Hansard, 1956-02-09

Mr Speaker, Sir, it is not expected that this House will be able to complete its business at today's sitting. I therefore move, That at it's rising today the Assembly do stand adjourned till tomorrow, Friday, 10th February.

Question put, and agreed to. Resolved, That at it's rising today the Assembly do stand adjourned till tomorrow Friday, 10th February.

Mr Speaker, Sir, may I seek the indulgence of this House and your permission to make a personal explanation on a matter which occurred yesterday?

By all means.

Sir, I was guilty yesterday of an epithet that is not compatible with the dignity of this House. Being addressed to my right, you did not hear it, and many of the Members on my left did not hear it. But others did and the Gallery did. I should not like, Sir, to hide behind your ignorance, or to fail in my responsibility to this House. In the circumstances, Sir, I should like to make my unreserved apologies to the House for my action.

Order read for resumption of proceedings - [8th February]: That this Assembly is of the opinion that for the purposes of oral debate the languages of the Assembly should be English, Malay, Mandarin and Tamil; and that a Select Committee be appointed to examine, report upon and make recommendations in respect of matters necessary to enable effect to be given to the proposal.

If it please you, Sir, yesterday I dealt with one danger which I think we must face in this very crucial issue. This morning I would like to deal with just one other matter, an argument which has been consistently repeated in private, though rarely in public, and it was somewhat highlighted, Sir, in a conversation I once had with a very intelligent Malayan whom I sought to enrol in the Labour Front. He said to me, "The Labour Front is too pro-Chinese. With multi-lingualism, you are going to hand us over to the Chinese. They will swamp us." Sir, we must face these things in the open. It is no use hiding them. I tried to explain that as we saw things we did not believe in favouritism for any race. We were for justice and we were for political justice, which is democracy; that if one has faith and believes in democracy, then one must accept the rule of the majority. Yes, Sir, one must accept the rule of the majority. The Chinese are 76 per cent of our population. Let us not avoid the issue. I am not sugaring any pill. We will face it squarely, Sir. This is a serious debate. As I see things, it is right and it is proper that the Chinese people should have a preponderant voice in the government of this country. But, Sir, I tried to explain - and I think it is important that we should here, in seeking to put the issues frankly before the House, also seek to allay the very genuine fears of a very honest group in our population. Democracy, though it means the rule of the majority, also means absolute respect for the rights of the minority. It means justice. Justice, Sir, does not mean that the majority can steamroller through. They have got to use their powers in harmony with the concept of natural justice and with respect for minority interests. My friend said - I hope the Chinese here would forgive me, but I think we ought to speak bluntly - "What do the Chinese know about democracy?" Sir, I can only speak as one man from my experience. I have lived with them, though not very closely, and I have gone to school with them. I have worked with them. I have been a clerk with them, and I believe that the Chinese people in Singapore - those I know, Sir - are one of the most adaptable people and in Singapore one of the most peaceable and reasonable. I am - and this is genuine, Sir - full of admiration for their capacity to appreciate the value of a new concept and to make the kernel of that new concept, the valuable aspect of it, their own. I believe, Sir, that given the opportunity the Chinese people will be equal not only to understanding the virtues of democracy, which I believe in wholeheartedly, but to making adoptions of parliamentary democracy their own and adding to that doctrine in its practice in this Colony their own magnificent vitality. Sir, I was asked by this man how I could expect that when the Chinese schools in Singapore give the same education as the schools in Amoy, and the schools in Amoy have produced Communists. I do not know about the schools in Amoy, Sir, and I would like to know a lot more about the schools in Singapore; but I do say this - that even from Amoy there have been refugees, refugees from the tyranny of Communism, into the quite squalid conditions of the refugees in Hongkong. I do know that here they have the opportunities to understand democracy. I hope they will have the opportunity to participate in it, and I believe they will be a new ally and a refreshing new strength to this process. Sir, I asked him what alternative he had, and he said, "Why cannot we leave it as it is - the English language?" These are arguments other Members must have heard, and I think it is well we should face them. I pointed out that if multi-lingualism hands us over to the Chinese, then English hands the people over to the very small English-speaking minority. He said, "Oh, we will be just to the Chinese." My reply was, "Why should we think the Chinese would not be just to the minority races?" Why should we imagine that under the process of democracy, which means majority rule, anybody would be submerged? Sir, in this very House we see examples of minorities having their full say without being submerged. We have seen in a solemn moment the expression of our deepest feelings, a single-Member Party - Mr Sutherland - standing up and saying that, on behalf of the English expatriate community, he deplored our desire for immediate self-government, and he voted against it and is working against it. Are they being submerged, even in the minor processes of democracy that we have, much though we may deplore the fact that those who find their prosperity from the people of the country should work against the deepest urges of those very people? Sir, we must have faith in the basic decency of all human beings. I ask the Asian minority races of Singapore not to give way to any emotional feelings of apprehension, to have faith in the value and in the triumph of parliamentary democracy. I would like to say in this connection that I am particularly proud, Sir - if you catch his eye - that my loyal friend and colleague the Hon. the Minister for Local Government, Lands and Housing will be supporting this motion wholeheartedly and seconding it. Now, Sir, on the second part of my motion. I ask for the appointment of a Committee. You see, Sir, many issues have to be clarified. There is the question of the system of translation - it is my hope that it will be a simultaneous translation through electronic or other devices. There is the question of additional and highly skilled staff; the question of the language of the official records; the question of amendments to our Standing Orders. Sir, there is no desire at all for any delay - I can assure you - because I will say this: that the draft instrument for amendment of the Singapore Colony Order in Council, Sir, has, I am reliably informed, been forwarded to the Regency Council and I anticipate that section 55 will be no more very shortly, and in fact even perhaps before the Committee has had time to report. It is essential that this House, when it proceeds to enforce it, should have it with the maximum possible efficiency. I am quite sure that though hon. Members here speak English, nevertheless to some of them English comes a little awkward - quite naturally - and they would prefer to speak one of the languages which I have indicated in my motion. I think they should have that opportunity. I hope they all should have that opportunity. I trust that nobody would seek to make use of this motion for purposes of public propaganda or purposes of gaining votes, because these additional languages do add in a small measure to the inconvenience of the Assembly, and I am quite sure that all Members will co-operate in seeking the comfort and convenience of the Assembly. But, nevertheless, we ourselves have experience that some of our hon. Members do find difficulty in expressing themselves in English and would be much happier, not for purposes of propaganda but sincerely in order to express themselves better, to use their own language. Sir, I therefore formally move the motion that stands in my name, That this Assembly is of the opinion that for the purposes of oral debate the languages of the Assembly should be English, Malay, Mandarin and Tamil; and that a Select Committee be appointed to examine, report upon and make recommendations in respect of matters necessary to enable effect to be given to the proposal.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I rise to second the motion now before this House. Yesterday, Sir, when the Chief Minister started his speech, he said he was not speaking as the Chief Minister of the Government of Singapore but as the Member for the Cairnhill Division. Today, Sir, I rise in the footsteps of my Chief Minister. I say I speak not as a Minister of the Government of Singapore, but as a representative of a group of people of this island who could be termed the minorities. Sir, this motion has the unqualified support of my people and also of the Party to which I belong. Looking towards the immediate future while this island is about to enter the doors of self-government and independence, one cannot but concede that there is a necessity, if not for the sake of national pride, at least for practical reasons, that the people of Singapore should be given an opportunity of voicing themselves in this Assembly in the language best suited to them. For over a hundred years, the affairs of public bodies, like this Assembly, have been conducted in the English language. It may well be for some to say that English is the universal language of the world, but to me, Sir, English is not the universal language of the people of Singapore. We all believe, quite rightly, too, that apart from other qualifications, representatives of the people should have a certain amount of education, but it is one of the peculiarities of this country that there are still some who accept the view that a person can only be educated if he is educated in the English language. Sir, there are thousands of people in Singapore-Chinese, Indians and Malays - who may not know the English language at all but who do not lack the ability nor the education to become leaders of the community. I do not see, Sir, why these people should be barred from sitting as Members of this Assembly. Sir, I support the motion. Question proposed.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I take pleasure in supporting the motion before the House. I wish the Chief Minister would not have taken credit for this motion or for many Bills which have been passed in this Assembly. I would like to deal with it first, Sir, because it has been stated by the Chief Minister. Sir, multi-lingualism was debated on this very Floor by the previous Legislative Council on the 28th of January, 1955. The motion was by a very intelligent local-born Indian, Mr C. R. Dasaratha Raj, and claiming a division, the voting for was: Ayes Mr M. P. D. Nair (who is here) Mr C. R. Dasaratha Raj Mr Thio Chan Bee (of the Progressive Party) Mr Lim Yew Hock (who is here) Mr R. Jumabhoy. Sir, this is nothing new. It is the duty of any government to lake up the threads of the past in the interests of the people. Sir, Malayanisation - this motion was moved by me on the 18th of November, 1952. Those who wish to see the report can have a look at it. This motion was accepted by the Government as a whole and an ad hoc committee was appointed under the chairmanship of Sir Han Hoe Lim. This has been further pursued by this Assembly. Sir, Labour Code - this was a piece of legislation which was prepared by the previous Legislative Council. It was left over in the hands of the caretaker Government to bring forward in this new Assembly. Sir, freezing of land values and the Master Plan - a lot of time and labour was devoted to these two subjects by the previous Government. They were also left over in the hands of the caretaker Government. The matter was taken up in1953, and my friend the Member for Seletar (Mr M. P. D. Nair) on a motion on 14th December, 1954, raised the question of land acquisition for a Second Reading. Sir, take the Employers and Employees Bill. This was brought into this Assembly by the Progressive Party, but what we have is the policy label of the Labour Government.

That is a Government Bill.

Given by the Progressive Party.

That is a Government Bill.

May I have the attention of the House, Sir, undisturbed?

Continue, Mr R. Jumabhoy.

I have enough of disturbance, Sir.

Please continue.

Sir, I think I have no doubt that I must give credit to the Labour Coalition Government for bringing in the Public Security Bill. Sir, coming to the motion now before the House, as I supported before, so am I supporting it now in the interests of the people. What should be the languages for this Assembly? We have got English. We, have got Malay which is spoken, not written, by almost all people. Then we have got Chinese. It is for the Chinese to decide what language is to be used. As far as the Indians are concerned, the majority of the Indians in this country are Tamil-speaking - over 70 per cent. The Indian community as a whole will gladly support the Tamil language. Then, Sir, the Chief Minister unfortunately brought in the subject of racial disharmony if this was to take place - it was only a possibility, he said - and he brought in Bombay also. Sir, I have just come back from Bombay. The disturbances there are not at all concerned with language. It is to have Bombay within its own state. It is just like Singapore should go to Johore or to Penang - something like that - but it has nothing to do with language. Sir, multi-lingualism has been practised successfully in Switzerland, and there is no cause for disharmony in this country as far as the Indians are concerned. As I have said, Sir, the majority of Indians here are Tamils and I must give them credit for the fact that in the partition days not a single case of murder took place in that area. So you will realise that the Indians have lived here peacefully for centuries, even before the British came in, with the other communities and they will preserve the same state of harmony and peace. Sir, what is happening in India today? Even though about ten per cent of the population, or even less, is English-speaking, and even though India has gained independence nearly nine years now, the English language is still maintained, although they have decided that in 15 or 20 years' time, by a slow process, they can replace it with the official language, Hindi. On the other hand, the provincial languages are allowed in all the respective provinces, that is, Hindi, English and any other provincial language. I think, when the Committee comes to consider the question of multi-lingualism, they will take a leaf out of India's book for study and guidance. Sir, what happens if and when a united Malaya comes? Well, that is for the future; what will be its language? Many may argue that that might wait. I do not think why it should wait. Things will take their own course. Sir, as in the previous Legislative Council, I wholeheartedly support this motion.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I rise to support the motion on behalf of the Liberal-Socialist Party. One of the objects in the Party's policy is the introduction of multi-lingualism in the Assembly, and in laying down that policy we had in mind precisely what this motion envisages, namely, that for the purposes of oral debate, the languages of the Assembly should be English, Malay, Mandarin and Tamil, it being implied that for the time being at least the written word should continue to be in English alone. I would also add that I do not subscribe to this view simply as a loyal Party man, but I have come to the personal belief that this is not a retrograde step, as some of us would like to believe, but a forward move in the best ultimate interests of the country. As the only elected European in this Assembly, I have to ask myself whether it is right to maintain, as the only vehicle of speech in the country's Legislature, a language which, while it can claim in some sense to be as indigenous as any other (if we take 1819 as the starting point in Singapore's history), is not the only living language on this island. And to this thought there must be added another one. Secondary school education in Government English schools was very badly neglected until the old Progressive Party began pressing for it in recent years, and thousands of citizens have not had adequate opportunities of learning the language in which they have at present to be proficient should they wish to play their part in public affairs. A third point then arises. In a country which is close to self-government, is it possible to resist the argument that it must have the right to choose the language or languages in which its elected representatives shall conduct the business of the Legislature? Common sense, quite apart from sentiment, supplies the answer. I now come to two objections which have been voiced on this subject. The first one is that it would be better to experiment with multi-lingualism, first at the local government level rather than in the Assembly. My own view is that there will be more practical difficulties encountered at the City Council level than in this House. Local government is concerned with more detailed matters, and even personal problems, than the Assembly; such things as unauthorised structures and frontages, hawkers and sewage connections and so on. Most of the discussions on these matters take place in Committees and not in open forum, and I can foresee the danger of a great slowing down in the work of the City Council if multi-lingualism is introduced without its difficulties having first been ironed out. I have had some experience of these difficulties as a Municipal Commissioner in an Indian city where the languages were English, Hindi and Urdu. We shall find difficulties in this House - I have no doubt. We shall have, to some extent, to learn new techniques of procedure, but I believe the snags, whatever they may be, can best be smoothed out here first under the able guidance of Mr Speaker. The second objection is that the introduction of multi-lingualism will tend to encourage racial consciousness and racial antagonisms. I believe that, given the abundance of goodwill which exists in Singapore and given expert interpreters of the highest standard, the very opposite may well prove to be the truth. I believe that, through spontaneous translation, we shall be drawn closer to the thoughts and the outlook of those from whom we are at the moment shut off from communication. Lack of understanding arises from the barriers of language, from asking people to speak in a language in which they cannot think freely, and from maintaining the exclusiveness which one language imposes. We support this motion and we ask for its early implementation, for it is the first step on the road to finding out for ourselves and of our own free choice the most suitable language or languages to be the lingua franca of the future, a problem over which we must hasten, but hasten slowly. As I stated in this House in the Budget session, all the four main languages and cultures are needed to make up that composite thing that can be called Malayan nationalism, and they must be regarded as complementary to each other and not as existing separately in water-tight compartments. Where we have gone wrong is in the propaganda so prevalent today - and I hope I give no offence, as I mean none - which postulates that Chinese culture and the Chinese system of education are the exclusive property of the Chinese and must not be tampered with; that Malay culture and Malay history are being deliberately obliterated; and that the English language and European customs, predominant for many years because of British rule, seek obstinately to maintain their predominance amid a growing Asian consciousness. The antagonisms which are being engendered by this propaganda are all the more intense because there is no single obvious lingua franca for an independent Singapore of the near future. Malay has claims, because it is the oldest living language of Malaya, is shared by the millions of our neighbours in Indonesia, and is spoken to some extent by the large majority of peoples living in Malaya of whatever race. Its handicap is that it has no common usage outside South-East Asia and it is not well enough equipped for the expression of modern scientific thought. Chinese, too, has claims, because it is spoken by roughly half the population of Singapore and Malaya, because of its long history, longer even than Malay or English, and its great cultural heritage. Its handicap is that it is not an indigenous language, is used almost exclusively by the Chinese people alone, and is not strongly equipped to cope with modern science, although I believe that this difficulty is to some extent being overcome. English has claims, because it is the language of international gatherings and modern scientific thought. Its importance is inescapable because of its contacts for us with the rest of the world. Its handicap, however, is that it bears the stigma, rightly or wrongly, of being the language of the now nearly defunct colonial era and because its culture is foreign and imposed from without. English is the present lingua franca. Whether it will remain so is not for me to say, but so long as English is the main language of international trade and commerce, and so long as Singapore is to retain its proud position as a leading international port - as indeed it must - it seems to me imperative that English remains the language of communication with the outside world. Lastly, Tamil, if I may be pardoned for saying so, has the least claim of the four main languages, simply because it happens to be spoken by the smallest number of people. And so let us recognise that the introduction of multi-lingualism in this House, however desirable today, is a makeshift and not the most important thing we have to do. The Liberal-Socialist Party considers that what we must do, and do with all possible speed, is to make our people multi-lingual by giving facilities to learn at least three languages, so that they can converse with one another and understand one another without interpreters and earphones. Let us indeed keep the proposed multi-lingual scheme down to the absolute minimum cost, so that most of our funds can go into welding together a composite nation through multi-lingual education. So when the day comes to choose a lingua franca, perhaps I may be pardoned for hoping that it may be English, partly out of sentiment no doubt, but mainly because I believe the English language is the greatest single living unifying force in the world today. But whether or no that will be the choice, the decision must come from the people themselves and not be imposed from without.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I had thought no Member of any political Party would offer outright opposition to the motion before the House, because it would be political suicide to do so - almost as bad as saying, "I like the British!"

