. It is a pity because there were so many inspiring stories that I wanted to share with you, but I hope that they will find many opportunities to share these stories. Mr Speaker, Sir, let me thank my excellent Staff for contributing to a significant improvement in our productivity here.
Mr Speaker, Sir, we will face more complex challenges ahead, but we are in this for the long haul. We can succeed only if we work together.
Our on-going fight against the COVID-19 outbreak is a testament to how we can work together. Our healthcare workers and frontline officers are giving their all to keep us safe, and care for those who are unwell. And others – community groups, enterprises and many volunteers have stepped forward. Everyone has something to offer and every action makes a difference.
This is the spirit of the Singapore Together movement, which I launched last June – to build a democracy of deeds, mobilise the creative energies and commitment of Singaporeans, find common cause and beat the odds together, to build our future Singapore.
We made a concerted effort to involve Singaporeans and stakeholders in our strategic deliberations and budgeting process. Over the course of the Budget 2020 consultations, my colleagues and I met almost 1,000 leaders from different parts of society, including our unions, enterprises, social sector and youths. It was a very enriching experience for everyone and I thank every participant. Some of you will recognise your ideas in the Budget.
For example, we enhanced the internationalisation support schemes after receiving feedback from TACs such as the Singapore Manufacturing Federation and the Association of Banks in Singapore. We provided more resources to support our people to take action to reduce carbon footprint, after several youth leaders I met suggested this. I also thank the talented students from Nanyang Polytechnic for the artistic illustrations in my slides today.
Many Singaporeans are coming up with, and acting on, ideas to make Singapore a better place.
The youth movement has been particularly strong. In the area of climate change, youths like Ms Cheryl Lee and her team in the Singapore Youth for Climate Action have been organising activities to encourage youth to take action through simple lifestyle choices.
Ms Rohini d/o Ravindran is also contributing to the community, by conducting photography and videography sessions for lower income youth, to develop their problem-solving skills and build a good foundation for them to excel.
In 2016, we set up the Our Singapore Fund, or OSF, to provide funding support for ground-up efforts in the social domain. Since then, the OSF has committed nearly $4.3 million to support over 240 ground-up projects in culture, heritage, arts and sports.
One example is Progress NEST started by Mr Akram Hanif, to support children from low-income families.
Through these partnerships, we have been able to do more and do better. And we are committed to making partnerships an integral part of how we will build our future Singapore.
I will set aside $250 million to give greater momentum to our partnership efforts. I will top up the OSF and extend the Fund beyond 2020 to support more ground-up initiatives that Singaporeans are passionate about, across a wider range of domains. [Please refer to Annex C-5.]
The Government is committed to expanding and scaling up successful ground-up projects, such as those supported by the OSF.
MEWR will also be launching an SG Eco Fund to support partnerships with the community and enterprises in our sustainability efforts.
Channelling the energies of our people to key causes requires us to identify the challenges of our time. These challenges are multi-faceted and multi-dimensional, but they are ultimately about how Singapore remains exceptional in an increasingly complex world. The solutions will also come in all shapes and forms, from all levels of society – from government policies to individual efforts on the ground. We must overcome these challenges and find solutions together.
The Government will work with agencies and key stakeholders to identify major societal challenges. This will help us focus our collective efforts on the challenges that matter and allow us to galvanise good ideas and solutions from the public.
We have issued several national innovation challenges to date, in the areas of energy, land and liveability, ageing, urban mobility and AI-enabled healthcare. For example, our AI Healthcare Grand Challenge is drawing strong interest here and with partners from France and Germany.
Under the National Innovation Challenge in Ageing, we sought ideas to combine different technologies to enable ageing in place and deployed these solutions at a precinct level.
While we are only in our initial phases, we have learnt useful lessons, and seen encouraging results. We will issue more specific challenges to encourage ground-up participation. These include challenges in the social sector, where we have built many community partnerships to better support children from low-income and vulnerable families, and promote youth mental well-being, amongst other things.
The respective Ministers will provide more details of the schemes I have mentioned in this section later.
I am excited about the prospect of stronger Government-citizen partnerships in overcoming these challenges and look forward to the results that these partnerships will yield. As this Budget has many measures, MOF has prepared a booklet summarising the measures, which I hope colleagues will find useful.
With your permission, Mr Speaker, may I ask the Clerks to distribute these to all Members of this House?
Mr Speaker: Yes, please. [Handouts were distributed to hon Members.]
Mr Heng Swee Keat: Mr Speaker, Sir, let me say a few words in Mandarin before I conclude in English.
(In Mandarin): [Please refer to Vernacular Speech.] \tThe COVID-19 outbreak has brought about many uncertainties globally. The virus disregards nationalities and the effort to control the disease is a global one.\t
Governments, international organisations, researchers and healthcare workers from many countries are now working closely together. China has taken a series of highly effective measures and an early success of China in fighting COVID-19 will help both China and the world.\t
The current situation has brought about widespread impact to our economy. Some sectors have already been affected, and Singaporeans are worried about their employment prospects, I can understand their concerns.\t
In order to reduce the pressure on businesses and our people, I will introduce a $4 billion Stabilisation and Support Package. In order to help Singaporeans meet their daily expenditures, I will also introduce a $1.6 billion Care and Support Package.\t
Singapore has enough resources to meet present challenges. This is because we have been well-prepared accumulating surpluses from this term of Government, in order to meet unexpected expenditures.\t
Whether we can successfully overcome this challenge will depend on whether Singaporeans can look out for each other and maintain social cohesion. When facing the unknown, it is natural that people feel worried. \t
However, we must not panic. We should pay attention to personal hygiene and be considerate towards people around us. At the same time, we must take concrete actions to help those who are in need.
