Hansard, 1997-08-25

Under the provisions of clause 2(d) of Article 46 of the Constitution of the Republic of Singapore, the following Members have been granted permission to be or to remain absent from sittings of Parliament (or any Committee of Parliament to which they have been appointed) for the periods stated: Name From To (1997) (1997) Mr Chew Heng Ching 11 August 16 August 21 August 23 August Mr Tan Soo Khoon 12 August 13 August 15 August 18 August 21 August 22 August 1 September 6 September BG George Yong-Boon Yeo 14 August 17 August 26 August 28 August Mr David T E Lim 14 August 17 August 19 August 22 August Mr Hawazi Daipi 15 August 18 August 21 October 31 October Mr Charles Chong 15 August 18 August 25 August 27 August Dr Tan Cheng Bock 16 August 21 August 23 August 24 August 19 September 21 September Mr Chng Hee Kok 18 August 26 August Mr Ong Kian Min 20 August 23 August Mr Ahmad Md Magad 21 August 22 August Mr R Sinnakaruppan 24 August 31 August Mr Davinder Singh 25 August 25 August RAdm Teo Chee Hean 25 August 30 August Mr Tang Guan Seng 25 August 30 August Mr Leong Horn Kee 25 August 30 August 8 September 20 September Mr K Shanmugam 25 August 25 August Mr Loh Meng See 25 August 25 August Mr Lim Hng Kiang 27 August 30 August Dr Ho Tat Kin 27 August 31 August Mr Sin Boon Ann 27 August 6 September Mr Lee Yock Suan 28 August 28 August 2 September 2 September 26 September 29 September Name From To (1997) (1997) Dr Tony Tan Keng Yam 29 August 30 August Mr Heng Chiang Meng 30 August 6 September Mr Chan Soo Sen 31 August 6 September Encik Yatiman Yusof 31 August 6 September 9 September 19 September Encik Ibrahim bin Othman 31 August 6 September Dr Yaacob Ibrahim 31 August 6 September Mrs Yu-Foo Yee Shoon 1 September 6 September Mr Chiam See Tong 1 September 6 September 11 September 16 September Mrs Lim Hwee Hua 1 September 11 September Mr Inderjit Singh 2 September 6 September Dr Wan Soon Bee 3 September 20 September Mr Mah Bow Tan 4 September 6 September Mr Yeo Guat Kwang 8 September 11 September TAN SOO KHOON Speaker Parliament of Singapore

The following Bills were assented to by the President of the Republic of Singapore on the dates stated: 13 August 1997 Constitution of the Republic of Singapore (Amendment) Bill 1997. 16 August 1997 (i) Supply Bill 1997; and (ii) Final Supply (FY 1996) Bill 1997. TAN SOO KHOON Speaker Parliament of Singapore

The following Question stood in the name of Mr Chng Hee Kok- 1. To ask the Minister for Law if he will consider raising the financial limit under which the Official Assignee can grant a bankrupt discharge by certificate.

Mr Speaker, Sir, after a recent review of the implementation of the amended Bankruptcy Act, we have decided to increase the financial limit from $100,000 to $250,000. This will come into effect on 15th September this year. Sir, in 1995 we made major amendments to the Bankruptcy Act. The Official Assignee could exercise his discretion to discharge a bankrupt by certificate if his debt does not exceed $100,000. With this amendment, some 4,352 bankrupts have been able to obtain their discharges in the last two years. As at end June 1997, the Official Assignee has issued 11,636 notices of his intention to discharge bankrupts by his certificate. There were objections from the creditors in only 592 or 5.1% of the cases and few have challenged the Official Assignee's decision in the Courts. We believe that the new provision has worked well. We started with the financial limit of $100,000 for the Official Assignee to issue a certificate of discharge. In the light of experience gained, we are satisfied that we can now raise it to $250,000. The Official Assignee will continue to apply the same criteria to select cases for discharge, balancing the interests of both creditors and bankrupts. These are the cause of bankruptcy, age of the bankrupt and of the bankruptcy, the bankrupt's conduct, his contributions to his bankruptcy estate and the extent of cooperation extended to the Official Assignee. We hope that this will give an added incentive to bankrupts to make greater efforts to work towards their discharge from bankruptcy.

asked the Minister for Home Affairs what are the reasons for raising the charges for the use of Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) ambulances in non-emergency cases, given that there will be a concerted publicity campaign to encourage people to use the service provided by Commercial and Industrial Security Corporation (CISCO); and whether the SCDF can, as an alternative measure, re-route calls to CISCO when non-emergency cases are involved.