I, too, like the British.

I freely admit - I was quoting the Chief Minister, Sir, actually in his initial speech in this House - that, prima facie, it seems reasonable that locally-born people should not be debarred from being elected to this Assembly simply because they do not speak English; but the Chief Minister himself has admitted that his proposal is bristling with difficulties. If we examine the motion, what do we find? We find that "for the purposes of oral debate the languages of the Assembly should be English, Malay, Mandarin and Tamil." The records, notices, Bills, etc., as the Member for Tanglin (Mr John Ede) has just said, would doubtless continue to be in English, and I think the Chief Minister has also intimated that possibly for a period of years the records might continue in English. In that interim period we could have the somewhat anomalous situation of a Member being elected to this House and taking part in the oral debates but being unable to understand a single word of the papers passed to him. The Chief Minister said yesterday that non-English speaking Ministers could have one or two secretaries, but what about the ordinary Assemblyman? He might find it rather difficult to employ a secretary on his Assemblyman's pay - a secretary that could produce adequate translations of all the papers that come to him even late at night for the next day's sitting, unless he had a talented and erudite wife who might do it in her spare time. Now, admittedly there might be Members in this House who were merely not fluent in English and whose oratorical powers were greater in their own language - I think there may be some such in this House today but on the other hand, a Member might - in the interim period I am talking about - be entirely illiterate in English. Now, Sir, what of the choice of languages other than English? If we must have more than one language, then it seems to me that the Malay tongue has at least the right of precedent. But the statement made by the Member for Telok Ayer (Mr R. Jumabhoy) and the Member for Tanglin (Mr Ede) that Malay is spoken by the great majority of the people in Singapore is, in my opinion, quite wrong. I do not myself believe that very many people in Singapore can speak Malay at all. When I say that, I mean a Malay that can be used as a vehicle in this House. If I may just introduce a little personal note, Sir? I was coming to the last sitting of this Assembly two months ago and it was pouring with rain. My syce turned to me and said, "Banyak hujan, tuan." I thought now, let us see. I wanted to say, "Well, of course, there will be a lot of rain, it is the North-east monsoon just now. What do you expect?" So I said. "Oh, Betul, sekarang angin dan Utara-Timor." He turned to me with a blank face, so I thought that that was no good. I then came into the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association room here - I am sorry that the Member for Telok Ayer is not in his place - and I said to Mr R. Jumabhoy, "You speak Malay?" He replied, "Of course, I speak Malay." So I asked him, "Well, what is 'Northeast' in Malay?" He replied, "Oh, I do not speak that kind of Malay!" Then I approached the Hon. the Financial Secretary who I thought must, at least as a civil servant, speak reasonably good Malay, and I said to him, "Mr Hart, what is 'North-east' in Malay?", and he said, "Oh, I do not know." The Chief Minister rose -

Point of order?

Point of order, Sir. I do regret interrupting these delightful reminiscences, Sir, but may I draw the attention of the House to the rule that no aspect of the conduct of a Member outside the House should be referred to in the House, and although it does not really matter at the moment, it is a principle, Sir, and it should be adhered to?

Will the Chief Minister indicate which Standing Order he is referring to?

If it please you, Sir, it is 31 (9). I should like clarification, Sir, because I have myself constantly refrained from the references, thinking that we cannot say what a Member of the House did outside.

That Standing Order reads: "The personal conduct of Members of the Assembly shall not be referred to except upon a substantive motion moved for that purpose." I hardly think that what a Member said or tried to say in respect of the Malay language is personal conduct! Mr Sutherland.

Sir, I regret the interruption.

Thank you, Mr Speaker, Sir. Of course, I could have refrained from using the actual names of the people. It was just giving verisimilitude to my story. Anyway, if I may finish it - the hon. Gentleman whom I mentioned last came back to me, having contacted a Malay and he said, "The word is Tenggara." Sir, I went back that evening and looked up my dictionary and found that Tenggara is South-east! Sir, if we must have another language, then I should have thought the Malay tongue would have some right of precedence for obvious reasons; but I really see no valid reason for complicating matters by introducing Mandarin and Tamil. And why Mandarin? If this were an entirely Chinese Assembly, then I could see some reason for wishing to synthesize the various Chinese dialects, but the Assembly is multi-racial. Sir, I know many people - not Chinese, of course - think that acquiring a knowledge of Mandarin is quite a simple thing. They know that the written ideograph is universally understood and they imagine that, by a little modification of the tones and adjustment of a few hundred vocables, then anyone, for example, a Hokkien, can, with very little trouble, speak Mandarin. But it is not nearly as simple as that. Sir, it is true that Mandarin is more widely understood today than it was 20 years ago, but there are tens of thousands of Chinese in this island who do not understand a word of it. To tell the truth, I was quite astonished yesterday to hear the Chief Minister say that most Chinese in Singapore thought it would be their truly representative Chinese language. To my mind, that sounded like a statement of the Chinese Chamber of Commerce! Sir, if a mono-lingual Member or Minister can have a secretary or two secretaries, then I do not really see why we should not have one or two extra translators, and instead of having Mandarin we could have Chinese Members speaking in Fukienese or Cantonese or Hainanese or any of the other dialect; and in this motion, for the word "Mandarin" we simply substitute "Chinese". It seems to me, as it refers to oral debates why only have Mandarin? Most of them do not understand it. Spoken Mandarin is not the mother tongue of more than a handful of local Chinese and there is no doubt, to my mind, that the epigrams of our hon. and learned Friends would certainly be susceptible of far better translation into local dialects. I must confess, Sir, that you may wonder whether I am supporting this motion or no. I do not feel very strongly about it. Epitomising as I do, at least in the mind of the Chief Minister, the Colonel Blimps of Singapore, I certainly do not wish to unleash on their heads the fateful lightning of his terrible rhetoric and in that connection he certainly stole the thunder of the P.A.P. yesterday with his references to "the vulture clutches of colonialism" and "the dead hand of colonialism" and his series of stinging indictments of the colonial regime. Only the Communists scored higher marks than my people yesterday. What is the point, Sir, of whipping oneself into a passion over these matters? I said it once and I will say it again - there has been no subjugation of races in this island. Apart from the Malays, the forbears of all Singaporeans came here of their own volition. In my opinion, that is all there is to it. Sir, I do not intend in this motion to be again in a minority of one. I would point out, however, that English is as good a vehicle for an Assembly such as this as one could have. It was the Chief Minister who said that if multi-lingualism does not become an accomplished fact in the near future, this island would explode like a hand-grenade. That sounds like hyperbole to me. I think it is also true to say that the language of the very nearly ex-colonial power will, of necessity, always be widely used in this island as long as we live by international trade. And if we do not live by international trade, we shall most certainly die. Finally, Sir, the Chief Minister's remarks about the Swiss Confederation. Although four languages are spoken there, the people are a closely knit ethnical unit, and their four languages are at least all of the Indo-European group. The proposal to have a multi-lingual Assembly in Singapore is indeed without analogy in any other part of the world, but a multi-lingual Assembly will not necessarily mean a Tower of Babel unless - I am sorry, he is absent again - the Member for Telok Ayer becomes unduly obstreperous. On the contrary, it will be, in my opinion, a quieter Assembly with Members' ears glued to earphones and listening to the phlegmatic translations of impassioned speeches. I greatly fear, Sir, that the effect of this motion, if carried, will be to render many debates in future completely sterile.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I must confess that I hesitated before rising to support this motion, because I am afraid that there may be some observation from both sides of the House that this motion will be of much benefit to me. I must admit that I am one of the few among the hon. Members in this House who cannot speak fluently the Queen's English. Mr Speaker, Sir, with your permission, may I borrow a sentence that has quite often been used by the Chief Minister? "Today is a great day for the people of Singapore!" This was in my mind when this motion was brought up introducing multi-lingualism into this House for the purposes of oral debate. I believe this is a great step forward in the democratic process in this country, because for the first time the Malay, Indian, and Chinese ketuas will have a chance to present their views in this House if they are lucky enough to be elected. The leaders of these three communities will know that their contribution is wanted. Therefore, I sincerely hope that not only will the 25 elected Members in this House wholeheartedly support this motion, but that the ex-officio Members and the nominated Members will also follow the step which the Chief Minister took yesterday when he said that he moved this motion not as the head of the Government but as the people's representative of Cairnhill. And he (the Hon. the Chief Minister), I wish to remind the whole House, is the representative of the minority of minorities. I am also happy that this motion is supported by the leader of the only communal political Party, the U.M.N.O., the Member for Ulu Bedok (Inche Abdul Hamid Bin Haji Jumat). I can go further. This motion also gets support from the Member for Tanglin (Mr Ede) and the "Member for Tanglin Club", the hon. Mr Sutherland. Sir, with your permission, I must say, because many a time the hon. Mr Sutherland has been accused by the P.A.P. gang as the "Member for Tanglin Club" - Mr Lee Kuan Yew (Tanjong Pagar) rose -

Point of order?

Point of order, Sir. Does the hon. Member understand the word "gang"?

It is hardly a point of order!

And whether it is proper to refer to hon. Members in this House - once they are in this House anyway - as a gang? They are quite unarmed!

The point of order is whether the word "gang" is or is not in order. I have been under the impression that the hon. Member has been speaking with his tongue in his cheek, and if that is so, then I do not see any objection to the word "gang".

Thank you, Mr Speaker, Sir. But this time I cannot not say that I am not going to support the statement that the hon. Mr Sutherland really is the "Member for Tanglin Club" because he says that Malay is not the popular language in this country, and he seems to deny that Malay is at least one of the popular languages in this country. Secondly, he seems to make out to be a linguistic expert when he says that Mandarin is not popular among the Chinese. From these two statements we could come to the conclusion that the hon. Mr Sutherland lives very far away from the people of Singapore. Therefore, I am sorry to classify him as the "Member for Tanglin Club". Mr Sutherland rose -

Point of order?

Point of order, Sir. Mr Speaker, Sir, I did not take objection in the first instance to this appellation, but I can - I think quite legitimately - consider it to be mildly opprobrious and therefore I would like him to withdraw it.

Is it not appropriate, the "Member for Tanglin Club"? [Interruption.]

Order, order. The point raised is whether or not the expression "Member for Tanglin Club" is offensive or insulting within the meaning of Standing Order 31 (4). It depends entirely on the context in which it is used, how it is used and how often it is used. But once objection has been taken to it by the hon. Member, I must rule that it does come within the meaning of the Standing Order and therefore I ask the hon. Member who is speaking not to use that expression again.

Thank you, Sir.

Mr Speaker, Sir, with your permission, when I address Mr Sutherland as the "Member for Tanglin Club", I have in mind the fact that he is a European expatriate, and I believe all the members of the Tanglin Club are European expatriates - hence he is the "Member for Tanglin Club".[Interruption.]

Order, order. The hon. Member must remember that that expression has been ruled out. It must not be used again.