The Budget is a long-term strategic plan to ensure that Singapore develops sustainably, and Singaporeans can lead better lives. In overcoming our short-term challenges, we must also pay attention to the long-term structural changes and capture the opportunities brought about by these changes.\t
First, we must continue to encourage enterprises to transform and create more opportunities for Singaporeans. As the saying goes – “there is no end to learning”. Through SkillsFuture, we encourage lifelong learning, which can bring about lifelong benefits. We will introduce the SkillsFuture Mid-Career Support Package to help locals in their 40s and 50s learn new skills and take on new jobs.\t
Second, we will build a caring and inclusive society together. I have just announced that the GST rate will remain at 7% in 2021. However, in order to meet increasing recurrent expenditures, such as in healthcare, the GST increase will still be needed by 2025. When we raise the GST rate, we will continue to help low-income families and provide more support for them. We will provide a $6 billion Assurance Package when the GST rate is raised and enhance the existing permanent GST Voucher scheme.\t
Third, we must continue to develop Singapore, look after Singapore's security and stability, and ensure that we have a sustainable fiscal system. This is our commitment to our future generations. Especially in the area of climate change, I will provide $5 billion to set up a new Coastal and Flood Protection Fund.
Fourth, we will work together with Singaporeans to build a nation and home we will always call our own.\t
As the saying goes, \"the young will be educated, those in need will receive support, the old will be cared for\", we hope that Singapore will not only be a good place for raising children, but also a place where our seniors have dignified and meaningful lives.\t
We will enhance our current Silver Support Scheme to help lower income seniors cope with daily expenses, providing them assurance in their retirement.\t
In addition, we will introduce the Matched Retirement Savings Scheme to help those who do not have very high CPF balances build up their CPF savings. We also encourage our senior citizens to lead active and fulfilling lives after retirement.\t
At present, the global situation is uncertain and many countries face structural changes. Taking a long-term point of view, dealing with this sudden virus outbreak is only one of the challenges that we will encounter as we go forward. We cannot stagnate because of this. Together, we have to march towards our common objective. In the spirit of the Singapore Together movement, as long as we pool our efforts and work hand-in-hand, we will be able to solve all problems and create an even better Singapore.
(In English): I will now conclude in English. Mr Speaker, Sir, there are deep structural shifts taking place in the world today, coupled with near‑term concerns over economic uncertainties and the COVID-19 outbreak. All nations, big or small, will have to devise strategies and mobilise their people to navigate these changes and turbulence.
Singaporeans have enjoyed more than half a century of stability and prosperity because we have seized the opportunities from an increasingly open and interconnected world. Every decade or so, when a test comes, we have rallied and passed it together.
In this Budget, I have outlined our plans not only to help our people deal with near‑term challenges, but also to better enable Singaporeans of all ages to thrive in the new decade.
The Stabilisation and Support Package, costing $4 billion, will help viable enterprises and our workers during these uncertain times. Our Transformation and Growth effort, costing $8.3 billion over three years, will support our longer term plans to position Singapore as a Global-Asia node of technology, innovation and enterprise. The Care and Support Package, costing $1.6 billion, will support our households and alleviate concerns over cost of living. This is on top of the structural social subsidies given to Singaporeans in healthcare, education and housing.
We will continue to take steps towards climate change mitigation and adaptation, to ensure that in the decades ahead, our children and children’s children will have a safe and liveable Singapore.
I am confident that together, we can ensure that Singapore remains exceptional. As one Singapore, we will grow our economy and transform our enterprises, creating opportunities for Singaporeans. As one Singapore, we will care for and nurture Singaporeans at every stage of their lives, to build a caring and inclusive society. As one Singapore, we will build a liveable and sustainable Singapore in the face of climate change, secure our sovereignty as an independent nation and ensure our fiscal sustainability. And as one Singapore, we will work together with fellow Singaporeans, to build a nation and a home we will always call our own.
Our nation has built up the capital – financial, human, and social – to go the distance. The Singapore spirit is strong and growing. Together, we will advance, as One Singapore. Mr Speaker, Sir, I beg to move. [Applause.]
Mr Speaker: The Question is, \"That Parliament approves the financial policy of the Government for the financial year 1 April 2020 to 31 March 2021.\"
In accordance with paragraph (1) of Standing Order No 89, the debate now stands adjourned. Debate to be resumed on what day?
Mr Heng Swee Keat: Wednesday, 26 February 2020, Sir.
Mr Speaker: So be it.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Adjournment","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"OS","content":"[(proc text) Resolved, \"That Parliament do now adjourn to Wednesday, 26 February 2020.\" – [Ms Grace Fu Hai Yien]. (proc text)]
Adjourned accordingly at 5.18 pm.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Financial Products to Protect Special Needs Children and Their Families","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WANA","content":"13 Ms Rahayu Mahzam asked the Minister for Social and Family Development whether there has been a review of the sufficiency and availability of financial products that can protect special needs children and their families.
Mr Desmond Lee: There is a range of financial services and schemes available to special needs children and their families.
MSF set up the Special Needs Trust Company, or SNTC, about 10 years ago to better support caregivers in planning for financial and care arrangements for their loved ones upon the caregiver's demise. SNTC is a not-for-profit trust company that provides subsidised trust services. The social workers at SNTC work together with the caregivers to develop a care plan and estimate the amount of funds to set aside for the long-term care of their loved ones. The care plan takes into account the care, medical and accommodation preferences of the beneficiaries and their caregivers.
Apart from administering the trust services, SNTC also administers the Special Needs Saving Scheme (SNSS) developed by MSF in partnership with the Central Provident Fund Board (CPFB). Under the SNSS, caregivers can nominate their loved ones to receive monthly disbursements from their CPF savings after their demise.
Caregivers can also consider other financial instruments such as regular savings plans and insurance products to build a financial safety net for their dependents. One example is the Dependants' Protection Scheme (DPS), a term insurance scheme provided by CPF Board that is automatically extended to eligible CPF members. The DPS benefit will be paid out if the insured caregiver passes away or suffers from terminal illness or total permanent disability.