Mr Speaker, Sir, the Singapore Civil Defence Force's Emergency Ambulance Service (EAS) is primarily intended for response to life-threatening emergencies. SCDF ambulances are thus equipped with state-of-the-art equipment such as defibrillators and other resuscitative devices, and ambulance crews are specially trained to give basic life support to the seriously injured or sick. SCDF currently charges only $50 for each non-emergency call, although the full cost is $110 each time one of our ambulances is called out. Most private ambulance operators currently charge $50 to $70 per trip, but their ambulances are not similarly equipped. The EAS is increasingly being misused by the public, despite SCDF's sustained public education efforts. Although emergency calls have hovered around 40,000 per year over the last five years, non-emergency calls have nearly doubled - 11,000 in 1992 to 20,000 calls last year. Another way of looking at this is that roughly 1 out of every 3 ambulance calls was unnecessarily handled by the SCDF, when a private ambulance or even a taxi would have served the purpose. Each time the EAS attends to a non-emergency call, it is less able to respond in time to a real emergency. We must take decisive steps to stop this abuse. Our approach is two-pronged. First, SCDF has helped to set up a private non-emergency ambulance hotline, 777-0000, currently operated by CISCO. SCDF has widely publicised it, using the mass media as well as distributing brochures to every household. We have achieved modest results so far. But we need to do more to encourage the public to switch over and call for private ambulances when they do not have an emergency on hand. Secondly, from October 1997, every non-emergency EAS user will be billed $75, which barely recovers three quarters of the cost. From October 1998, non-emergency users will have to bear the full cost, which will be at least $110. Many countries such as the United States, Canada and Australia are charging full cost for their non-emergency ambulance services so that critical resources are properly allocated. Indeed, users even have to pay for emergency ambulance services in these countries. SCDF already re-routes an average of 10 to 15 calls a day to the CISCO hotline. But this still unnecessarily involves the SCDF and is only a small fraction of the number of non-emergency calls received by it. The measures we are introducing will have greater impact. They are designed to relieve the SCDF of unnecessarily taking calls or attending to non-emergency cases, so that it can be more effective in its core responsibility of attending to real emergencies.

Sir, can the Minister of State explain how a decision is made between non-emergency cases and emergency cases? Who decides?

Sir, in a large percentage of cases it is not possible to ascertain on the telephone whether it is an emergency or non-emergency case. Indeed, when a person calls the SCDF he will say that it is something that requires attention straightaway. In these cases, SCDF will not take the risk and they will go to the ground. There is a staff nurse who is well trained and there are guidelines. In instances when it is non-life threatening, for example, a headache or backache or sometimes a bad toothache, and so forth, the user will be told that it is a non-emergency situation. If the person insists that it is an emergency and he must get to the hospital straightaway, SCDF nevertheless will take him to the hospital. After which, SCDF will check with the hospital and the doctor, having treated the person, will tell us the situation. If it is a non-emergency case, we will treat it as such.

asked the Minister for National Development in what ways the Housing and Development Board can help those upgraders who have encountered great difficulties in selling their existing flats as a result of the recent policy change.

Mr Speaker, Sir, the revised policies announced in April and May this year are not intended to decrease the liquidity of HDB flats and stifle the HDB resale market. HDB's records show that the number of resale transactions since the announcements in April and May has not dropped significantly. There are about 3,200 and 3,000 flats registered for resale in the months of June and July respectively. These figures are close to the monthly average of 3,300 applications received last year. Therefore, the revised policies have led to a consolidation of the HDB resale market, without significantly affecting the demand for these flats. HDB resale flat prices have been experiencing a sharp upward turn in the past few years, with annual increases of about 35% in the last two years. We cannot expect such increases to continue year after year. A consolidation of prices would place the HDB resale market on a firmer footing. In general, price movements of HDB resale flats will be determined by the market forces of demand and supply, as well as the prevailing market sentiments. Therefore, HDB flat owners should still be able to find buyers for their flats, provided their asking prices reflect these market considerations.