I am sorry. I will withdraw the word. Now I wish to clarify two remarks which have been made by the Chief Minister's friend. First he asked, "What do the Chinese people know about democracy?" A platform does not entitle me to claim that I am a representative from the Chinese community alone. I cannot enjoy the privilege which the Hon. the Minister for Local Government, Lands and Housing can claim when he says, "I am the head of the U.M.N.O. and I represent the Malay community here." But I am a Chinese. I think it is my duty to defend all this - that when that friend of the Chief Minister said that the Chinese people in this country know nothing about democracy, he is entirely wrong. The last election clearly proved that the Chinese in this country are the most non-communal-minded voters. They voted according to their conscience. They elected their truly respected leaders. You can see that for yourselves on the Government Front Bench. Is it because the Chinese outnumber the other races? No! Take the representative from Cairnhill, the Hon. the Chief Minister. He is a minority among the minorities, and, as I have said, yet he was voted in. And the majority of the Cairnhill voters belong to the Chinese community. Therefore I strongly object to the information which the Chief Minister has given to us - that the Chinese know nothing about democracy.

On a point of personal explanation, Sir,I did not associate myself with that opinion.

I am well aware that the Chief Minister did not believe that, but I only want to clarify it, that is all. Secondly, the same gentleman said that the Chinese schools in Amoy are exactly the same as in Singapore. That has also no foundation at all. In this connection, I think the Hon. the Minister for Education can give us a very clear picture. The curricula and the textbooks in Amoy are entirely different from those in Singapore. These are the only two points I just wish to clarify as a Chinese representative.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I rise to support the motion moved by the Hon. the Chief Minister. Today, Sir, with the introduction of this motion moved by the Chief Minister, the Labour Front, with the aid of its Coalition partners, is seeking to fulfil yet another promise that it has made to the people of Singapore. Sir, I speak today not as a Member of the Government but as one who has been elected by all communities in the Stamford Division. The majority of the voters in the Stamford Division are Chinese, and I can say rightly, Sir, that they do not have the faintest idea of swamping the other communities, but that they believe in the democratic process and the party system. That was shown in the last election. Sir, though I have been elected by all communities, yet - and I do not want it to be misunderstood - I must say that I have been in close contact (it is natural) with Indian opinion in Singapore, and though the Indians are in the minority, I can safely say, Sir, so far as I have heard, their opinion is that they are all in support of this motion, and that they are happy and willing to co-operate that Tamil is going to be chosen as the language for the Indians. Sir, today the people of Singapore must be happy at the freedom that will be given to them from the restrictive shackles of being confined to one language. Today, Sir, the doors of the Assembly are going to be opened to those who have the ability, but because of their limitation of the knowledge of English, they do not qualify to sit and legislate on behalf of the people of Singapore. Sir, with due respect to the Member for Telok Ayer (Mr R. Jumabhoy), I wish to refer to one or two points that he has made. Sir, my principle has always been to give credit where it is due. Quotations have been given to us of legislation that was pending when the last Legislative Council was dissolved, and therefore it was stated that it was no credit to this Government to have carried forward the same legislation. Sir, there is one vital difference, and that is that many of the measures, like the Labour Code, have been brought to this House by the present Government with vital changes in them, so that the whole tone of these measures has been changed. Sir, it was thought that the credit should be taken away from this Government and that its efforts should be belittled. But, Sir, the last Legislative Council had the opportunity to discuss this subject of multi-lingualism and only one Member from the Progressive Party voted in favour of it. Sir, they had the chance to throw the doors open to everyone in Singapore who had the ability, but they did not take that chance. Sir, I do believe that credit must be given where it is due, and I say, Sir, that this credit should go to the Labour Front and its partners for bringing in this measure. Sir, the hon. Mr Sutherland made the point that after multi-lingualism has been established, the papers will still be in one language and therefore many Members will fail to understand one word of it. Sir, that is the reason why the Chief Minister is recommending the appointment of a Committee to go into the question thoroughly, and if it feels that it is necessary, it can recommend the creation of posts for translators and so on, so that there will be adequate translation facilities for Members who cannot understand English.

Mr Speaker, Sir, the speeches that I have heard this morning make me more than convinced that we should not delay the introduction of multi-lingualism in this Assembly. In our cosmopolitan Singapore the lifting of the restriction on the use of the English language only in the Legislative Assembly will go a long way towards making future elections to this Assembly truly representative. The language restriction, in effect, has created two classes of citizens. Those who speak English fluently are able to vote and also stand for election, and those who cannot speak English or speak English with insufficient fluency are able to vote but are not qualified to be elected. Such a form of government which divides the people of Singapore must be done away with as soon as possible. There are among us many, many loyal and able citizens who are educated either in Chinese. Malay or Tamil and who will no doubt make as good legislators as those who speak English, if they are given the opportunity. I therefore hope that all hon. Members of this House will, without hesitation, rise to support the motion moved by the Hon. the Chief Minister, who has the good intention of giving equal justice to all races.

Mr Speaker, Sir, when the Labour Front stood for election last year, it had, as its aims and principles, the provision of multi-lingual facilities in this Government and local councils. Today we see that this aim is achieved by having before us a motion to introduce four languages for oral debates. I should say that this is due to the efforts of the Chief Minister and his delegation that went to the United Kingdom recently. This country is a country with many nationalities, and several languages are spoken, including many dialects of the several languages, and if this Assembly is supposed to be a representative body of all people, then the languages of all people should be spoken in this Assembly. Many arguments have been put forward by those who opposed the introduction of multi-lingualism before the elections, and the reason why they opposed it was because they feared that much time would be wasted in the interpretation of speeches from one language to another. From my experience recently at the Labour Front conference - though I am on the opposite side now - I feel that there is no interruption at all. I have gained a lot of experience that simultaneous interpretation of speeches could be carried out very smoothly, and the procedure at that conference was not at all in the least interrupted. A large majority of our younger generation do not have an English education, but, as the Hon. the Minister for Local Government, Lands and Housing has said, they are fit to run local government or central government. Why bar them because of the language difficulty? Let us, as legislators of this country, open the door and pave the way so that when they grow up there will be no language difficulty and they can take an active part in the running of the country. As a firm believer of democracy, I am pledged to the electorate on the platform where I stood and I think that it is the duty of every citizen here and every Member of this House to support this motion. I strongly support the motion.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I do not want to flog a dead horse. Multi-lingualism has been one of the big issues since the Rendel Commission. It has killed one political Party and has changed the whole complex of political life of Singapore. But to get our historical perspective right, I think it might be useful, in view of the disclosure of the Chief Minister yesterday that he wrote a memorandum to the Rendel Commission, if we could get the facts in their proper chronological order. I have had access to the Singapore Standard library and I have with me here a file of all the letters to the Press, news reports and memoranda connected with the Rendel Commission. It is with some nostalgia that I look at some of these reports, for I know the people who were responsible for these reports and for the publication of these reports. The issue was first raised by the Singapore Senior Officers Association in their memorandum handed to the Rendel Commission on the 28th of November, 1953, and published in the Singapore Standard on the 30th of November, 1953. They said: "Experience has shown that there is a large element of the population who are British subjects, who have been permanently resident in the Colony for many years, and who do not participate in the legislative processes open to them because they are unable to speak the English language. On the other hand, there is a much smaller number of postwar emigrants who are British subjects who have been able, because of a slight command of the English language and the absence of any residential qualification, to gain an influence in local political activities out of all proportion to their numbers and their actual ability. It is inconceivable that such elements, known locally as birds of passage with loyalties elsewhere, should under the constitution be allowed such scope in the political arena; whereas others with very much better claims are debarred from a fuller participation in the legislative processes by this language bar." A few days later member unions of the Council of Joint Action - a virile and vigorous body of which I think the Hon. the Chief Secretary must have happy memories, sent in a memorandum to the Rendel Commission. It is like reading something that was written in a different age. This memorandum was submitted by the Working Class Employees Unions of the Singapore Government. May I read just the relevant passages? In this memorandum they explained the difficulties against organised labour expressing itself. They said: "There is a second handicap with which organised labour has to contend. It is this: The official language of the Legislature is English. Since the proportion of English-speaking people in the Colony is very small - some ten per cent - it is clear that the language restriction serves to confine political leadership to this small section of the population. The effect of the present arrangement has been disastrous so far as the working class movement is concerned. The movement has to rely for its leaders, or at least as its spokesmen in the Legislature, on members of the English-educated minority. There are two main Parties in Singapore - " This was then, Mr Speaker, 1953, - "the Progressive Party and the Singapore Labour Party." They are both dead now! "The first, namely, the Progressive Party, is, to judge by its actions in the Legislative Council and elsewhere, as distinct from its electoral blandishments, the local counterpart of the Conservative Party in Britain, though, of course, it receives nothing like the mass support which the British Conservative Party enjoys. Organised labour recognises the right of a Right-wing political Party to exist in a democratic system, but it obviously cannot place any great confidence in such a Party to advance the cause of the working class. The alternative at present open to the labour movement is the Singapore Labour Party. Grave doubts have recently been expressed as to whether this Party exists other than in name. Certainly its activities, so far as the public is aware, consist mainly of sensational resignations, expulsions, charges and counter-charges in public of petty intrigues within the Party caucus. They have reduced the Party to a state where it is regarded with open derision by members of the public in general and members of the working class in particular. The main cause of the deplorable state in which organised labour has found itself in the political scene of Singapore is clear. The real leaders of the labour movement in Singapore, as it is elsewhere, are those who are thrown up in the evolution of the movement to positions of leadership by their fellow workers. These natural leaders are, however, prevented from active participation in the political institutions of this Colony by the rule in the Legislative Council Standing Orders that the language of the Council is English. The result has been to give scope to all manner of opportunists and adventurers who speak the English language and who proclaim themselves to be sympathetic to the labour movement. Some of these have contrived to obtain for themselves nominal leadership of the labour movement. The result is only what one could expect, though it can hardly be the one as is intended by those who framed the present constitution. We therefore urge the Commission, with all the emphasis at our command, to make provision in the new constitution for various languages to be spoken in the Assembly. The difficulties are largely technical and may be solved by providing earphones and translators. Simultaneous translations of speeches may be arranged at Council meetings. For the paper work necessary in the management of public affairs, written translations could be arranged without great inconvenience or cost, and in Committee meetings the services of a few interpreters may be necessary. It is a trite, but, nevertheless, true statement that Singapore is a cosmopolitan city with people of many ethnic and linguistic origins. The participation of the natural leaders of the people in public affairs of the Colony cannot be achieved unless due regard is paid to the range of languages spoken here." And so they went on to ask: "The actual languages for which it may be necessary to arrange translations in the Legislative Council meetings are a matter of detail which could be settled without undue difficulty. We suggest that the following languages and dialects be regarded as the accepted medium of expression in the Legislature - English, Malay, Tamil, two or three Chinese dialects, e.g., Mandarin, Hokkien and Cantonese." In January that year these Unions made oral representations before the Rendel Commission. I remember the story in the Singapore Standard dated 15th January, 1954: "Demand for a multi-lingual Legislature for Singapore was made in three languages by three trade unionists at the first open session of the Rendel Constitution Commission at the Victoria Memorial Hall yesterday. The unionists stressed that the language barrier placed on candidates standing for elections to the Legislative and City Councils was preventing genuine workers' representatives from entering the Councils. The three workers' representatives - Mr K. M. Byrne, Mr A. K. Karipaya and Inche Ismail Bin Bajee - declared that Singapore was being ruled by an English-speaking minority of ten per cent of the total population." That is how it began, Sir. Looking back now, I do not think that those who drafted the memoranda which they presented to the Rendel Commission fully realised the depths of the problem that had been facing Singapore all this while. We have heard today how everybody feels that the demand for a multi-lingual Legislature is reasonable and just. But for two years there was bitter and fierce opposition put up by one of the English-language papers and backed, unfortunately disastrously for that Party, by the English-speaking middle class. They went to town with it and they were thrown out. The Progressive Party is today dead. They have become Lib-Soc. They have become Liberals ad lib. They now say they believe in multi-lingualism and, with a touch of drama, they get their sole European-elected representative to come here and put forward in reasonable language why this is as it should be. But I think we should congratulate the hon. Mr Sutherland for nailing the lie. He says he is not afraid of what will happen to him. He is not elected. He does not care. The others are elected - The Chief Minister rose -

Point of order?

Point of order, Sir. With respect, it is true that they are in the Opposition. They held views. They may have changed their views. To speak of "nailing the lie", I respectfully suggest, is not the proper procedure under our rules.

An objection has been taken by the Chief Minister and I must deal with that objection. The objection, as I take it, is that the use of the phrase "nailing the lie" in respect of Members of this Assembly is out of order. I must rule that it is, in fact, out of order and should never have been used.