Persons with disabilities can also benefit from the following:
(a)\t\t\t CareShield Life – which provides universal coverage to all Singaporean Citizens and Permanent Residents born in or after 1980 from mid-2020, to ensure basic protection of long-term care needs for our future generations, including those with pre-existing disability. Coverage starts from 30 years old, and monthly payouts are provided as long as one is severely disabled.
(b) Home Caregiving Grant – which provides a $200 monthly cash payout to offset the caregiving costs of eligible persons who always require some assistance to perform three or more Activities of Daily Living (ADLs). Families can contact the Agency for Integrated Care (AIC) if they would like to apply for this grant.
(c) Other Government subsidies – which help ensure the affordability of essential services and products utilised by persons with disabilities, which include early intervention, special education, day care, residential care, assistive technology devices and transportation. Low-income families pay minimal or no out-of-pocket fees, with government subsidies to cover their expenses. For those who are unable to afford the out-of-pocket fees, social workers from Social Services Agencies (SSAs) help to look into their financial situation. The SSAs may further subsidise persons with disabilities through donations raised by their organisations.
Persons with disabilities can also tap on MediShield Life, a basic health insurance plan that protects all Singapore Citizens and Permanent Residents against large hospital bills for life, regardless of age or health conditions.
There are many persons with disabilities who are capable of finding work on their own, and living independently. Some may require a little more support to find employment. To this end, MSF set up SG Enable in 2013 to enhance the employability of persons with disabilities and increase employment options for them. SG Enable works closely with SSAs to support persons with disabilities in finding employment, through its job placement and job support services provided by job coaches. This helps to empower and enable them to live more independently.
Persons with disabilities and caregivers can refer to the SG Enable website at www.sgenable.sg and the Enabling Guide at www.enablingguide.sg for more information on such schemes and services.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Work-study as Integral Component of Undergraduate Degree Programmes at Autonomous Universities","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WANA","content":"14 Ms Foo Mee Har asked the Minister for Education (a) how pervasive is work-study an integral component of undergraduate degree programmes offered by our autonomous universities; and (b) what is the current percentage of degree programmes that have compulsory internship as part of the course work.
Mr Ong Ye Kung: The Autonomous Universities (AUs) work closely with industry partners and sector agencies to equip students with industry-relevant skills. As part of this effort, the AUs have included work-study elements in their curriculum which typically involve an industry stint for workplace learning.
This is done in two main ways. The first approach is through internships. Currently, internships are compulsory for around 70% of our degree programmes, and are typically between 6 to 12 weeks long. For programmes where internships are not compulsory, students are encouraged to take up internships.
The second approach is through SkillsFuture Work-Study Degrees. One key feature is the joint development and co-delivery of the curriculum by the AUs and employers. This training includes both theory and practice, through a combination of institution-based learning and structured on-the-job training. The work component of the Work-Study Degree is also more significant than internships, typically about 30% of the programme duration. The number of Work-Study Degree programmes has increased from 10 in 2017 to 30 in 2019, spanning a range of disciplines such as Data Science, Engineering and Hospitality Business. As at 2019, around 350 students have enrolled in a Work-Study Degree.
We will continue to work with our AUs to expand work-study opportunities for our students. We target to put 12% of each cohort to undertake work-study programmes by 2030.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Review of Sexual Education in Schools with Greater Emphasis on Gender Equality","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WANA","content":"15 Ms Anthea Ong asked the Minister for Education (a) whether there are any plans to review sexual education in schools beyond sexual protection and abuse towards building sensitivities and consciousness by focusing on gender equality; and (b) how often are sexual education programmes reviewed and what is the process of doing so.
Mr Ong Ye Kung: Sexuality Education in our schools focuses on imparting knowledge and social and emotional skills for positive self-development and self-identity, and developing healthy and rewarding relationships.
Besides important topics on safety and protection from abuse and sexual health, students also learn how to deal with physical, social and emotional changes that they are going through. They will also learn about gender roles and stereotypes, and that one's roles, interests and career pursuits are not defined by gender stereotypes. They learn the value of appreciating one's unique qualities and to respect and show empathy and care for one another.
MOE reviews sexuality education regularly. We take into consideration local and international research, inputs from stakeholders including specialists in their field, parents and students and our local context. For example, new scenarios and discussions had recently been included, covering areas like pornography and the influence of social media on self-perception and esteem, and relationships.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Number of Families and Couples Renting under Parenthood Provisional Housing Scheme and Those in Arrears","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WANA","content":"16 Mr Png Eng Huat asked the Minister for National Development (a) what is the number of families and couples who are renting under the Parenthood Provisional Housing Scheme currently; and (b) what is the number and percentage of this group who are in arrears.
Mr Lawrence Wong: There are about 630 households currently renting under the Parenthood Provisional Housing Scheme, or PPHS, as at end January 2020. Among these households, about 7% of them are in arrears.
For PPHS households in arrears, HDB will work with them on an instalment plan to repay their arrears, or to move to a flat with lower rent, according to their budget. Those in financial hardship can also be referred to MSF's Social Service Office for financial assistance.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Cause of Recent Mass Fish Deaths at Pasir Ris","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WANA","content":"17 Ms Rahayu Mahzam asked the Minister for National Development with regard to the recent case of hundreds of dead fish at Pasir Ris beach (a) whether the Ministry has determined the cause of the mass fish deaths; (b) whether there are any health concerns which may affect residents in the area; and (c) whether there is a need to control the plankton bloom which may be the cause of the incident.
Mr Lawrence Wong: NParks has worked with NEA and SFA to look into the cause of the recent fish deaths at Pasir Ris Beach. NParks has found that the affected fish were of mainly one species of wild fish found in our coastal waters. The incident appears to be an isolated one. Thus far, NParks has not observed any other dead fish or animals along the surrounding coastal areas at Changi Beach, East Coast Park, and Pulau Ubin.