Sir, can I ask the Parliamentary Secretary whether he is aware that the market prices of HDB resale flats since the announcement of the revised policies have dropped significantly and, in some cases, up to 20%? Would he consider this drop as a consolidation of prices?

Sir, since 1992, prices of HDB flats have risen quite high. In fact, I recall, sitting on the other side of the Bench for the last five years, that Members have been screaming that HDB flat prices have shot through the roof. I just said that in the last two years, HDB resale flat prices went up by 35% alone. This adjustment downwards from a very high benchmark is a consolidation. It is not excessive. It is not significant.

Can I ask the Parliamentary Secretary whether he would still consider it as consolidation if the prices of HDB resale flats drop to valuation or below valuation?

Sir, I think it is still consolidation. I will give him some numbers. In July 1997, ie, 2-3 months after the two announcements made in April and May, the number of resale transactions registered with valuation, that means resale transactions with valuation reports, totalled 1,855. 1.7% or 32 out of the 1,855 resale applications registered with valuations were sold at prices below valuation. In other words, only 1.7% of the 1,855 resale flats with valuation reports were sold below valuation. The majority of them, 98.3%, were sold at or above valuation prices. Of these few cases which were sold below valuation, the difference between the valuation price and the asking price was only about 5%. So the figure is not alarming. In any case, the valuations are only a guideline. They are not numbers tabulated in stone that cannot be changed. In fact, valuation reports are very much like topographic maps. Very often, when a map is published it is out of date. In the case of a valuation report, in many cases, when it is published it may also be out of date.

Sir, can the Parliamentary Secretary confirm that, in fact, valuation reports are made for the purposes of getting loans and the reports do not reflect the open market value? The valuation report is about 20% less than the market value. If the sale is below the valuation report, then it will be greater than 20%.

The buyer has the option of selecting a professional valuer from the HDB's list. So these valuation figures are not provided by HDB. They are provided by professional valuers unless he is questioning the judgment of these professional valuers. The market prices change from time to time. Over the last few months, prices of HDB resale flats have fallen slightly but not significantly. In the case of a falling market, the valuation prices will always lead the asking price. Just like in a rising market, valuation prices will usually lag the asking prices.

Sir, I have done many cases concerning valuation of HDB flats and all these valuations are for purposes of raising mortgage loans. Therefore, they do not reflect the open market price of the flat. It is only about 80%, because HDB only gives a loan of about 80% of the open market price. So the valuation report as it is does not reflect the open market price of the flat. It is about 20% less. Even if you sell at valuation, it is already 20% less than the open market value.

Sir, that is not the case. Valuation prices are valuation reports.

Sir, can I ask the Parliamentary Secretary whether such a drop in prices in such a short time had been anticipated by the Ministry when implementing the new policies? Because such a drop in prices has affected a large number of Singaporeans selling their flats at that particular point of time and a lot of them were actually caught. The Parliamentary Secretary may not be aware but there are many persons selling their flats during this period of time and conducting open houses who did not get any call at all.

Sir, during the Budget debate, the Minister for National Development has given a very clear and concise assessment of the property market since the announcement of the two policies in April and May. In the case of Dr Wang, I understand that some of his residents have difficulty selling their HDB flats at or above the valuation prices. In fact, HDB allows a six-month period for the person who has taken possession of the new flat to sell his existing flat. So his resident has six months to sell the flat. If at the end of six months, he still cannot sell the flat HDB, on a case by case basis, does allow another six months for him to sell the flat provided attempts have been made by the seller to sell on the market seriously. In other words, such evidence could be newspaper advertisements or reports from housing agents. In all, it could be a one-year period. So within that year, a serious seller asking for a reasonable price should be able to sell his flat.

Sir, I would like to ask the Parliamentary Secretary for his opinion. In view of the drop in the selling prices of HDB flats after the election, does the situation now tie in well with the PAP's asset enhancement scheme, as proposed at the last election?