As you please, Mr Speaker, Sir, it is tiresome to listen to these finickity objections on points of order - however I must abide by your ruling. However, I think I have conveyed enough to this House to show that what really is behind this demand is a force of some 300,000 people who have voted unequivocably for multi-lingualism. Everyone of us who has to go back to his constituency in the not too distant future must have this in mind. So we have heard all these blandishments that nobody need take any credit for it - "I am speaking for Cairnhill." "I am speaking for Stamford." "I am speaking for Ulu Bedok." "I am not the Government." "We represent the voters." But comes the Member for Stamford who says, "We must give credit where credit is due." That credit, I think, must be due to the few who work with these unions and who wrote that memorandum. For purposes of record. I have recounted the beginnings of this issue. When they started it, they did not realise that it was going to grow into such enormous proportions and reach a point where the whole political structure of our constitution would change radically. When they wrote this memorandum, they had in mind a transitory period where we would have a multiplicity of languages, hoping that the time would come when we would all be one homogeneous, linguistic whole. But ethnic, linguistic and racial forces are more powerful than the thoughts - rational and logical even though they may be - of an English-educated minority. This issue has brought forward real and deep problems which we must face not tomorrow but now. We have to decide for ourselves the basis of the society upon which an independent Malaya is to rest. We have heard, and, as far as I am concerned, with considerable amusement, the last ditch stand by the hon. Mr Sutherland. There is something engaging about the Scots - they are doughty warriors and they go down fighting. "I believe in what I believe, and I believe in English. It is the best language and let us have no nonsense with North-East monsoons and South-West monsoons! We all know what we are talking about when we talk English, but when we talk one of these bazaar languages we get all mixed up!" I thought to myself then - what great luck that this Assembly should constantly be reminded of what it might have been if all those who had won the election were those who had supported the point of view of the hon. Mr Sutherland. We would have seen a wonderful facade, a legislature completely divorced from the people, and without the slightest knowledge of what was going on in the hearts and minds of the people. I thought to myself also then - what an incredibly dangerous thing to have admitted - that a hundred years of British domination had reduced the Malay language to such a pitiable state of disrepair! It cannot even express "North-East monsoon", and therefore we should abandon it! Mr Speaker, Sir, 70 million Indonesians in Indonesia have officially abolished the Dutch language, abjured forever their desire to speak Dutch, introduced a new language because they hated the Dutch, and still hate the Dutch, and are actively building up their language and their literature. This is a matter where I think that white men would be wise not to rush in. If they want to be friends with the local people, they must understand why they are and what they are. They must know that there is one urge stronger than any other in Asia, and that is the assertion of Asians in Asia and in the world. That was the spirit of the Bandung Conference. The demarcation line there was not Communism, anti-Communism, pro-Communism or non-Communism. There was a bigger denominator. We are the dispossessed. We have been that for the last century. They said the yellow man was a coward, the black man was a fool, and the brown man was lazy. One cannot expect these natives to work democracy. What can one do with their languages? In Bandung, Asia and Africa symbolised for all Asians and Africans the spirit of the new Asia and the new world. If the white man does not believe that the yellow man, or the brown man or the black man can do it, they are going to show it to him in a very swift and decisive manner. So, apart from the emotional symbols, the paraphernalia of building up a coherent and cohesive state, there is the question of the national language. It is something more than just learning about the North-East monsoon. It is something which becomes part of the way of life, of the thoughts of a whole race, of a whole people. That is why the Chief Minister and his kin can go back to Israel today and speak Hebrew after 2,000 years of being chased all over the world. They can go back to Israel and they can speak Hebrew, which they have kept alive. When we take this step today, we must understand that it is irreversible, unless at the point of the bayonet, and even that would not work for long. We must remember that there are deeper and wider implications and that is why, in our All-Party Education Report on Chinese education, we could not confine ourselves to the problem of Chinese education. The whole thing is tied up with what kind of Malaya we are to have, and I hope the most constructive suggestion made in this Education Report is that which provides that whichever stream of education you enter, you should come out at the end of that stream in one confluence. We have here a proposal that if a boy goes to an English-language school, he shall immediately also learn his mother language. He shall do that for the whole of his school life. In his secondary school he will opt for one more of the four languages that will be offered him - Malay, Mandarin, Tamil or such other language as the Indian community will decide for themselves, and English as the first foreign language. Let us face facts. Pandit Nehru (and I think few non-Europeans can claim to have the same facility of expression in the English language as Mr Nehru) has said that every time he speaks in the English language he feels ashamed that he is a product of a colonial society, that he has not a command of his own language as he has of English. We have decided that no boy in Singapore - and we hope in Malaya - will ever be in the predicament in which some Members in this House find themselves - the products of the English-educated colonial system. So this scheme is devised in order that whatever school a boy goes into - if it is Malay, he will learn two other languages: if it is Chinese, he will learn two other languages; if it is Tamil or Hindi, he will learn two other languages. And we hope that, with the content of the textbooks and the whole approach the same, then at the confluence of the four streams of education we will have a Malayan as homogeneous as it is culturally and ideologically possible in a multi-racial society. That is one of the most difficult and one of the most important problems of Malaya, and the only people who can solve that problem are the people of Malaya themselves. However much we may be pleased at the European elected Member, however much we may be amused by the European nominated Member, those of us who are Asians and who are elected have the task not only of satisfying an emotional urge of the people but also of guiding that urge along lines which will lead to a cohesive, structurally sound and stable Malaya. When Mr Sutherland said, for instance, "Mandarin, they do not speak it! I know they do not! I know! I have been there and I know it! They speak Hokkien and Teochew! ", he completely failed to understand that it is something deeper. It is a primordial urge. The East has said, "We shall assert ourselves." And one of the ways in which the East is asserting itself is the rejuvenation of its languages and its cultures. We have here today in Malaya three main cultural and linguistic streams - Malay-Indonesian, Chinese and Indian. We are at the confluence of these streams. We have the problem of building up a nation just at the moment when the three outside sources of these civilisations have themselves blossomed forth as international forces. We are trying to build a Malaya when there is an India which is growing more powerful and more industrialised every day. We have a China which is growing more powerful and more organised every day. And so with Indonesia. As for the six to seven million Chinese, Indians and Malays in Malaya, we have to ask ourselves whether our paths lie in reverting back to the lands of our forbears, or whether our future lies in seeking some common way which will be acceptable to all and which would make a democratic Malaya a thing to be proud of. We have to have faith in "unity in diversity" because, if we do not believe that, then we will have to despair and we will have to leave it to the gods. We do not believe in leaving it to the gods. We believe in channelising, marshalling, and understanding these forces in order that we can bring them together to build this Malaya. Mr Speaker, Sir, my Party, and I am not speaking just as the Member for Tanjong Pagar - it is part of the programme of my Party - believes in multi-lingualism. We have said in our Party manifesto that Malay will be the lingua franca because it is the easiest language; but we have also said that Mandarin and the Indian language (whatever language the Indians may opt for) shall be part of the official languages of the country. This is my Party's policy, not my individual thought, my personal quirks, my personal idiosyncrasies. We believe in it because we believe therein lies the way to salvation. I have great pleasure in supporting this motion with this one proviso-that so far as the Tamil language is concerned, it should be opened to the Indian community to make representations to the Select Committee to choose some other Indian language if they so desire. In our Report on Chinese Education, signed by all the parties, we stated that it would appear that Tamil is the most widely spoken language, but that if for reasons of national convenience they wish to choose some other language for their children to study, then it should be open to the Indian community to make representations as to what particular language they wish to have in the Assembly. Mr Speaker, Sir, we support this motion.

Mr Speaker, Sir, a great Chinese philosopher once said, "A complete man blushes when credit is given to him for any good that he has done." It is perhaps difficult to find a complete man amongst the elected Members. We will have to look amongst the nominated Members to find a complete man. I would like to refer, Sir, to one of the remarks made by the hon. Mr Sutherland, and that is whether it is altogether wise to restrict the Chinese language to Mandarin. The older generation of Chinese either do not speak Mandarin or do not understand Mandarin. They have various dialects of their own-Hokien, Teochew, Cantonese and others. I do not say that Mandarin will not be acceptable to the Chinese as a whole, but to restrict the Chinese dialect only to Mandarin may mean excluding a great number of the older Chinese who might be useful in an Assembly of this nature.

Mr Speaker, Sir, in one of the most brilliant speeches delivered yesterday, the Chief Minister reiterated his belief in "justice for all" in Singapore. That has been well received by almost all sections of the people in Singapore, and I do not think that there is very much for me to add to what the Chief Minister already stated yesterday. My constituents have always told me that they desire this Assembly to be a multi-lingual Assembly, so that more of them could take part in the public affairs of this Colony, and, as such, I am bound to support this motion. I personally believe that this principle of "justice for all" is very good for the unity of the people of this country, because it will enable them to build a united Malayan nation in the very near future. I do hope that this principle will stand for all time in any future constitution for Malaya and Singapore. In regard to the language for the Indians in this Assembly, Tamil has been recommended. I feel sure that all the Indians will agree that the majority of the Indian population do speak Tamil, and that there will not be much quarrel about this language being introduced into this Assembly. If, however, any other section of the Indian community would make representations to the Select Committee that a language other than Tamil should be introduced, I am sure the Select Committee would consider their representations. Sir, I have the privilege of supporting this motion.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I rise to support this motion. It is the policy of my Party -

Which Party?

- the Liberal-Socialist Party, the new Party that will have the support of all in Singapore, because it represents all shades of opinion and represents all races. This is the Party that will be supported by all races because it does not seek to depart - Mr J. M. Jumabhoy rose -

Point of order?

Sir, is this debate relating to a Party or to the motion before the House?

In answer to your question -

Order. I am afraid the hon. Member invited those remarks. Mr Lim Choon Mong.

I shall not dwell too much on that, Sir. I will get back to the debate. In this world today we fight for equality. We find that the Western world have always said that they are the champions of democracy. Indeed, Sir, we are also fighting for that ideal. That ideal, however, must embrace at least a few fundamental points. It must embrace freedom of action and freedom of expression. We do not in Singapore restrict people outside this Assembly from speaking whatever they like to speak, but in this Assembly, however, we do confine them to the English language. Such freedom of speech, Sir, I would say is not effective. It is not what the people want. The ideals of the people, their aspirations, must be allowed to reach the masses, to reach the highest of Government organs, and it is therefore important that the people of this country should be allowed to speak and express their opinions in their own languages. Many people in this country feel that there are practical difficulties on the introduction of multi-lingualism, but I ask you, Sir, in whatever matter that we are starting, is there no difficulty? There must be difficulties in the beginning of everything. If we happen to be the first to meet with such difficulties, then we must have the courage and conviction to carry on and overcome such difficulties, and make the project work. We may not work at full efficiency at the beginning, but it is my hope - and I know - that in the end it will work. I know that this will come if it is implemented by the Ministry of Education. I have a hope that one day we will be able to converse with people of all races, who comprise the population of Singapore and Malaya, in any language whatsoever. I have had a bit of experience here and there, and I do know that in Singapore today there are many who are equipped with a knowledge of more than one language; in effect, they speak two, three or four languages. Today it may be possible for us to speak to an Englishman in Malay and make him understand it, although he may not be able to express himself in Malay; and the Englishman may be able to speak to a Malay or a Chinese in English and the other person may understand it, although he may not be able to express himself in English. It is just another step forward whereby another person may be made or persuaded to learn more languages than one. I think it is essential that multi-lingual education should be introduced to make this scheme of a multi-lingual Assembly successful. I will say, Sir, that every person in this world has his pride, and also his prejudice - pride and prejudice. I, let us say, am a European. I happen to know the English language and no other. I therefore say that the English language is the best. If I happen to be a Malay, I am proud of being a Malay, and I will say that the Malay language is the best. And so it is with the Chinese and the other communities. Such prejudices must be broken. We must see that we should have a more open mind and that can only be achieved, Sir, by knowing the languages of other races. If we should know more languages, we would be able to understand the cultures and the points of view of the other sections of the people that comprise Singapore. If we should know and understand other people, then indeed, Sir, it would work towards a more harmonious Singapore. This, I believe, should be the aim of everybody inside and outside the Assembly, and in contrast to that, Sir, there may be people who want to champion one race and make that race hate another, just for their political ends and their own selfishness. I think these people will do harm to the whole nation. The people of Singapore must recognise such leaders as people who are not going to do them good but people who may, by such action, cause bloodshed in the future. Not only must we unite the people of Singapore by language and break the barrier in this cultural life, we must also break the preaching of hatred of class. We must break the people who say, "I represented the workers. I wrote all the memoranda for them. You must go against all the other people who are stopping us from getting what we should get." These people, Sir, are not actually giving the workers what they want. Just as they are going to divide the people of Singapore by race, they will agitate the workers to go on strike and make them suffer, and they still call themselves champions. In Singapore we want harmony, racial harmony, harmony between capital and labour. We must weld Singapore into one strong nation with only one aim - that aim being for the betterment of Singapore and not for ourselves. Coming back again, Sir, I would say that if multi-lingualism is going to be introduced into the Assembly, then I think the Assembly will be able to get within its ranks people who are the natural leaders of the people. I have been going round the whole of Singapore. I have visited villages. I have visited shops right in the centre of the town, and I have always noted that in every locality there are one or two or more people whose opinions are valued, and they are, in fact, doing a great deal of work, leading the people there. Looking at Singapore as a bigger whole, Sir, I believe and I know that there are people whom all Singapore respect, but because of the language barrier they cannot come into this Assembly to make their contributions for the country. It is not a loss to these people but it is a loss to Singapore that we could not have the services of such good men. But taking away the language barrier, I believe that this Assembly will be filled by representatives who are nearer and dearer to the hearts of the people. Sir, for these reasons, I support the motion before the House. Question put, That this Assembly is of the opinion that for the purposes of oral debate the languages of the Assembly should be English, Malay, Mandarin and Tamil; and that a Select Committee be appointed to examine, report upon and make recommendations in respect of matters necessary to enable effect to be given to the proposal. Hon. Members: Division, Sir.

Clear the lobbies. The House divided: Ayes, 29; Noes, nil; Abstentions, 3. Ayes Abdul Hamid Bin Haji Lim, R. C. H. Jumat. Lim Koon Teck. Ahmad Bin Ibrahim. Lim Yew Hock. Braga, A. J. Mak Pak Shee. Chew Swee Kee. Marshall, D. S. Ede, John. Mohd. Sidik Bin Haji Goh Chew Chua. Abdul Hamid. Goh Tong Liang. Nair, M. P. D. Jumabhoy, J. M. Ong Piah Teng. Jumabhoy, R. Seah Peng Chuan. Lazarous, A. R. Sutherland, G. A. P. Lee Choon Eng. Tan Theng Chiang. Lee Kuan Yew. Tan, William. Lim Cher Kheng. Thomas, Francis. Lim Ching Siong Wong Foo Nam. Lim Choon Mong. Noes Absentions Nils Butterfield, C. H. Goode, W. A. C. Hart, T. M.

Sir, on a point of order. Is a Member permitted to vote contrary to the expressions of opinion made by him during a debate?

He is converted!

The only point that hon. Members must remember is that, on the call for voices, if they do say "Aye" they cannot change that opinion when the division is taken. An hon. Member can, in fact, as has been stated by another hon. Member, be converted! Resolved, That this Assembly is of the opinion that for the purposes of oral debate the languages of the Assembly should be English, Malay, Mandarin and Tamil; and that a Select Committee be appointed to examine, report upon and make recommendations in respect of matters necessary to enable effect to be given to the proposal.

May I suggest, Sir, that the House stand adjourned until 2.30 p.m.?

This is an appropriate time. I shall therefore suspend the sitting until 2.30 p.m. Sitting accordingly suspended at 12.05 p.m. until 2.30 p.m. Sitting resumed at 2.30 p.m.