NEA's and SFA's coastal water quality monitoring sensors did not pick up any anomalies over this period. The coastal water quality during the week of 27 January and 3 February 2020 met the World Health Organisation’s recreational water guidelines, and Pasir Ris Beach remains safe for recreational water activities. The plankton count was normal. There were also no abnormal fish deaths reported at the nearby floating fish farms.
Agencies will continue to look into the cause of the fish deaths. We will also continue to closely monitor the coastal beaches near the Pasir Ris area, including the water quality, for any anomalies.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Encouraging Companies to Provide Family Care Leave and Other Support to Help Employees Cope with Work and Care-giving Responsibilities","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WANA","content":"18 Ms Foo Mee Har asked the Minister for Manpower how can the Government and tripartite partners encourage employers to provide support to employees with caregiving responsibilities such as family care leave to help them cope with work and caregiving responsibilities.
Mrs Josephine Teo: The Government and tripartite partners are committed to provide working caregivers with the necessary support so that they can fulfil both their work and caregiving responsibilities. To better understand the needs of caregivers, MOH led a cross-agency review in 2018. When interviewed, employees who were caregivers provided feedback that Flexible Work Arrangements (FWAs) were more important than other measures such as family care leave in supporting them in their caregiving needs.
To help caregivers, MOM has, together with our tripartite partners, adopted a multi-pronged strategy to support and encourage employers to adopt FWAs. First, we provide grants to employers who adopt FWAs. In 2019, MOM increased the Work-Life Grant (WLG) budget to $100 million to support and encourage more companies to provide FWAs to their employees. Second, through the Tripartite Standard (TS) on FWAs, we recognise progressive employers who offer FWAs. As at end-December 2019, close to 2,100 employers responsible for some 470,000 employees, have adopted the TS FWAs. Third, we guide employers on how to implement FWAs. Resources such as the Tripartite Advisory (TA) on FWAs and Job-Sharing Implementation Guide help them make FWAs available to their employees. Fourth, we actively promote FWAs among employers and raise their awareness of how FWAs can improve their staff retention. We reach them through sector-specific engagement sessions, online marketing and roadshows.
These efforts are paying off as we are seeing more employers offering FWAs. Based on MOM surveys, more than 9 in 10 employers in 2018 offered some form of formal or ad-hoc FWAs, up from about 8 in 10 in 2013.1 As a result, more employees are benefiting from FWAs. Among those who required FWAs in 2018, more than 8 in 10 could avail themselves to the FWA they needed, which was an increase from 2016, when only 7 in 10 could do so.2
In response to the Citizens' Panel on Work-Life Harmony's recommendations made last year, our tripartite partners will also commit to intensifying their efforts to support adoption of FWAs. More details will be shared at the upcoming Committee of Supply debates.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":["1 : Conditions of Employment survey 2018.","2 : Labour force supplementary survey 2018, a biennial MOM survey."],"footNoteQuestions":["18"],"questionNo":"18"},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Complaints of Excessive Number of Foreigners Working in Financial Institutions","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WANA","content":"19 Mr Lim Biow Chuan asked the Minister for Manpower how many complaints have been received in the last three years regarding excessive foreigners working in financial institutions.
Mrs Josephine Teo: Over the last three years, MOM and TAFEP received 65 complaints or feedback regarding the hiring of foreigners in financial institutions. In most cases, the complainants did not provide specific information for follow up action. Of those that did, MOM and TAFEP investigated thoroughly and took appropriate actions, including withholding of work pass privileges.
Locals hold more than four out of five jobs paying $3,600 or more (the minimum qualifying salary for Employment Pass) in the financial sector. This ratio has held steady over the last three years, even as the workforce in the sector grew.
While most financial institutions and hiring managers understand the need to hire based on merit, there is a minority of employers that seek to circumvent our fair hiring requirements. MOM does not tolerate any form of workplace discrimination, and has recently raised penalties across the board for all forms of discrimination. Beyond the employers, MOM will also take individual employees to task if they were involved in any unfair hiring practices. Beyond complaints, MOM has enhanced our detection of unfair hiring behaviour through data analytics.
We urge members of the public to report to MOM or TAFEP if they come across workplace discrimination, and provide specific information so that we can take action. The identity of whistleblowers will be kept confidential.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Balancing Needs of Motorists and Pedestrians with Increasing Number of Silver Zones Built","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WANA","content":"20 Mr Desmond Choo asked the Minister for Transport with the increasing number of Silver Zones to be built, how will the Ministry strike a balance between the needs of motorists and pedestrians at these Silver Zones.
Mr Khaw Boon Wan: Silver Zones were launched in 2014 to improve safety for seniors. They include features such as (i) longer green man timings; (ii) two-stage crossings for seniors; (iii) reduced speed limit of 40 km/h; (iv) speed bumps and bus-friendly humps; and (iv) narrowing of lanes with a centre divider. These features would inconvenience the motorists, but are necessary to enhance safety for senior pedestrians. Since the implementation of Silver Zones, there has been a 75% drop in road accidents involving senior pedestrians within these zones.
Silver Zones are implemented in places with a high proportion of senior residents, and where there have been past accidents involving seniors. LTA consults the local community and considers the needs of all stakeholders, including motorists and seniors in deciding on the location and design of the Silver Zones.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Lessons Learnt from Recent COVID-19 Outbreak","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"1 Mr Gan Thiam Poh asked the Prime Minister (a) what lessons can be learnt from the recent COVID-19 outbreak; (b) what can be improved upon to better equip and prepare Singaporeans, including education in total defence, against a pandemic outbreak; and (c) whether the Government will include production of masks and other medical protective gears as a strategic facility and support of the investment of such a facility in Singapore.