The answer is yes. The Government has increased the assets of the overwhelming majority of Singaporeans. I will give an example. The selling price of a 3-room flat, which formed the bulk of the flats sold in the early years, was between $8,000 and $15,000. My parents' flat, for example, was sold, if I remember correctly, at about $10,000. Today, those 3-room flats are now sold on the open market at about $200,000. If you do not call that an asset enhancement, what is that? Even if they drop a little bit, 5%, 7%, or 10% from $200,000, it is a significant increase from $10,000. Does he not agree? Does he not call that asset enhancement?

In other words, the Parliamentary Secretary's view is that even if the selling price of a HDB flat were to drop by another 30%, he will still consider it an asset enhancement.

Mr Speaker, Sir, it is a hypothetical question. I will not dignify that with a reply. HDB flats have not fallen by 30%. It has consolidated itself and I think the volume of resale transactions proves that the market is adjusting quite nicely.

Sir, I would like to ask the Parliamentary Secretary whether his Ministry is considering any measure to help people sell their flats at higher prices and whether the Government's planned land sales have any impact on these HDB flats.

The HDB's building programme has been announced and the information is there. The people who buy and sell HDB resale flats based on this information should understand that prices can go up and they can also come down. And over the last 30 years, prices have on the whole gone up quite significantly. Right now, it is consolidating itself. It has still gone up by quite a lot if you look at the base figures from 1992-1996 and even the first quarter of 1997.

Sir, those who bought HDB flats from the resale open market before the general election actually paid higher prices than what the flat is worth now. I do not know whether the Parliamentary Secretary is of the view that it is still an asset enhancement.

Property prices go up and down. The economy is on the way to recovery. I think in the long term property in Singapore will only go up. But in the short term, there could be fluctuations. But we should look at the long term. Property is something that is not movable and is held for posterity.

Sir, HDB flats are public housing. The Parliamentary Secretary says that prices move up and down. So there is a speculative element in it. Does the Government allow this speculative element to continue in public housing?

You cannot say that there is a speculative element. Resale prices of HDB flats go up and down according to demand and supply and the state of the economy. And HDB has never said that prices can only go up.

The Parliamentary Secretary did not answer my question on whether the land sales programme affects HDB prices.

I want to repeat that the Ministry of National Development publishes its land sales programme and the number of units HDB will build, and based on these figures, the market will react to it. It is not for HDB or the Government to influence prices. We cannot do it. It is beyond our control. He is asking whether HDB will help the sellers fetch a higher resale price. You tell me how?

asked the Minister for Health whether there are adequate numbers of trained healthcare workers to look after our greying population and the subsidised transport needs of needy elderly citizens who have to attend regular medical check-ups at the hospitals; and whether the revised ambulance charges will affect them.

Most of the elderly are healthy. For the sick and dependent elderly, they require different levels and types of care which are provided by the family members as well as healthcare professionals. The Ministry is coordinating special training programmes for healthcare professionals and home carers to cater to the special needs of the elderly. These include: Firstly, geriatricians, who are physicians who sub-specialise in medical care of the elderly. They usually work in geriatric departments in acute hospitals. As geriatric care is a relatively new specialty in Singapore, we are in the process of training more doctors in this specialty. There are currently 15 geriatricians in Singapore, with another five in training. We target to have 23 geriatricians by the year 2000. Secondly, general practitioners play a major role in looking after the elderly. The School of Postgraduate Medical Studies is starting a Postgraduate Diploma course in geriatric medicine in September this year. This one year course which incorporates elements of distance-learning will allow many more doctors to be better trained in looking after the elderly. Thirdly, nurses who have undergone post-basic training in gerontology. Currently, 117 nurses have advanced diplomas in gerontology. The Nanyang Polytechnic's School of Health Sciences is able to train about 25 registered nurses in this advanced diploma course every year. There is also a course for assistant nurses run by the School of Nursing on Care of the Elderly to complement the registered nurses. Fourthly, nursing aides are trained in simple nursing skills relevant to the needs of the elderly. Finally, community-based service providers do provide training for family carers to look after their sick elderly at home. As to the second part of Mr Ang's question, the ambulance service by the Singapore Civil Defence Forces (SCDF) is provided for emergencies. The increase in charges by the SCDF from $50 to $75 refers to non-emergencies who use these ambulances. The elderly who require transport for routine medical check-ups at hospitals and clinics are not affected by the SCDF's increased ambulance charges, as in the first place, they should not be using those ambulances.

asked the Minister for Health since upgrading the Certificate in Nursing to a polytechnic diploma has improved the image of the nursing profession and consequently the intake of nurses, whether there are any plans to introduce degree programmes for nursing in the local universities.