Mr Speaker, Sir, in moving this motion before the House which reads, That this House approves in principle the introduction of commercial television in Singapore by the issue of an exclusive licence to a commercial undertaking without charge on public funds but subject to control by the Government, I wish to emphasise that this is not strictly a Government policy and therefore hon. Members are free to vote according to their convictions. Singapore today, by virtue of its strategic position in South-East Asia, is a commercial centre and is like a department store. It is therefore not unnatural for the management of this great commercial house to decorate its frontage to attract customers and to display as many attractive goods as possible in the interior. The management is you, upon whom lies the decision whether or not to modernise this attractive city by providing, at no expense at all to Government, this modern form of entertainment. Singapore is a modern city and we must keep up with the march of time in other countries where television is already a common thing. Hon. Members will no doubt have read Sessional Paper No. Cmd. 32 of 1955 in which all three tenders submitted to Government have been published for information. The public have been given two months within which to submit their tenders and only three tenders have so far been submitted. From them, several factors are clear to us. Firstly, it needs a large capital to set up a station without the slightest prospect of making a profit at the outset. Secondly, the licensee must have a supply of entertainment material to keep its programmes popular. Thirdly, the commercial value of Singapore will be boosted up and the benefits to the public in the form of tourist attraction will be immense. As the House is not asked to approve any particular tender, I need not go into the merits or demerits of each tender submitted. It is clear, anyway, to Members of this House which of the tenders reflects seriousness of thought. In advocating the acceptance in principle of commercial television in Singapore, I am not unaware of the opposition to an entirely commercialised operation. The main objection to such an undertaking is that a commercial television firm will not be able to resist attempts by advertisers to advertise their goods at programme time when viewers are not at all interested in such advertisements, thereby sacrificing programme content to the control of commercial interests without regard to the general benefits accruing to viewers. Surely, the operators are alive to this prospect and it is in their own interests to ensure that the likes and dislikes of the general public are treated with priority instead of their having to bow to the whims and fancies of advertisers. On this matter, it may be argued that the Press accept advertisements but they remain responsible for their news and editorial columns. Cinemas show advertisements during the interval but their programmes are not sponsored by advertisers. It has been argued that a private company cannot remain unbiased in the field of politics, but against this there is the proviso that in matters of public policy the Government has control over them. The company will not be allowed to put forth its own political or religious views to the public as is done in the United Kingdom. Government will see that this policy is strictly adhered to. There is also the objection that with this most powerful means of mind influencing in the hands of an unscrupulous undertaking, caution will be thrown to the winds and we will see only trash entertainment, such as gangster films, cowboy pictures and the like. It is suggested that during electioneering campaigns, commercial undertakings might flash across the T.V. screens pictures of certain candidates in whom the T.V. owners are interested. It is because of such possibilities that Government retains control in matters of public policy. Another safeguard against this is by way of legislation which prohibits such programmes. I wish to draw the attention of hon. Members to the United Kingdom Television Act of 1954. Section 3 of the Act ensures: "That nothing is included in the programme which offends against good taste or decency or is likely to encourage or incite to crime or to lead to disorder or to be offensive to public feeling or which contains any offensive representation of or reference to a living person." It goes on to say: "That the programmes maintain a proper balance in their subject matter and a high general standard of quality; That any news given in the programmes in whatever form is presented with due accuracy and impartiality; That the programmes broadcast from any station or stations contain a suitable proportion of matter calculated to appeal especially to the taste and outlook of persons served by the station or stations; That due impartiality is preserved on the part of the persons providing the programmes as respects matters of political or industrial controversy or relating to current public policy." Sub-section (4) further says: "That items designed to give publicity to the needs or objects of any association or organisation conducted for charitable or benevolent purposes, reviews of literary, artistic or other publications or productions including current entertainments will not be treated as an advertisement." Legislation of this nature will make it possible to appoint Advisory Committees, to advise against any offensive religious matters, to advise Government as to misleading advertisements, and to give advice as to the principles to be followed in connection with the broadcasting of suitable programmes intended for children and young persons. In the United Kingdom it is the Government which supplies all the equipment necessary for transmitting television, thus incurring capital expenditure, but in Singapore we are only asked to approve in principle an exclusive licence to a commercial undertaking which will supply its own equipment and bear all the recurrent expenditure. Another aspect of the value of T.V. is the cultural and educational side of the programme. In this, the Government will certainly make use of the free time allotted for cultural and educational programmes. This is a form of visual aid to education which is entirely different from a radio broadcast. I do not mean to say that educational programmes are an answer to the many problems facing us as regards the education of our young ones but they are at least a supplementary to what they are already learning. Any visual aid to education conducted on proper lines and based on a Malayan background can be very useful to youths to supplement their knowledge. Cultural shows depicting the several cultures of the Malayan races that form the population of this country can be systematically put across the television screen, thus bringing to life the various aspects of culture of educational value which cannot be depicted by the radio. Television incorporates, I understand, two systems of transmission, one by sound and one by signal. In times of war, any message by the signal system can be flashed across the screen without fear of being picked up by the enemy. Once the principle in granting a licence to a commercial undertaking is accepted by the House, Government will assume the responsibility of ensuring that the wishes of this House are carried out by the licensee. It will then be necessary to enact legislation, part of which I have read out just now, so that provision can be made to control the nature of the programmes, advertisements, etc. Sir, I beg to move

Mr Speaker, Sir, I second the motion and reserve my right to speak at a later period. Question proposed.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I am glad that it is the Minister for Education of the Labour Front Coalition Government and not the Minister for National Amusement and Entertainment who is moving this resolution. I am glad to be reassured that there are people in the Labour Front who understand that television is one of the most powerful weapons for influencing human minds, whether for good or for evil. There are times when many of those on my side of the House have despaired as to whether there are such people in the Labour Front. Recently when we heard that a teacher, who is a specialist in teaching mental defectives, was being employed to reorganise the Labour Front, we thought that things had come to a very sorry state indeed. However, we are amused that the Minister for Education has undertaken the task of putting forward to this House the proposition that this powerful weapon for the education of our young and old should be left to a commercial undertaking. We have just published an All-Party Education Committee Report in which all Parties, fortunately, were able to arrive at a unanimous agreement. The Committee agreed that education is the most important weapon in forging a Malayan nation and that it cannot be left to the whims and idiosyncrasies of any commercial tycoon or groups of them. The Hon. the Chief Minister told the House yesterday that seven million televiewers were glued to their television sets whilst the great statesman from Singapore walked across the world stage in London. I wonder, Sir, whether he realised how many of those televiewers would have seen him walking across the world stage if there were not an independent British corporation which runs television -

And a commercial.

And a commercial - we shall come to that by and by. The commercial one is not quite so successful and I shall give the reasons for the resignation of one of the big men engaged in the commercial undertaking. But I am surprised that a Socialist Party should put forward the proposition that a public utility - and television is no more no less than a public utility - should be handed over to private enterprise. I have always thought that a Socialist is one who believes that state planning and control would bring about the greatest benefit to the community as a whole. If it will be to the benefit of the community to have this instrument become the monopoly of some capitalists, however benign, however philanthropic, for fifteen whole years with two five-year periods for renewal, why does the Government run its own radio station and not let a commercial tycoon run it? If it were not for a colonial power, we would have had a public corporation by now, and run it independently, instead of making a mockery of the impartiality with which it pretends to manage Radio Malaya. But we shall come to that by and by, after April. I would like to remind this House that the way in which this television scheme has been presented reminds one of the way in which the Rediffusion scheme was pushed through by the colonial power. Tenders were invited, published in the Press, and were received. Wires were going over private property before any Bill was presented in the Legislative Council. It was opposed in the Legislative Chamber, but it went through. Then, typical of the elected representatives of that pre-Rendel era, when Rediffusion held its opening ceremony, those "stalwarts" who tried to prevent it from coming into operation, all joined in the felicitations and the celebrations for the opening. In this particular case, we have before us Sessional Paper No. Cmd. 32 of 1955 and in the back page is set out "TENDER NOTICE T.V. STATION IN SINGAPORE". There are three applicants, but, as the Hon. the Minister for Education has said, only one tender was really submitted with seriousness. One was by Shaw Brothers. It was very short and appeared on page 2. There were no concrete programmes and no concrete proposals. The second was by Rediffusion, on page 3. The third was by the Cathay Organisation, on page 5. It might be interesting for the House to know that the local Chairman of Rediffusion is the same person as the man who signs himself for the Cathay Organisation - Mr Loke Wan Tho. Sir, I know Mr Loke personally, and I hope he will understand that what I have to say in my capacity as a Member of this Assembly in no way affects any personal regard I may have for him. But I think that it is unfair on the part of the Minister for Education to slide over the applications. What he says amounts to - "If it is a matter of detail, you can trust us. We will see that it is done properly. After all, there is only one serious application, and we will see that it is given to the right man, and it will be done in the proper way." Sir, the qualifications of the applicant are set out on page 8 under five heads: (i) Experience of commercial broadcasting. There, Mr Loke sets out his experience as the local Chairman of Rediffusion Limited. He is the only Asian Director. (ii) Film Production and Distribution. (iii) Early application. (iv) Newspaper Experience. (v) Civic Responsibility. Sir, no one, I think, would deny that we all admire civic responsibility amongst those members of the community who are fortunate enough to have been blessed with wealthy parents. But I find it difficult to understand how it can be advanced as an argument that, because the applicant personally is a man of some social standing, he should therefore be entrusted with this powerful weapon of propaganda - that it is safe - that he himself, it appears, will personally see to it that things are done in a manner which will benefit the people of Singapore. May I just read out two of the qualifications which I think completely disqualify the applicant: "(ii) Film Production and Distribution. The Cathay Organisation produces and distributes films in Malay and Chinese (Mandarin and Cantonese). It operates a film studio in Singapore and one in Hongkong. The Distribution Department of the Cathay Organisation also handles product from Britain, the U.S.A., France and Italy. It is well known that a T.V. station depends to a large extent on films for its programmes, and the Cathay Organisation with its own film distribution facilities will be in a splendid position to provide for the needs of the T.V. station; its film studios will also be able to provide programmes in Malay and Chinese. The knowledge which this Organisation possesses of film production is knowledge which may be applied to the production of live shows for the T.V. programmes. Moreover, we have the contacts with the artistes whose services will be needed for these programmes. Then: "(v) Civic Responsibility. Television, apart from being a medium of entertainment, is also an instrument that can be a powerful force in the influencing of public opinion. Before a licence is granted, Government no doubt will wish to take seriously into consideration the civic record of the applicant. His record in this field should not merely be judged by the monetary contributions which he has made to charitable objects, but it should also be judged by the amount of personal service and of his time which he has given to public work. In this connection we would suggest that the education and background of the applicant, his sense of responsibility, his awareness of political, cultural and economic developments, his financial and moral standing, his record as an employer, his imagination and farsightedness, his record with the income-tax department, are all aspects of the applicant's character which must be assessed before a licence is granted. (Sd.) LOKE WAN THO, Chairman, Cathay Organisation." Sir, I have here a copy of an application for a T.V. licence made by a certain Mr Williams on behalf of the Herald and Weekly Times Ltd., Melbourne. I think it will show the Government - I do not know whether it is the Government that is involved or just the Hon. the Minister for Education - that this is not a trifling matter, where one puts in an advertisement in a newspaper which reads: "Government invites schemes from the public for the construction and adequate operation of a T.V. Station in Singapore. Successful tenderer will be given an exclusive operating licence on the following general terms subject to contract. Put in your application.' In this application in Australia, there are a series of questions which ask the applicant to lay bare all the possible factors that may influence his running of a T.V. Station. There are fifteen questions and they occupy the whole book. "(1) State whether application is made on behalf of an individual, partnership, or company, or company to be formed, or a combination of interests: (2) If application is made by a company, state where incorporated. Attach a copy of Memorandum and Articles of Association and furnish full details of: (a) Financial position including balance sheet and copy of Profit and Loss Account and Profit and Loss Appropriation Account for the last five years: (b) Shareholders including address and occupation of each...; (c) Names and occupations of directors and names of principal officers of company, (d) Association of the applicant or any director or principal officer in any way with any of the following businesses: (i) Broadcasting, including production of programmes; (ii) Newspaper; (iii) Advertising; (iv) Theatrical management and production; (v) Motion pictures, production, processing, distribution and exhibition; (vi) Manufacture or distribution of radio and television equipment or receivers; (e) Association of any shareholder of more than five per cent of the shares in the company of any other business specified in paragraph (d)." Even a shareholder having more than five per cent of the shares of the company, who is connected with any of these businesses, must declare it, because it is considered that anyone who is connected with the cinema industry or broadcasting or with any theatrical performance is not a person who can fairly advance the interests of television. Sir, seven million people watched the Hon. the Chief Minister in London. I was struck by that, Mr Speaker, Sir, because it is this old idea of the mass man - people by the masses. But I wonder how many would have been watching the television screens, their eyes glued to this little movie at home, if there were not the programmes to sustain that interest. If people are watching television at home, they are not likely to be watching pictures at the local theatre. Cinema attendances are falling off in Great Britain, and the cinematograph world has answered with 3D, 3D Sound, Vista Vision, and CinemaScope. It is a challenge to them. Sir, it is in the interest of cinema exhibitors to drive the people from their homes into the cinemas and not to attract them from the cinemas into their homes, and I should have thought that that alone completely disqualifies all the three tenderers, including Rediffusion which is connected with broadcasting. Sir, the Hon. the Minister for Education has said that a person who runs this T.V. Station would probably lose money and here we have a philanthropic organisation that is prepared to lose money. I am a charitable man by nature, Sir. I like to believe that people do things with charitable motives. But there are limits to human charity. Nobody runs a T.V. station for fifteen years at a loss after a capital outlay estimated by the Hon. the Minister for Education at some $5 millions.

I never said that.