Mr Lawrence Wong (for the Prime Minister): Singapore has faced several infectious disease outbreaks since SARS in 2003, including H1N1, Zika, and most recently Monkeypox. Many lessons have been drawn from these past experiences to improve our readiness for the next outbreak. Over the years, we have strengthened our epidemiological surveillance and containment capabilities, and held regular emergency preparedness exercises to keep ourselves operationally ready. The setting up of the National Centre for Infectious Diseases (NCID) has enhanced our infrastructure and capabilities to manage a disease outbreak in Singapore.
When COVID-19 emerged, we alerted all our healthcare institutions and put in place precautionary measures according to our response plans. Even before Singapore had its first confirmed case, we anticipated that we would need a Whole-of-Government effort to respond effectively to this threat and we set up the Multi-Ministry Taskforce on 22 January 2020 to coordinate our responses and measures. Since then, the Taskforce has put in place in place a whole range of measures from border controls to extra precautions within Singapore. We will continue to monitor the situation and take more measures when necessary.
We recognise that an important part of our system of defence is the role that every individual plays, by exercising social responsibility, practising good personal hygiene, and supporting our fellow citizens, especially our healthcare workers on the frontline. We must not let our fears overwhelm us and cause us to behave irrationally, selfishly or irresponsibly. Instead, let us support and look out for one another, so that we can all get through this together and emerge stronger.
It is also important not to spread unverified information or false news which can cause panic and fear. The Government has and will continue to push timely information through various platforms including broadcast media, display panels in HDB estates, websites and social media, so that Singaporeans can easily refer to these authoritative sources for news, health advisories and the latest updates.
The Government has also taken proactive steps to secure essential supplies, including masks. In peacetime, we had built up a stockpile of surgical and N95 masks. As we draw down on this stockpile, we will also need to replenish it with new supplies. In recent weeks, some places like Taiwan, Thailand and India have banned or tightened regulations on the export of masks. We are therefore strengthening the resilience of our supply chain, including looking for new sources, and developing local manufacturing capabilities.
We will continue to do everything we can, to keep Singaporeans safe, and to overcome this challenging situation together.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Increase in Number of Non-renewal of Road Tax Offences after Implementation of E-notification to Vehicle Owners","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"2 Mr Zainal Sapari asked the Minister for Transport (a) whether there has been an increase in the number of offences related to non-renewal of road tax after the implementation of the e-notification to vehicle owners; and (b) whether LTA can consider withdrawing the notice of offence related to non-renewal of road tax especially if the offence was committed for the first time by the motorist.
Mr Khaw Boon Wan: In November 2018, LTA introduced e-notifications for vehicle-related transactions such as road tax renewals to provide vehicle owners with timely and convenient updates. To ensure reasonable notice, vehicle owners are sent notice of renewals one month ahead of the expiry date. Subsequent electronic reminders are issued seven days and three days before road tax expiry. These reminders are issued via hardcopy letters to vehicle owners who prefer physical notifications. It is an offence for vehicle owners to fail to renew their road tax on time. Since the introduction of e-notifications, the number of such offences has decreased from 7.3% in 2018 to 6.9% in 2019.
We have no plans to withdraw the offence of non-renewal of road tax, which ensures compliance with the road tax regime. LTA will assess each appeal carefully, taking into account extenuating circumstances.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Measures to Protect Children at Home from Sexual Grooming and Harassment on Social Media","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"3 Ms Anthea Ong asked the Minister for Home Affairs (a) what measures are being taken to protect children from sexual grooming and harassment through their exposure to social media in the home and from a very early age; and (b) what percentage of all reported sexual assault cases involving children in the last three years took place in homes under the Public Rental Scheme.
Mr K Shanmugam: We have strengthened the law to enhance protection for children against sexual offences. The amendments to the Penal Code came into effect on 1 January 2020. In particular, the threshold for the offence of sexual grooming has been lowered, by reducing from two to one, the number of instances of prior contact between the offender and the child needed to make out the offence. Another amendment is the reduction of the age floor below which an offender cannot be charged for the offence of sexual grooming, from 21 to 18 years of age. In addition, new offences were introduced, for example, to criminalise sexual communication with a minor or showing a minor a sexual image. This allows authorities to intervene earlier, before the offender is able to commit additional and more serious sexual offences.
The Government has taken steps on various fronts to raise public awareness of the risks associated with the use of the Internet and social media. Through MOE's Character and Citizenship Education (CCE) programme, students learn about the harmful and criminal exploitation of the internet and how to protect themselves. MCI, on its part, has been strengthening digital literacy in Singapore. In July 2019, the Digital Media and Information Literacy Framework was launched to deepen Singaporeans' appreciation of the benefits and risks of digital technologies and information. MCI's partner agencies and programme owners, such as NLB, have incorporated this framework into their programmes.
Police do not track statistics on the number of sexual assault cases involving children, broken down by the type of housing in which the crime was committed. We take a serious view of sexual assault against all children, regardless of where it takes place.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Breakdown of Number of COVID-19 Cases by Type of Residence Prior to Diagnosis","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"4 Assoc Prof Walter Theseira asked the Minister for Health whether he can provide a breakdown of the number of COVID-19 cases by type of residence in Singapore prior to diagnosis, namely (i) registered hotels and serviced apartments (ii) group quarters such as dormitories and hostels (iii) residential housing where the case is an unregistered commercial occupier (eg. through Airbnb, unregistered sublet, or other commercial arrangement) (iv) residential housing where the case is an unregistered family or friend of a registered occupier (v) residential housing where the case is a registered occupier or owner and (vi) no residence, as the case was quarantined immediately on entry.
Mr Gan Kim Yong: As of 17 February 2020, there were 77 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Singapore. Of these, 10 were staying in hotels or serviced apartments. One was living on board a cargo vessel, one was living in Malaysia, and one was living in a dormitory. Six were evacuated from Wuhan and quarantined on entry. The remaining cases were living in residential housing prior to diagnosis.