At present, there is no full-time local degree programme for nursing. But there is a 2-year, part-time Bachelor of Nursing degree programme offered by the Singapore Institute of Management (SIM) which was introduced in September 1994. Nurses who have acquired the Nanyang Polytechnic (NYP) Diploma in Nursing can proceed to the degree programme either locally at the SIM or at the University of Sydney itself. Nurses can apply for sponsorship from their employer, be it the Ministry of Health, the restructured hospitals or private hospitals, to enrol in this programme. We will continue to sponsor nurses who show the ability and aptitude for greater responsibility to participate in the programme. The degree programme at SIM has managed to take in, on average, about 140 students per year in the last three years. The first year's intake has already completed their programme. This programme will provide us with a steady supply of graduate nurses to meet our requirements in the immediate future. We will monitor the demand for the degree programme by the healthcare institutions and by the nurses. This will help us gauge whether there is a need for a full-time local degree programme. My Ministry is also aware that there are good `A' level students who wish to take up nursing as a career. For these young people, PSC offers scholarships tenable in the UK and Australia. Thus far, 28 nursing scholars have returned and are working in MOH and the restructured hospitals. Another four PSC scholars are still pursuing their degree. A small number of World Health Organisation scholarships are also available.

I would like to ask the Senior Minister of State how readily available are these sponsorships for Singaporeans who are interested to pursue a nursing degree in Sydney. Does she have any statistics?

The degree course for nursing at Sydney is not normally open to sponsorship, unless private institutions or restructured hospitals want to sponsor the students this way. This is because the course is already available locally at SIM. But I think he is talking more about PSC scholarships. These are offered only to people who qualify for them. Students can apply but the PSC will select.

Sir, basically, I raise this question because we have been debating about the need to upgrade the image of nurses and because of the fact that nurses are treated more like drudges in Singapore. This is unfortunate because it is a high calling, and we need to upgrade this dignity.

Order. Dr Toh, can you ask your question?

Yes. Sir, I would like to urge the Ministry to perhaps consider whether there is this need to push the PSC programme so that we will have more scholars who are nurses and nursing can become a dignified profession again.

PSC scholarships are for people who do very well academically and want to take up nursing as a career. The number of scholarships also depends on how many are willing to take them up. But in general, Dr Toh's concern, I believe, is about raising the professional status and prestige of the nurses. There are other ways. For nurses to take up degree training, we have to consider whether they have the ability as well as the readiness to take up greater responsibility in the post. So the nursing degree is not really for everyone.

The following Question stood in the name of Mr R. Sinnakaruppan - 6. To ask the Minister for Communications if he will consider liberalising the bus services to allow private companies and co-operatives to compete with and complement the services provided by the Singapore Bus Service (1978) Ltd and the Trans-Island Bus Services Ltd.

asked the Minister for Communications whether he will allow Scheme B buses, school buses and other groups to operate feeder bus services in both public and private housing estates.

Question No. 6, Sir.

Mr Speaker, Sir, as Questions 6 and 7 are related, can I have your permission to take them together?

Yes.

Sir, currently, private bus operators are already operating 27 Scheme B routes. In addition, there are numerous private bus shuttle services operating from private condominiums, factories in Jurong and Tuas, etc, linking commuters and workers to specific destinations like MRT stations, bus interchanges and workplaces. Such services play an important role in supplementing the regular services provided by SBS and TIBS. I am pleased to inform Members that LTA has identified six more Scheme B services for implementation within the next few months. They will complement the services provided by SBS and TIBS. LTA will continue to look for areas where such services are viable, and encourage private operators to apply to PTC for approval. Dr Vasoo asked whether other operators are allowed to run feeder bus services. As mentioned earlier, we have allowed private bus operators to operate some bus services to supplement and complement SBS and TIBS services. We can consider allowing private bus operators to operate some feeder bus service to supplement and complement SBS services. Private bus operators who are interested in operating feeder bus services can apply to PTC for approval. However, I should point out that at current fares, most feeder services are not profitable and are cross subsidised by the main trunk services. There may be limited scope or incentive for other private companies or cooperatives to fully run or even supplement these services.