Is it five? I think it is in the application form - ah, yes, it is $3 millions. I am quite prepared to believe that the Cathay Organisation is a wealthy and powerful organisation with limitless resources, but people do not run T.V. stations for the sake of losing money. Either they can make the thing work and it pays money, in which case there is no reason why a Government department or a public corporation should not do it; or if it is going to lose money, then there must be a reason why they are prepared to lose that money. I suggest that that reason is the protection of certain other interests - that it is thought better to lose some money here than to lose more money elsewhere if somebody else gets hold of this T.V. station. And the protection of those other interests is inimical to the interests of the people. Mr Speaker, Sir, the Hon. the Minister for Education has referred to Government controls and he has sought to emphasise that he will see to it that he will introduce legislation to achieve this. He cannot personally see to these things but there will be legislation to see that the programmes are not of doubtful standing, that they are appropriate for young boys and girls and that they should have nothing to do with gangsters. I congratulate the Minister for being alive to the dangers of T.V. being misused. Sir, there are two commercial T.V. stations in Asia. The Americans are very proud of it. They built both of them - one in Japan and one in Bangkok. I have the word of a personal friend of mine who said that he had seen the one in Japan. "It is unbelievable", said he. "You see trailers and you have got to go to a cinema to watch the whole of the picture; and you see all kinds of absurd and inconsequential things." Well, that is hearsay. But I do have some document to show what they do in Bangkok. It is a pity that the Far Eastern representative of R.C.A. did not pursue his invitation to this Assembly to invite Members to view his magnum opus in Bangkok. He at one time suggested to the Hon. the Chief Minister, and later to the Common- wealth Parliamentary Association, that we might send an all-Party delegation to Bangkok, all at R.C.A. expense, in order to broaden our education. But the R.C.A. representative somehow felt that there might be some Members in this Assembly who would think it an improper suggestion and so he decided not to pursue the matter. I have pursued the matter and I have here what is known as R.C.A. News dated August 5, 1955, by Leonard S. Skoblin - I think he was the gentleman who wanted to do us a favour the other time and it says here: "R.C.A. NEWS No. 7. TELEVISION IN THAILAND 'Thailand Has Entered The Television Age.' This is how one of the leading newspapers in Bangkok started its editorial on the opening of the country's first T-V Station. 'The new medium', it said further, 'seemed to lend itself well to the Thai skill in showmanship and love of entertainment.' The first television station in Thailand, and the first on the mainland of Asia, was opened in Bangkok by the Prime Minister, Field Marshal Phibul, on June 24th, Thailand's National Day." (I could imagine a similar ceremony opened here). "It is owned by the government-controlled and commercially operated Thai Television Company." Then there is a lot of blurb about the modernistic trends and beautiful studios with air-conditioning that could be switched on and off independently. Finally we come to the programmes. It says: "Perhaps one may best feel the reaction through reading a few abstracts from an editorial of another Journal in Bangkok previously critical towards television. In part, it said: 'We wish to extend to the newly arrived Television our welcome and our wish for its success. As we rapturously watched the Television Screen for our first experience of Television in this country, we were awed by the technical perfection of the transmission. The figures shown on the screen came out as bright and clear as we could ever wish for. There was a sense of magic in the atmosphere, as one always feels when face to face for the first time with the latest development in modern science. We looked forward to this first transmission with some trepidation. Realizing the importance of the occasion, we were resigned to have staring at us some well-known face of an important personage. But, instead, we had smiling at us a young and comely wench, who seems to be a perfect medium for Television since she could, without uttering a word, speak quite fluently with her eyes alone... We were simply regaled with a "Hit Parade" of the more famous jazz tunes and an item called "Venetian Night" in which a young man pleaded soulfully with us to "Come Back to Sorrento!" "Laurel and Hardy" made us chuckle with their destructive pranks, and, in the end, we were held spellbound by the gripping life story of Dillinger.' (Mr Dillinger, Sir, was a very famous American gangster.) 'Experts may look down their noses at the programme and call it second rate. We may agree with them on point of technical skill; but the spirit of the whole show was as mad, as non-consequential and as free as the United Nations Charter of Human Rights.'" Sir, that is T.V. come to Bangkok. May I read it? - "owned by the government - controlled and commercially operated Thai Television Company." God forbid, Sir, that it should come to Singapore. We all know - I think it is general knowledge - that British T.V. is the pride of the world. It is acknowledged that there is no other T.V, station in the world which produces programmes of such high quality without interruptions in the middle of a very dramatic scene with Kolynos Toothpaste, or Pepsi Cola. After that they tried to launch into commercial television. There was a long period of investigation and survey. A White Paper was tabled and there were long and strenuous debates. I know the Hon. the Minister for Education has got the White Paper, but I do not know if he has looked through these debates. Finally, the Bill was passed with a great deal of opposition from the Socialist Members in the House of Commons. They opposed it bitterly and they still oppose it. Great safeguards were included in the Bill to see that standards were maintained. Recently, a man called Adrian Crawley, who was in charge of the News and Features Section of this commercial T.V. station, resigned and one of the reasons for his resignation was that he was unable to resist the pressure of advertisers, and if he yielded to the advertisers, he could not maintain the standards laid down for commercial T.V. Sir, we all want television to come to Singapore but not at that price. We feel that the proper way would be to have a Commission set up to investigate the possibilities of introducing T.V. in Singapore to be run by an independent corporation. Before we can debate the matter, there should be a report by those qualified to make such a report. Expert technicians, expert entertainers and all kinds of bodies - political, religious, they are all set out here in this Australian application, if the Hon. the Minister for Education is interested - must be consulted before the matter could even be debated. We must acquaint ourselves with the facts. I would not go into the merits and demerits of it because I feel that we are not properly equipped to argue the case. But we do know this: that the best thing to do is to send it to some Commission - not to a Commission of this Assembly - but to an independent Commission to be appointed by the Government which can include amongst its members experts in the broadcasting world, in the entertainment world, in the news world and in the political world, to explore the whole field and then make its report. On the basis of that report, the Government might table a White Paper stating Government's policy - not any particular Minister's idiosyncrasies - and then we could be in a position, having properly deliberated on the matter in our respective Parties, to state our Party view. Sir, it is with this in mind that I beg to move, That the motion before this House be amended, first, by deleting the word "commercial' before "television", and then by deleting the whole of the phrase following "in Singapore" and adding thereto "and recommends that a Commission be appointed to explore the possibilities of setting up a public corporation to operate it." The amended motion will then read: "That this House approves in principle the introduction of television in Singapore and recommends that a Commission be appointed to explore the possibilities of setting up a public corporation to operate it." Amendment handed in.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I am told that there are some Socialists on the other side of the House -

May I have just a minute to consider the amendment?

I beg your pardon, Sir.

Will the hon. Member consider a different amendment which would facilitate debate? This amendment would be to leave out all words after the word "of" in line 1 and to insert the words "television in Singapore and recommends that a Commission be appointed to explore the possibilities of setting up a public corporation to operate it."

Certainly, Mr Speaker, Sir. It is another way of putting the same thing.

It would facilitate debate.

Yes, I am much obliged, Mr Speaker, Sir.

The amendment is in order.

Sir, I do not think that any Socialist will deny that that is the proper way in which to embark on this public project. If we are to avoid sex and gangsterism, then let us have a properly constituted corporation to run it, if need be at a loss, for if private enterprise is prepared to run it at a loss, then it must be worth the Government's while to run it at a loss. Sir, I beg to move.

Mr Speaker, Sir, it falls to me, by ill-luck, to second an amendment which I should otherwise substantially have moved. I sought to catch your eye but I was unlucky and I have to come second into the field. I had intended to move a substantially similar amendment to omit all the words from "of" in line 1 and substitute "a Committee to study the means of introducing television" but I am happy to accept the Member for Tanjong Pagar's motion in lieu thereof. I agree with a good deal of what he said, but there are certain other points which I think will further justify the appointment of a Commission or a Committee to go into this matter and advise us. I would first like to point out that in the original motion, we have the words "without charge on public funds". That is, no doubt, strictly true but it is not an adequate statement of the case. The fact is that public funds and private funds are only two aspects of national funds, and although the Government, as a Government, appears to give television free, the country does not get it free. It has to pay for it, just as much as or possibly more than if it was paid for out of taxation. A publicly operated television station will be financed by direct taxation. A privately operated one will be financed by what is essentially indirect taxation, that is, out of the profits which the commercial operators make on their commercial transactions. From these profits they find the money for the television station. That is as far as the financing of it goes - no difference in the cost to the national funds - although the Hon. the Financial Secretary no doubt is saved the trouble of keeping accounts, as those are done privately. That is the main significant difference, and from that aspect the Government does not have to bother looking after the money side of it. There is another significant difference between private and public control which has already been pointed out, and that is that public ownership means public control by a responsible government, and private ownership means private control by less responsible private interests. This brings me to the point which the Member for Tanjong Pagar made very forcefully, and I would like to endorse it - that although the original motion says "subject to control by the Government", of course, everything in the country is subject to control by the Government in the last analysis. But, in fact, it is extremely difficult to control some things unless you have the proper mechanism for it, and experience of the Independent Television Authority in England has not given any great confidence in the ability of a government to devise means of controlling advertisers in their relations with commercial television. However, those are by the way; points which have substantially been made already. I would like to elaborate on another point which the Member for Tanjong Pagar made. He pointed out - what was obviously clear anyhow - that a commercial station operates for profit, and that if they do not make a profit they will not operate. Where the profit comes from and where it actually lies may not be obvious to the man in the street, but, ultimately, there will be a profit; a future profit if not an immediate one. If that profit does not come about, then your commercial television will collapse underneath you and you will be left with some expensive and idle equipment and nothing else. But we will assume that businessmen are good judges of their own business and that a commercial television station does run at a satisfactory profit. That profit can only derive from increased sales as a result of increased advertising, and increased sales means increased consumption, and that consumption is not of essential goods. You will not find any commercial firm saying, "Buy Mr Blank's beautiful white rice", or even "Buy a North & Hillard Latin Grammar". What you will find advertised are the luxury goods, soft drinks, cigarettes, or possibly hard drinks, whisky, possibly cinemas, possibly newspapers - all the things which, no doubt, are very nice to have - lipstick or nylon stockings - delightful things in their way but not essentials. They are luxuries. The increased sales largely take place in the relatively prosperous group, and every luxury consumption reduces the amount of money available for saving. This is a serious point as the people in Singapore are not very adept in saving.

They have not got it.

I would like to stress this because saving is the essential basis of freedom. Independence, freedom, Merdeka - all this is going to be largely dependent on whether this country can be economically independent and if we are going to achieve economic independence, there must be a very great increase in savings by the people of this country as a whole. Otherwise you are going to have to import your capital and your imported capital means that you are dependent on foreign control for a considerable part of your economy, so that if we have a successfully operated commercial station, it must succeed, as far as I can judge, at the expense of the savings which we ought to make in order to finance the essential development of industry. There is another effect which will follow from successful commercial advertising. It is an effect which is sometimes praised by the economists. That is the monopoly effect. A brand of goods, a cigarette or a soft drink which has the largest allocation for advertising and employs the best advertising talent, will attract the largest sale. It will drive off the market or drive into the fringe of the market other goods which are less well advertised because they have less money available. In other words, the luxury goods that have the largest capital backing drive the weaker ones off the market and you get something approaching a monopoly situation which, it may be argued, does produce greater efficiency. It is an argument which economists make, that a monopoly situation produces efficiency. Whether we all accept that I do not know, but there is this point to make - that in quite a considerable sector of economy, I imagine that the firms which will secure the market in television advertising are likely to be expatriate firms where the capital backing is good, where the technical skills are good, and where, through television, they can secure much larger sales for things that are not manufactured in this country at all but are imported. Hence, as far as I can judge, a commercial television station is liable to tend to restrict the development of our economy. Firstly, it strikes at savings which are necessary if we are going to develop locally. Secondly, it strikes at the development of small local industries because they are pushed off the market by the big overseas industries. A further aspect of that is also that there may well be a considerable flow of wealth overseas to overseas investors. There are a number of technical points which also need considering in relation to television, both as to the quality of the television image which is projected and also as to the type of programme which is appropriate and feasible. I do not propose to enter into those points at all except to say that they are very important, and do need study and cannot be studied except with considerable labour and a good deal of expert knowledge. That is why I am anxious that we should have in this Assembly general agreement that we should look before we leap, and that the enormous accumulation of facts relating to television and the enormous volume of arguments for and against it should be studied by a competent body of independent, able and impartial citizens who can put their findings in the form of a report on which we can reasonably judge as to what is the right thing to do. I am therefore very happy, Mr Speaker, to second the amendment put forward by the Member for Tanjong Pagar.

The original motion was: That this House approves in principle the introduction of commercial television in Singapore by the issue of an exclusive licence to a commercial undertaking without charge on public funds but subject to control by the Government, since when an amendment has been proposed to leave out all the words after the word "of" in line 1 and to insert therein the words "television in Singapore and recommends that a Commission be appointed to explore the possibilities of setting up a public corporation to operate it". This would then make the Question: "That this House approves in principle the introduction of television in Singapore and recommends that a Commission be appointed to explore the possibilities of setting up a public corporation to operate it." The Question now before the House is, "That the words proposed to be left out, be left out."