5 Assoc Prof Walter Theseira asked the Minister for Trade and Industry regarding the $15.2 billion in fixed asset investments in 2019 (a) what is the dollar cost in grants and incentives to attract these investments; (b) how many of the 32,814 new jobs to be created are projected to be net job creation, rather than substitution of existing jobs in other firms or sectors; and (c) of the $15.2 billion, what amount is projected to be invested in the absence of grant and incentive support from EDB.
Mr Chan Chun Sing: The Singapore Economic Development Board (EDB) uses a range of grant and tax incentives to attract investments into Singapore. These are compliant with the World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules, as well as with the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) rules to address base erosion and profit shifting.
The value of incentives awarded is a fraction of the projected total investment. Tax incentives are notional, and do not erode the tax base from existing activities. In addition, if a tax incentive recipient is not profitable, it will not enjoy any benefit. Other incentives such as training or research and development (R&D) grants are modest. Moreover, these grants are administered on a reimbursement basis. In other words, if the grant recipient does not incur the expenditure, it will not receive the grant.
The number of jobs created are new jobs linked to new and expansion projects committed in that particular year.
It is not meaningful to hypothesise the investments into Singapore absent these incentives. Competition for these investments is intensifying, and we must continue to remain globally competitive and an investment destination of choice. Doing so requires us to go beyond incentives, to strengthen our fundamentals such as our strong rule of law, pro-business environment, physical and data connectivity, and access to skilled talent. MTI will continue to do so, to grow our economy and better Singaporeans' lives.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Records on Death of Licensed Dogs at Dog Farms and Pet Shops in Past Three Years","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"6 Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang asked the Minister for National Development for each year in the past three years (a) how many dogs have died while licensed to (i) dog farms and (ii) pet shops respectively; (b) how many of these dogs died as a result of euthanasia in these premises respectively; and (c) whether the Ministry will start collecting such data if it is not already doing so.
Mr Lawrence Wong: In 2019, dog farms and pet shops reported that 134 and 14 licensed dogs died at their establishments respectively. In 2018, the figures were 162 and 26 licensed dogs respectively. We do not have figures for 2017, as the requirement for these establishments to report deaths of licensed dogs in their care only came into effect then.
Currently, NParks does not require the establishments to provide information on the cause of death. NParks will look into this as part of its ongoing efforts to enhance traceability of animals, in order to protect public and animal health.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Projection on Absolute and Percentage Change in Net Carbon Emissions Each Year from 2019 to 2023","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"7 Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang asked the Minister for the Environment and Water Resources for each year from 2019 to 2023 (a) what does the Ministry project will be the absolute and percentage change in net carbon emissions in each individual year; and (b) what percentage of absolute change in each individual year does the Ministry project will be attributable to the carbon tax rate of $5 per tonne of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.
Mr Masagos Zulkifli B M M: For our 2030 Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC), we have pledged to reduce our emissions intensity (emissions per dollar GDP) by 36% from 2005 levels by 2030, and to stabilise emissions with the aim of peaking around 2030. Given expected growth in economic activity and increased energy demand, Singapore's greenhouse gas emissions are projected to rise over the next few years before stabilising. Short-term year-on-year emissions projections may be affected by a multitude of factors such as unforeseen disruptions, and are thus not a good reflection of the emissions trajectory.
To achieve our 2030 NDC, the Government is putting in place mitigation measures to reduce emissions across all sectors, such as the industry, transport and building sectors, and ensure that Singapore continues to develop in a sustainable manner.
The carbon tax is not standalone. It forms part of our comprehensive suite of mitigation measures. It provides an important economy-wide price signal to spur emissions reduction, while giving companies the flexibility to take action where it makes the most business sense. The Government is prepared to spend more than the expected carbon tax revenue of about $1 billion over the first five years to help companies improve their energy and carbon efficiency. As such, it is more meaningful to monitor the progress and impact of our mitigation package as a whole.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Number of \"Virtual\" Restaurants Operating by Food Apps in Singapore","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"8 Ms Rahayu Mahzam asked the Minister for the Environment and Water Resources (a) what is the current number of \"virtual\" restaurants that operate by food apps in Singapore; (b) whether there have been any hygiene lapses in these shared food preparation premises; and (c) what additional measures is the Ministry taking on \"virtual\" restaurants to safeguard public health and prevent food poisoning.
Mr Masagos Zulkifli B M M: \"Virtual\" food businesses, also known as \"cloud kitchens\", are food establishments that do not have a physical store front but sell food directly to consumers through online food delivery platforms. They are licensed by the Singapore Food Agency (SFA) under the Environmental Public Health Act. There were 61 of such food businesses as of 31 January 2020.
Just like any other food establishment, \"virtual\" food businesses must comply with SFA's food safety requirements and standards, and ensure that the food they prepare is safe to eat. For instance, their food handlers and food hygiene officers must all be trained and certified under the Basic Food Hygiene Course and the Workforce Skills Qualifications' \"Conduct Food & Beverages Hygiene Audit\" programme respectively.
These \"virtual\" food businesses are also subjected to inspection and enforcement actions by SFA just like other food establishments. Since \"virtual\" food businesses started being licensed in 2017, there has been one food hygiene and safety offence committed which involved an unregistered food handler. Should a \"virtual\" food business be suspended due to food hygiene and safety lapses, its food handlers and food hygiene officers must undergo re-training and re-certification as per any other food establishment.
Food safety is a joint responsibility across the industry, consumers and the Government. All food establishments must play their part to upkeep high standards of food safety as well as environmental and personal hygiene at all times.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Statistics on Primary and Secondary School Children Homeschooled in Past Five Years and Assessment on Their Social-emotional and Character Development","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"9 Ms Rahayu Mahzam asked the Minister for Education (a) what is the number of primary and secondary school children who are home-schooled currently and whether this has increased over the past five years; (b) whether the Ministry assesses or tracks the socio-emotional and character development of the home-schooled children; and (c) if so, how is the assessment done.
Mr Ong Ye Kung: The number of home-schooled children has remained small and generally constant, at an average of 50 Singaporean children for each primary age cohort every year. We do not track the number of Singaporean children who are home-schooled at the secondary level as they do not come under the ambit of the Compulsory Education Act. But it is likely to be fewer than primary school for each cohort as many home-schoolers do eventually enrol in mainstream primary schools, or secondary schools after PSLE.
Each application for home schooling is approved on a case by case basis. Parents have to submit an academic learning plan, as well as a plan on how they are going to develop their child's character, deliver education in citizenship and social emotional competencies. Annually, parents are required to submit a progress report updating MOE of the progress of their child's learning in the different areas. In addition, MOE Inspectors engage parents during home visits to ascertain the delivery of the learning outcomes in the different domains.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Statistics on Primary Schools with Highest Alumni under Integrated Programme in Last Three Years","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"10 Ms Anthea Ong asked the Minister for Education for each of the 17 Integrated Programme (IP) schools in the last three years (a) which are the three primary schools with the highest alumni respectively; and (b) what percentages of their respective student populations are made up of students from the three primary schools.
Mr Ong Ye Kung: In general, IP schools are drawing from a larger number of primary schools. This is because parents are more willing to send their children to primary schools near their homes, instead of popular schools.
To the Member's specific question, across our 17 schools that offer IP, there is considerable variation in terms of which are their three highest-contributing primary schools. On average, these primary schools account for 24% of IP schools' admission, falling from 27% in 2019 and 28% in 2018.
Our IP schools are taking active steps to ensure that they remain accessible to deserving students from all primary schools, including through the Direct School Admission scheme. IP schools also undertake individual efforts to increase diversity in admissions, from enhancing their school-based awards to reaching out to the community.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Reduction of Salary of Work Permit Holders to Below Amount Stated on In-principle Approval Letter","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"11 Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang asked the Minister for Manpower for each year in the past three years, among notifications sent by employers to the Ministry to reduce the salary of a work permit holder to below the amount stated on the in-principle approval (IPA) letter (a) what has been the median absolute amount of reduction; and (b) what has been the median percentage of reduction compared to the initial salary.
Mrs Josephine Teo: In the past three years, the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) was notified of salary reductions affecting less than two percent of non-domestic work permit holders (WPH) per year. The median amount of salary reduction reported was $170 in 2017, $160 in 2018 and $100 in 2019. The median percentage of reduction reported was 20% in 2017, 22% in 2018 and 17% in 2019, compared to the initial salary declared.
Under our laws, employers are not allowed to reduce the salary of their work WPHs below what was declared on the In-Principle Approval (IPA) letter unless they have obtained the workers' written agreement and notified the Ministry beforehand. WPHs who have their salary reduced without their agreement should approach MOM or the Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management (TADM) to lodge a case. MOM will require him to make good any salary shortfall to the worker and impose a fine of up to $10,000. WPHs whose employment contracts are terminated by their employers for not agreeing with the salary reductions should also come forward to seek help from MOM. MOM will allow such WPHs to transfer to a new employer.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Statistics on Workplace Harassment in Last Three Years and Efforts to Set Up Watchlist on Employers","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"12 Assoc Prof Walter Theseira asked the Minister for Manpower for each year in the last three years (a) how many employers have been the subject of complaints regarding workplace harassment; (b) whether the Ministry has set up a watchlist or other measures to identify employers who have not dealt adequately with workplace harassment; (c) how many employers have been placed on such a watchlist, if it exists; and (d) how many employers on such a watchlist have received training or other help from TAFEP and successfully exited the watchlist.
Mrs Josephine Teo: With greater awareness following the global #MeToo movement in late 2017, and TAFEP's establishment of a help & resource centre for managing workplace harassment in 2019, we have seen more reports of workplace harassment where employers have been the subject of such complaints.
In each of these cases, the employer had not properly followed up on allegations of workplace harassment. TAFEP engaged the employer to educate and ensure they implement measures in the Tripartite Advisory on Managing Workplace Harassment, including asking the employer to re-investigate the complaint, where necessary. Specifically in one of these 22 cases, as the employer was alleged to have verbally harassed the complainant, TAFEP additionally advised the employer to be more mindful of his behaviour and respectful when engaging his staff. So far, all the employers that TAFEP engaged have been cooperative and receptive to their advice.
A watchlist allows MOM to monitor specific workforce metrics of employers suspected of errant behaviours to see if they have improved their employment practices. However, workplace harassment complaints typically involve specific incidents and persons. There are no clearly identifiable metrics to monitor. A watchlist approach is therefore impractical. Instead, MOM's policy is to revoke the work pass privileges of egregious offenders, such as employers who fail to provide a safe environment for employees or refuse to improve their grievance handling processes. So far, we have not encountered a case of such severity.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Number of In-principle Approval Letters Issued for Foreign Domestic Workers with Zero Rest Days Declared","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"13 Ms Anthea Ong asked the Minister for Manpower in the last five years, how many In-Principle Approval (IPA) letters has the Ministry issued for foreign domestic workers with zero rest days declared.
Mrs Josephine Teo: Employers are required to provide their Foreign Domestic Workers (FDWs) with a weekly rest day. If an FDW agrees to work on her rest day, her employer is required to provide compensation in lieu of the rest day.