If it please you, Mr Speaker, the Member for Tanjong Pagar, in moving the appointment of this Commission, indicated that we know nothing of the merits or demerits of the proposal and gave an extraordinary exhibition of a long speech about nothing. Sir, out of luck - and I think I must take responsibility for the paper before you - the suggestion for television in Singapore was broached many months ago and it attracted me because it was obvious and it seems to be generally accepted here now that television could be an instrument for cultural fusion, an instrument for a matter of which we stand in considerable need. Investigations disclosed, however, Sir, that the cost of installation and buildings would amount to between two and three million dollars and that it was quite certain, however efficiently run it was, that in the first two to three years there must be a loss, but that if run efficiently it could thereafter make a profit. Sir, we are in this position, that although this is by no means a poor country, we wish at the present moment to direct all our available wealth to certain immediate needs of a social welfare character. You can appreciate that Government is anxious - I do not suggest that it is not in a position to do so - to avoid expenditure where possible, particularly expenditure of so large a character and with a continuing liability of an unspecified nature, and also having regard to the advice that, if undertaken by an organisation without entertainment experience, it could in itself become a fiasco. In those circumstances, Sir, it seemed to me that, if it were possible for private capital with experience in that field to do the work subject to Government control, we should both have our cake and eat it. I was so surprised that that would be utterly impossible and fantastic, and that if Government wanted control it would have to subscribe capital and to partake of the liability for annual losses. It was in those circumstances and in order to ascertain whether the idea was feasible and in no way an attempt to jump the gun, as seems to have been suggested by the Member for Tanjong Pagar, that an advertisement was put in to see whether any responsible organisation would be prepared to work with Government on that basis. I must confess that I was delighted to discover, on the last day, that there were three responsible organisations - organisations which have experience in the entertainment world and which have proved themselves over many years in this country as being capable of running an efficient enterprise. Now, I would like to make some things clear, Sir, in the matter of this original proposal. If the original motion is approved, then it will be a matter of negotiation between a Committee to be appointed by the Government and the tenderers to finalise the exact conditions under which a licence would be issued. I think hon. Members are aware, and if not I would like to make it clear, that any such agreement would be submitted in the form of a Bill. This Government is giving no monopoly under any authority except the authority of this House. It would be submitted to this House for approval. I would like to say this, Sir, that much of the speech of the Member for Tanjong Pagar seemed to be in derision of the organisation known, I think, as the Cathay Organisation. I should like to make this very, very clear, Sir, that the motion itself does not suggest, nor is it intended that it should suggest, that any of the tenders are accepted in their present form. I think the motion is quite clear, Sir, in pointing out that there will be absolute Government control, and, secondly, that there will be no charge on the public funds. Sir, it is asked why, if there is to be a loss, these organisations should tender. Is it for charity? No, of course, not. These organisations are allied with entertainment organisations or are themselves entertainment organisations. They could get a wider field for the entertainment which they now present. Therefore, they could get cheaper services which an independent corporation cannot. They can therefore, Sir, make additional profits for their existing organisations, or make less onerous the loss that would be suffered by the television organisation until such time as television has caught on. As I say, Sir, one can in these matters but estimate, and the estimate is that it might take about three years before there could be a sufficient number of viewers to make possible a reasonable income for commercial organisations interested in the venture. Sir, we are told that, on socialistic grounds, there should be state planning and control. I do ask hon. Members to recognise the fact that, in this instance, there is state control - absolute - and although the licence is for fifteen years - ten years renewable or whatever it is - that is merely in the advertisement, Sir, and is not inherent in the motion. What I hope can be worked out is an exclusive licence which can be re-purchased by Government at any time, subject to payment of capital invested plus a reasonable profit, and if allowed to continue for a certain period, let us say, ten or fifteen years, which would enable them to recoup themselves and make a profit, then we purchase only at market value on the date of purchase. In those circumstances, Sir, I feel that we can rapidly get together on the issues, present the Bill to this House, have a Select Committee on it and, if passed, we may have with luck a television station in operation sometime next year. This reference to a Commission which will hear the same type of objections which have been made here is merely an attempt to shelve an issue, as I see it, and is one that will cause delay and is rather a promise of something on the never never system. I would like to say this, Sir, that the suggestion that this House should appoint a Commission to consider the implementation of its desire for television only on the basis that it is owned by a public corporation is a dangerous one, because it may well be that the report is of a character which negatives the practicability of television by a public corporation other than at an exorbitant cost which it is quite unreasonable to bear. Sir, in life there is never perfection. There must be compromise. The proposal made in the original motion is one where there is compromise between public control and private finance - rather a marriage between public control and private finance. I say, Sir, that I can see no merit in the amendment and that, in my view, it has serious objections: one, of delay and, two, of making television probably impracticable, because you are tying the Commission down, Sir, to refusing to consider the possibility of commercial television. It is important to recognise that. If you tie that Commission down to just consideration of state television, you may find the cost quite beyond our means. But it is important, I think, that we should have this instrument of cultural fusion and it is possible to have substantial control of the policy and the programme of a television station which has commercial television. I do ask hon. Members seriously to consider the issues and I do request that they realise that if they accept the amendment, it may well be that that is the end of television for the time being.

Sir, the problem which faces us this afternoon is not an easy problem. It is a very difficult problem. It is a problem which has engaged the very serious and prolonged attention of other Governments - New Zealand, Australia, South Africa and other countries - and they have for a long time been wrestling with the issue of the method by which television should be allowed to operate in their countries. It is an issue, Sir, which I regard as being of the very greatest importance for the welfare and the future of the people of Singapore, and I would suggest to hon. Members of this House that it is one on which we should not decide in haste and repent at leisure. I, for one, will weep no tears if acceptance of this amendment delays the introduction of television into Singapore. If, by the delay of a few months, in order to carry out detailed and careful examination of all the issues involved and of all the ways in which difficulties can be overcome, we find an answer which is more satisfactory than the present proposal, then I say that the delay will be well in the interests of the future of Singapore. To me, there is one consideration in this problem which is of over-riding importance, and that is that we must keep constantly before us the power of this instrument of television to influence the minds and the lives of the people of Singapore. This is a small community. The whole of the community will be within range of a television service. The television service goes into the homes of the people, it has an attraction unrivalled by any other form of entertainment. It combines - I think this has already been said - the power of the Press, the power of the cinema and the power of broadcasting. Already, it has raised serious social problems in other countries, such as the United States and the United Kingdom, particularly in its effect on children - and half of our population is under 21. This Assembly has, I submit, a very clear and real responsibility to ensure, as far as we possibly can, that television is an influence to the good here and not an influence towards lowering all standards - educational, moral and civic - and it is for this reason alone that I personally have no doubt at all that, in the best interests of the people, television should be in the hands either of the Broadcasting Department or of a public corporation, charged by statute to look after the interests not of those who sell soap, but of the men, women and children of Singapore. There is to me a fundamental objection to entrusting television to a commercial operator, however worthy may be the individuals connected with that organisation. My objection is this: that for a commercial operator to cover his costs and to make his profits, he must have advertising, and if his programmes are going to be worth while to the advertiser, then he must let the advertiser have a say in the content of those programmes. He who pays the piper must be allowed to call the tune, and by the very nature of things, whatever assurances we may have to the contrary and with whatever good intention they may be made, the ultimate criterion of the programme must be to sell goods, and for that purpose it must have an appeal to the mass to encourage sales. We know very well from the experience of other countries that what sells advertising is the sensational and the popular - what appeals to our senses and to our appetites rather than to our minds and our better nature. You do not sell soap-flakes by the lasting virtue of good music. You sell it by what have come to be called "soap-box operas". You do not sell cigarettes and other articles by the beauty of art. You sell them by what is called "cheesecake". The result must be that, sooner or later, the mass of the programme will be sub-standard by any objective criterion of art or entertainment. I am told that in the United States 92 per cent of television programmes are made up of films. Most of these films are specially made for television sponsored by the advertisers. They consist largely of the cheap sob-stuff stories of the home, of crime serials and other forms of trashy entertainment. They pander to the worst and not to the best in popular taste. What happens there is that a vast quantity of material is needed hour after hour, day by day, to fill the time of dozens of television programmes, and to satisfy that gargantuan appetite the emphasis must be, not on quality, but on quantity - putting out a tremendous lot as quickly and as cheaply as they can. Now, I suggest, Sir, if we allow television in Singapore to pass into the hands of the film industry, what will happen will surely be that they will turn to this ready-made source of material for television in Singapore - bought by the mile from the United States and pushed into the minds of the people of Singapore. To me, there is only one answer to this. The Government must discharge its responsibility to see that the minds of the people are not exploited in the interest of big business selling goods. The answer to me is that television should either be entrusted to a Government department, as broadcasting is, and surely if we think it right that broadcasting should be under public control, so much the more must we ensure that television - a far more insidious and potent instrument - should not be put into the hands of vested interests. I cannot see, Sir, how any person or political Party claiming to adhere to Socialist principles, whether they are Liberal or not, can hand over television, with its tremendous influence on the people in the future of Singapore, to big business. The only reason, as my hon. Friend the Chief Minister has explained, why we come to think of allowing television to be operated by a commercial operator is because of the problem of finance. The Government naturally is chary of accepting a very heavy financial commitment, both in capital and in running costs, when there are so many other prior claims on our resources. The estimates that I have been given are that it will take at least $2 millions of capital and possibly as much as $900,000 a year to cover the current costs. The Cathay Organisation's figures are - I think it is $3 millions in capital and only $500,000 to $600,000 in running costs. So we can take that as the magnitude of the call that would be made on public finance if television was run wholly by the Government. In this connection, Sir, I should like to take the opportunity of informing the House, with apologies, that there is an error in the printing on the Command Paper which is before us in connection with the Cathay Organisation tender on page 7. The tender speaks of the savings which can accrue by using the Cathay Building and land. The total saving in this direction is printed as $70,000. It should, of course, be $700, 000, as I hope it is clear from the context above. I would like, if I could, to ask the House to take note of that, for which I apologise. There are two other comparatively minor errors on the opposite page where the suggestion about licence fees, that the gross revenue should be "supplied to financing", should be "applied to financing". I do not think the sense is altered really. Lower down there, "The licence of a commercially-operated television station must concentrate", it should, of course, read "licensee". But the hard fact of the matter is that if we were to operate television by a Government department, we should have to face a very considerable capital investment and a very considerable sum for the running costs, and we should also have to face, what is a very real difficulty in these times, the problem of finding staff and so on. So it is not to me improper that the Government should hesitate to embark on this new venture, but I still say that we should think very well before we do so, and I should like to suggest that we ought to give far more time than we have yet to examining other alternatives. The amendment, which I support, suggests that television should be handed over to a public corporation. I should like to suggest, at the same time, that we should consider whether we cannot, with advantage, ally television with broadcasting. That is what has happened in other territories. In the United Kingdom, the B.B.C. run both television and broadcasting and it is likely to be so, I understand, in South Africa. I think that it is right in principle that television and broadcasting should go together rather than that television should be split from broadcasting and handed over to the film industry. Now, it is possible that we could raise the finance for television to be run by a public corporation by running television on its own, that is to say, by allowing the corporation to obtain revenue from advertising; but I should like to suggest that we should also examine the possibility of pooling the resources of broadcasting and television, and I would not rule out the possibility that we should allow a degree of advertising in broadcasting in order to increase the revenue. I do not like at all to introduce advertising into broadcasting. I think I possibly have a natural British prejudice against it, but at the same time I would very much prefer to allow advertising to come into a Government-run or a Government-controlled broadcasting system than I would hand over television to a commercial operation. Reference has been made to what has been done in the United Kingdom. There is one very important lesson for us, I think, from the United Kingdom arrangements. What happened in the United Kingdom was, as hon. Members probably know, that the British Broadcasting Corporation was running both broadcasting and television completely divorced from all commercial influence. The Conservative Government, in pursuit of its general policy to prevent these big public corporations becoming privileged monopolies, wished to introduce an element of competition. That element of competition had to come, of course, from commercial television, but they were quite insistent that they would not surrender television to the free use of any commercial operator. To that end, a somewhat complicated organisation has been set up, the basic features of which are that you have, first of all, a public authority the members of which are appointed by the Minister known as the Independent Television Authority, and that Authority is charged with the responsibility for providing television stations and studios and services, but it is not charged directly with producing programmes. In fact, the law, while telling the Authority that it must see that a high quality is maintained, tells the Authority that it should not produce the programmes. The programmes are produced by a separate organisation known as Programme Contractors. Those are people from the entertainment world and elsewhere who pay the Television Authority to put their programmes on the air. Yet another division is made whereby neither the Authority nor the Programme Contractors are allowed by law to have any connection at all with those who are interested in advertising. So what the British Government has tried to do is to ensure that the content of the programme is in no way influenced by the advertiser. They have drawn a parallel with the cinema and the Press where, although an advertiser pays to put his advertisement in a newspaper or have it shown on the cinema screen, he does not yet, I am thankful to say, write the news or the leading article or produce the film. As the Member for Tanjong Pagar has pointed out, even then a very guarded introduction of commercial operation met with violent opposition in the United Kingdom and it is still subject to very considerable criticism. I think that it is too early to say whether the establishment of the Independent Television Authority is going to succeed in keeping the influence of commercial advertising out of the content of the programmes. The moral for us is that, in introducing commercial competition, a British Conservative Government took the utmost pains to try to ensure that the minds of the British people are not exploited by business for advertising purposes. It is also significant that the Independent Television Authority, while being required to pay its way, was financed initially by advances from the Treasury. The Member for Tanjong Pagar has referred to what our neighbours the Thai Government have done. They have done what I think we should do, and that is to set up a wholly Government-owned corporation. But my information is the same as the Member for Tanjong Pagar's and that is that the influence of commercial operation in that Government-controlled system in Thailand has resulted in a very low standard of programmes which I hope we shall not see here. It is all very well to suggest that if we give an exclusive licence to a commercial operator, we can ensure control. The first objection I have to that is that we are going to set up a vested interest, and once we set up a vested interest, ultimately the only thing we can do is to buy it over; and if we are going to buy it over, it is going to be extremely expensive. I think we should at least take further thought before we decide to hand television over to business and create a new vested interest in Singapore that somebody in the future will have to take over at vast expense.

Order, order, moment of interruption. Debate to be resumed, what day?

Tomorrow, Sir. Remaining items on the Order Paper read and ordered for the next day.

If it please you, Mr Speaker, I move, That this Assembly do now adjourn.

I second it. Question proposed.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I have taken advantage of the right to speak on this Adjournment to raise the question of Malayanisation of Malayan Airways and of other public utilities. The other public utility I have in mind is the passenger road transport industry. However, there is at the moment on the Table of this House the Report of the Hawkins Commission on Passenger Transport. I shall therefore confine my remarks to the Malayanisation of our air transport industry. Mr Speaker, Sir, it is often the case that, where something essential to the community is not profitable, the State finally takes over, like the Malayan Railways, but where it is profitable, as in the case of the passenger road transport and passenger air transport industries, they are left in private hands. There are two reasons why we must rapidly put our house in order: (1) We are approaching independence and the less trouble we have when we take over, the more efficiently will the industries be run after independence; and (2) Unless we have a definite policy now, we may make it almost impossible to take over the industry immediately after independence. The Malayan Airways operates under Government franchise which gives them a monopoly. The Hon. the Chief Minister was an advocate against that monopoly. He pleaded powerfully and persuasively against making Malayan Airways a complete monopoly for Mansfield & Company Limited, but that is not what I am so concerned with today. The franchise of that Airways is due for re-consideration by the Government very shortly - I understand in April. I understand also that this is not a matter which affects Singapore alone and that the Federation Government is equally interested.