Based on information collected by the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) over the past four years, about 20% of FDWs agreed to be compensated in lieu for all their rest days at the point of work permit application. Nonetheless, FDWs and employers tend to subsequently make changes to the rest day arrangements during the employment period, based on mutual agreement. For example, some FDWs may wish to take more rest days per month after they have paid off their placement loan. Based on MOM's survey with FDWs in 2015, 98% of FDWs surveyed had at least one rest day a month. This is consistent with a survey of FDWs conducted by the Centre for Domestic Employees in 2017, where 96% had at least one rest day a month.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null},{"startPgNo":0,"endPgNo":0,"title":"Update on Number of Mediation Requests and Their Outcomes since Establishment of Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management","subTitle":null,"sectionType":"WA","content":"14 Assoc Prof Walter Theseira asked the Minister for Manpower since the establishment of the Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management in April 2017 (a) what is the number of mediation requests that do not result in a mediation session; (b) what types of cases typically result in amicable resolution and which do not; and (c) what are the outcomes of cases that cannot be resolved through mediation, broken down by type of case and outcome.
Mrs Josephine Teo: Between April 2017 and December 2019, there were 26,000 mediation requests lodged with the Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management (TADM), of which more than 70% went to mediation. Of the remaining cases, most claimants withdrew their claims before mediation took place.
Of the claims that went through mediation, more than 80% were resolved amicably by TADM. These tend to be cases where the facts were clear or salary arrears had not been accumulated over a long period. Claims that could not be resolved through mediation would be referred to the Employment Claims Tribunals (ECT) for adjudication. About 40% of cases that were referred to the ECT resulted in money orders issued to employers to settle the claims. The remaining claims were dismissed by the ECT or withdrawn by the claimant.
For more details, the Member may wish to refer to the Employment Standards Report published by MOM in October 2019.
","clarificationText":null,"clarificationTitle":null,"clarificationSubTitle":null,"reportType":null,"questionCount":null,"footNotes":null,"footNoteQuestions":null,"questionNo":null}],"writtenAnswersVOList":[],"writtenAnsNAVOList":[],"annexureList":[{"annexureID":1217,"sittingDate":null,"annexureTitle":"Annex A-1","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/annex-Annex A-1_Stabilisation and Support Package.pdf","fileName":"Annex A-1_Stabilisation and Support Package.pdf","sectionType":"OS","file":null},{"annexureID":1218,"sittingDate":null,"annexureTitle":"Annex B-4","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/annex-Budget Annex B-4 - Examples for Budget 2020 Speech (2).pdf","fileName":"Budget Annex B-4 - Examples for Budget 2020 Speech (2).pdf","sectionType":"OS","file":null},{"annexureID":1219,"sittingDate":null,"annexureTitle":"Annex B-1","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/annex-Budget Annex B-1_Enabling Stronger Partnerships and Deepening Enterprise Capabilities (2).pdf","fileName":"Budget Annex B-1_Enabling Stronger Partnerships and Deepening Enterprise Capabilities (2).pdf","sectionType":"OS","file":null},{"annexureID":1220,"sittingDate":null,"annexureTitle":"Annex B-2","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/annex-Annex B-2_Developing Our People.pdf","fileName":"Annex B-2_Developing Our People.pdf","sectionType":"OS","file":null},{"annexureID":1221,"sittingDate":null,"annexureTitle":"Annex B-3","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/annex-Annex B-3_Senior Worker Support Package.pdf","fileName":"Annex B-3_Senior Worker Support Package.pdf","sectionType":"OS","file":null},{"annexureID":1222,"sittingDate":null,"annexureTitle":"Annex C-1","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/annex-Budget Annex C-1_Care and Support Package (2).pdf","fileName":"Budget Annex C-1_Care and Support Package (2).pdf","sectionType":"OS","file":null},{"annexureID":1223,"sittingDate":null,"annexureTitle":"Annex C-2","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/annex-Budget Annex C-2_Basic Retirement Sums for CPF Members Reaching Age 55 in 2021 and 2022 (2).pdf","fileName":"Budget Annex C-2_Basic Retirement Sums for CPF Members Reaching Age 55 in 2021 and 2022 (2).pdf","sectionType":"OS","file":null},{"annexureID":1224,"sittingDate":null,"annexureTitle":"Annex C-3","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/annex-Budget Annex C-3_Enhancements to Silver Support Scheme (2).pdf","fileName":"Budget Annex C-3_Enhancements to Silver Support Scheme (2).pdf","sectionType":"OS","file":null},{"annexureID":1225,"sittingDate":null,"annexureTitle":"Annex C-4","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/annex-Budget Annex C-4_Illustration of Enhancements to Retirement Schemes (2).pdf","fileName":"Budget Annex C-4_Illustration of Enhancements to Retirement Schemes (2).pdf","sectionType":"OS","file":null},{"annexureID":1226,"sittingDate":null,"annexureTitle":"Annex C-5","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/annex-Budget Annex C-5_Partnering Singaporeans to Build Our Singapore Together (2).pdf","fileName":"Budget Annex C-5_Partnering Singaporeans to Build Our Singapore Together (2).pdf","sectionType":"OS","file":null},{"annexureID":1227,"sittingDate":null,"annexureTitle":"Annex D-1","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/annex-Budget Annex D-1_Tax Changes (UN-REDACTED) -(2).pdf","fileName":"Budget Annex D-1_Tax Changes (UN-REDACTED) -(2).pdf","sectionType":"OS","file":null},{"annexureID":1228,"sittingDate":null,"annexureTitle":"Annex D-2","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/annex-Budget Annex D-2_Fiscal Position in FY2020 (2).pdf","fileName":"Budget Annex D-2_Fiscal Position in FY2020 (2).pdf","sectionType":"OS","file":null}],"vernacularList":[{"vernacularID":3701,"sittingDate":null,"vernacularTitle":"Vernacular Speech by Mr Heng Swee Keat","filePath":"d:/apps/reports/solr_files/20200218/vernacular-Heng Swee Keat Budget Statement 18Feb2020-Chinese.pdf","fileName":"Heng Swee Keat Budget Statement 18Feb2020-Chinese.pdf"}],"onlinePDFFileName":""}