And Borneo.

And Borneo. But I have sought on this motion to draw attention to the fact that we have to do something about it. We cannot just renew the franchise on the old terms. If it is renewed, it will be renewed probably for another seven years and I feel confident that we will not wait seven years for Merdeka. One of the important things about renewing the franchise is that this is the time to alter those conditions. If a franchise is to be renewed, this is the time to enter into a new relationship with the present proprietors of Malayan Airways. It might be to Government's advantage to take over 51 per cent of the shares in order that it can have the controlling voice in the running and management of Malayan Airways, but in order that there may be no break in managerial continuity, the Company might be allowed to retain 49 per cent. But I put that in as a suggestion regarding the possibilities of creating a new combination or a new type of management of Malayan Airways. Malayan Airways has been going on for seven years and one of the terms in the franchise is that it should encourage the training and employment of local personnel. Every independent country - Burma, Indonesia, Ceylon, India, Pakistan - has an airline which flies the national flag. It is part of the trappings of an independent country. We have Ceylon Airways, Air India, Garuda, Air Burma. The management is good in some and bad in others. Apart from the international air transport problem, we should start Malayanising our own internal air transport personnel. Malayan Airways, after seven years, have only trained three pilots. They have recruited nine other local men who received their training as pilots independently of Malayan Airways, in the Chinese Nationalist Air Force, in India, Australia and elsewhere. After seven years, all it has been able to show on the balance sheet - and I am reading now from the memorandum of the Malayan Airways Local Employees Union - is that there are twelve Asian First Officers, thirteen expatriate First Officers and twenty-five Captains. No aircraft can fly without a captain and a first officer. In other words, no aircraft in Malaya can be flown without an expatriate on board. That is not what one could call a healthy situation. We know, and the Hon. the Chief Minister knows very well, the difficulty of finding men to fill the top jobs when there has been a long period when men are kept down at the bottom. The reason for it is not only that Malayan Airways does not train them, but actively discriminates against their employment. For instance, before the elections and before Malayanisation became a real scare to all Europeans, they were paying their local pilots less than one-half of what they were paying their European pilots - job for job, qualification for qualification. They paid a European, on entering at the top of the service, $1,450 with $250 marriage allowance, $300 housing allowance, $400 expatriate inducement allowance, $75 licence allowance. They gave further privileges like home leave, dental treatment, accident insurance, and hospitalisation. The local officer got $1,150 - less than half. In the case of qualified engineers, a locally qualified engineer was getting one-third of what his European counterpart was getting. When in the course of negotiations the European directors were told that this is a new era - post-Rendel - and that there is a very "fierce" Chief Minister who is in favour of Malayanisation and who might be influenced by the attitude of the Company on Malayanisation, only then did they say, "Right, we shall give them the same basic pay as the European." That made it go up to one-half of what the European was getting because the European still has a marriage allowance, a housing allowance, an expatriate inducement allowance, a licence allowance, a leave allowance, dental treatment, accident insurance and hospitalisation which the local man does not get. Sir, to give an indication of the enormity of the discrimination, may I just say that when they increased the basic from the 1st of September last, the local man was paid $500x25-600. After the 1st of September, he was paid $800x25-900. He got, in fact, a 60 per cent salary rise in the basic alone but he still does not get any of these allowances. Then the Company, with the doggedness typical of all European businessmen fighting a last ditch stand, said that henceforth they would have a new scale for expatriates and Asians alike. They reduced the scale from $800 to $650x25-900. Then, with a wangle, which might have done credit to the Establishment Officer of the local Government, they said that they would take on new recruits at this new point of entry - much lower -

On a point of order, Sir, it may well be that this company wangles, but I do object very strongly to the suggestion that any officer of the Government wangles. If there is any such suggestion, Sir, I would like facts. In the meanwhile, I ask leave that it be withdrawn.

I have said time and again that my hands are tied by Standing Orders and the only time that a Member is out of order is when, amongst other matters, he imputes improper motives to any other Member. So it seems to me that if a Member desires to say something derogatory of an official of the Government, it is up to a Minister of the Government to reply to that in due course.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I feel that some of us have perhaps not been following the evidence submitted to the Malayanisation Commission. Those who have will know all the instances that have been cited ad nauseam to justify what, in my opinion, is very moderate language. However, as I was saying, having had to concede because of the change in the political situation, the Company then contrived to introduce a new plan whereby they could bring European engineers from Australia or elsewhere and put them at a higher point of entry, whilst the Asian would go in at $650. That could be quite simply done with no apparent racial discrimination by bringing in the question of previous experience. For instance, a man has been a corporal in the Royal Australian Air Force; although he did not have an engineering licence at that time, the moment he gets that licence, the Company then says, "Ah, yes, here is a man who has had seven years in the R.A.A.F. and knows all about Dakotas." So, he will get $650 plus seven increments. Well, that is the sort of thing that just poisons the whole relationship between Malayans and Europeans. I have here a memorandum of the Malayan Airways Local Employees Union - this is not my language - and this is the way in which they have put it themselves: "The expatriate engineer does only supervisory work while the Malayan engineer, holding identical qualifications, is treated as and made to feel a glorified mechanic whom the expatriate engineer regards not as a colleague but as a dangerous rival." This business of treating the men differently goes to such an extent that the local engineer has to find his own way to work. The expatriate engineer gets a Volkswagen to collect him and send him home. Now, with Merdeka in sight, the Company has decided that, in so far as it is possible, it will divert the Volkswagen to where the local engineers are staying but that if this is not possible, either because the Volkswagen is already full up or otherwise, it will pay a small allowance to the local engineer to find his way to work. Sir, all this is happening in a public monopoly, which operates under the franchise of the Singapore, Federation and Borneo Governments. All these matters should be carefully considered with a view to the taking over of the whole airline. We must so arrange things that in the not too distant future we should be in a position to take over Malayan Airways lock, stock and barrel and run it - An hon. Member: Stop it!

Stop it? We shall have bigger things, better things, better services. We shall fly the flag throughout the world, just as all the other independent countries are doing. We may even re-design our flag - that is a matter for some other time. But for the time being, what we are interested in is to see that this private British company is not allowed to continue with a Government monopoly in the way it has. In seven years, it has only trained three local pilots. In seven years, it has trained only ten local engineers. It engaged fifteen boys in 1948. Five left because they were frustrated and because there were no prospects of training or promotion. Ten remained. Since 1948 there has been no further recruitment for training. That is the kind of private enterprise which has helped to sour the whole of the political situation in Malaya. I hope the Minister for Telecommunications and Works will be able to give us some information as to -

Now, where does Telecommunications come from? Has not television been finished with?

Telecommunications? I beg your pardon. Is it Communications? One gets confused by all these wordy Ministries.

After ten months!

What I hope he will do is to give us some indications. I well understand that his hands may be tied because he will have to consult other Governments, but I hope he will give us some indication of the factors, which he is taking into consideration when renewing the franchise.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I hardly know where to begin, but let us begin anywhere. It does not matter much where. Perhaps I can begin by passing the Malayan Airways agreement across to the hon. Member. He referred to a statement in this memorandum from the Local Employees Union of Malayan Airways, that the franchise included certain conditions about the Company employing and encouraging the training of Malayans. I have only a short time before me. If you can find it in the agreement, I shall be very interested.

Will the hon. Member just place that on the Table?

I lay it on the Table and if some Members are interested -

Is the hon. Member addressing me?

I beg your pardon, Mr Speaker, Sir. However, that is by the way. I am not concerned about arguing the question of what training has been given in the past or what should have been given. But just as a matter of record, I think that it is important to note what actually is in the franchise. I have not been able, at a cursory glance, to establish the truth that they are bound to give training to Malayans. It may be that they ought to have. The Member for Tanjong Pagar was anxious that we should give early consideration, because on the 30th April this year we have to give notice to the Company. In fact, consideration has been going on for just precisely two years. The first opening letter in this file from the Director of Civil Aviation in Singapore is dated 9th March, 1954, raising the question of the future of Malayan Airways. Ever since, the matter has been under discussion and a very great range of possible futures for civil aviation has been discussed. There are very complex and technical factors included. It is delightful to think of larger aeroplanes and more of them and so forth, but that is not necessarily the right approach. A large aeroplane introduces a number of technical factors - whether it is the length of the runway, or whether it is the economic pay-load, which has to be considered. Merely to have a larger aeroplane so that you can show the flag on it would not necessarily be a sound economic policy. There are also a number of other points to be considered. If it is felt that consideration has gone on too long, I must endorse and stress what the hon. Member himself has said, that although Malayan Airways is based in Singapore, its base is all that it has in Singapore and all its flying territory lies outside this island. It has an agreement with the Governments of the Federation of Malaya and Singapore. It also operates in Borneo as Malayan Airways and as a subsidiary as well. It also has certain other services, which are not enormously significant, and, of course, it could possibly expand into a regional or territorial service and not merely a local airline service. These are all possibilities which have to be considered but which are not matter for a statement at this stage. I cannot, I am afraid, go into much detail about the points in which the Member for Tanjong Pagar is specifically interested - the question of the Malayanisation of the staff, whether it is air-crew or ground engineers of the Malayan Airways, or on negotiations which have to take place between the Governments concerned. I must comment, in passing, that even the word "Malayanisation" is inappropriate. If they are going to operate in Borneo, then the Borneo territories will emphatically demand "Borneonisation", and as soon as we use accidentally the word "Malayanisation", there will be an immediate reaction from Borneo, "You cannot do that here! We do not want Malayanisation!" A Malayan in Singapore is an expatriate in Borneo, or he may be held to be so, and, unfortunately, Malayanisation is not quite the appropriate term for -

Confederalisation!

Yes, we will get the reality and then find the name for it, I hope! Now, on the question of Malayanisation, there are one or two points that I think I might profitably raise (without anticipating future negotiations) on the figures supplied to me about six or seven months ago. The Asians or Malayans now employed in the Malayan Airways air-crew will have to be expanded by about 400 per cent. You multiply them by four to get enough to provide all the pilots and chief officers, captains and whatever the appropriate ranks are. For the ground engineers, you have to multiply them by three. In other words, you have got a lot more expatriates than you have Malayans at present, and if you want to replace the expatriates, you have to get a great number of Malayans. It is not a matter of one or two people. It is a matter, as I say, of multiplying your present Malayan staff by three or four times and it does take two years to train a pilot and three years to train a ground engineer, so that there is necessarily bound to be a lag before you can replace expatriates by Malayans. That is significant because you may have to be most anxiously seeking for Malayans to replace the expatriates who are likely to go. The information I have received is that already there is a significant outflow from the engineering side, and as everyone knows, pilots, engineers and all technical people can pick up excellent jobs anywhere in the world. And if they think that their future is not secure in this country, they will not wait for a year or two until they are chased out. They will look around, read the technical papers and find a job that looks permanent and profitable. It may be that we should prefer them to stay on until we were ready to replace them but they are very likely to say, "Well, my family, myself, my children, my future and my career come first, and I cannot afford to wait in a place where I am going to be replaced very soon. I had better get off straightaway. There is a nice opening and I will take it and get myself re-established elsewhere." I am not going into the rights and wrongs of this matter in the least. I am merely pointing out that, as far as I can judge at the moment, the indications appear to be that it is not so much that we have no places for the Malayans as we have not enough Malayans for the places. I am not giving that as a statement of fact. I am looking at it as far as I can guess from the rather limited information available. I would stress also that we would have to have careful training and satisfactory experience after training, because, whilst in certain services you can perhaps take a chance on a man's fitness, whether he is really able to do the job that he is trained for, when you are flying through the air with thirty or forty or fifty lives depending on one touch of the rudder or whether you come down on the right part of the airport or come down too far or too short, you have the possibility of destroying fifty people's lives. You have also the possibility of destroying the repute of your national airline. An airline which has frequent accidents will very soon cease to have many passengers. Malayan Airways have a remarkable record for accident-free flying, which is an undoubted asset both to themselves as a company and still more to this territory as a place which has satisfactory aviation communications, where you can get into a plane as you will get into a bus and feel that you will safely arrive at the other end without having suffered any serious damage. I do not think I need go into the question of precisely how many people Malayan Airways have trained. I wish it was more but I do not think that it is quite as small as the hon. Member thinks. It remains for me to say that all the factors which the hon. Member has stressed are ones which have been most anxiously considered and which are still being considered and which are the subject of negotiations. It would prejudice negotiations if I were to attempt to indicate precisely where we have got to or precisely what we are attempting to do. Moreover, I could not do so in honesty without previous consultation with the other Governments which are also parties to the negotiations. I very much regret to say that I cannot say very much more beyond assuring the hon. Member and all Members of this House that everything that we feel it is possible to do in the circumstances to ensure that our local civil aviation is Malayan in its organisation, in its staff, in its services, and in its capital structure, will be done, but precisely what will be done I cannot say.

If it please you, Mr Speaker, Sir, I would like, very briefly, to make this statement to supplement that of my colleague and friend, and that is that any new arrangement which may be arrived at, whether involving Malayan Airways itself with a new franchise or not, after the end of the present franchise will be submitted to this House. This Government is not issuing any monopolies under any prerogatives without the knowledge and consent of the House, and I quite agree that the question of Malayanisation of the Malayan Airways staff will be a material factor in consideration of Malayan Airways' application or interest in any new arrangement.

Sir, I should like to support, for the record, the remarks made by the Hon. the Minister for Communications and Works on the standard of service which has been provided in this part of the world by Malayan Airways. I am not briefed by Malayan Airways as the Member for Tanjong Pagar is briefed by the Union, but I would like to put on record, as a matter of fact, that in Malayan Airways we have in this part of the world one of the most efficient local air services to be found anywhere, bar none. They have an accident-free record which, God willing, they may long, long keep and they are one of the few that do not have to be subsidised.

How much money have they made?

Order, order. We have reached the time appointed for the termination of business. The Question having been proposed after Four o'clock p.m. and the debate having continued for half an hour, Mr Speaker adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order. Adjourned accordingly at thirty-one minutes past Four o'clock p.m.