Sir, may I ask the Minister of State whether in the new towns where there is a shortage or inefficient feeder services to some extent, he would consider allowing private operators to operate in such new towns?

Sir, as I mentioned, we will definitely consider allowing such private operators to operate. The existing operators have to fulfil certain basic standards set by PTC. But to supplement these feeder services, we would allow private operators maybe to go into areas where there are problems, especially during peak hours. As I say, if there are private operators who are keen to provide these services, we will consider their applications.

Will the Minister of State enlighten the House as to which six services under Scheme B that he was talking about?

Sir, some of these services are identified through feedback from MPs. If the Member is interested, I would just briefly mention them. First, a new link between Simei interchange and Changi Airport via Upper Changi Road. Our former colleague, Mr Teo Chong Tee, had been asking us to introduce this. Second, a new link between Choa Chu Kang interchange and Kent Ridge NUS via Teck Whye Avenue, Upper Bukit Timah Road, Bukit Timah Road and Clementi Road. Third, a new link between Airport Road and Orchard Boulevard via MacPherson Road, Bendemeer Road, Jalan Besar, Bukit Timah Road and Scotts Road. Fourth, a new link between Hillview Avenue and Marina Centre via Upper Bukit Timah Road, Bukit Timah Road, Dunearn Road, Stevens Road and Orchard Road. And also two main existing operators' routes - SBS service 147 and TIBS service 176. The Scheme B buses will also duplicate these routes during peak hours.

Sir, I am more interested in Whampora. May I know why is Whampoa not included?

Sir, there is a Question on Whampoa Estate later on. Do you want me to answer it now?

We will wait for it later.

All right.

Sir, the Minister of State mentioned that feeder bus services can apply to run shuttle services. They have to comply with certain criteria. As regards fares/charges, is it one of the criteria? How much more than the existing fare are they allowed to charge? What is the percentage?

It should not be more than what is charged for the current services provided by TIBS and SBS.

asked the Minister for Community Development and Minister-in-charge of Muslim Affairs (a) what is the number of pilgrims with haj visas from overseas embassies during the 1997 pilgrimage; (b) whether these pilgrims pay the administrative fees of $206 to the Majlis Ugama Islam Singapura (MUIS); (c) what is MUIS' stand on the status of these pilgrims; and (d) what action MUIS intends to take against the General Sales Agents that flouted the rules with regard to these pilgrims. The Minister for Community Development and Minister-in-Charge of Muslim Affairs (Mr Abdullah Tarmugi): Sir, there are four parts to the question. I will reply to each one in turn. In the last haj, MUIS was informed that there were about 950 pilgrims with haj visas issued by Saudi Arabian embassies outside Singapore. Did these pilgrims pay the $206 administrative charge? The approved haj package price charged by travel agents, in fact, includes the administrative charge of $206. And since the haj applications of those pilgrims who obtained their visas from outside were not submitted to or registered by MUIS, the Council did not receive the administrative fee from this group. The Saudi Haj authorities informed MUIS that Singaporeans who want to perform the haj should obtain their visas from the Saudi Embassy in Singapore. MUIS, therefore, does not condone the practice of obtaining visas from outside Singapore as it may lead to complications in the management of the haj by MUIS. Sir, MUIS is concerned that pilgrims with these foreign visas may put themselves at risk and uncertainty. For instance, they could be sent back by the Saudi authorities when they reach Saudi Arabia. The Saudi authorities allocate sites and facilities in Makkah based on the pilgrim quotas specified for each country. But the actual number of pilgrims from Singapore exceeded the official quota because of the presence of the unregistered pilgrims. As a result, there was overcrowding and inadequate facilities in the areas meant for Singapore pilgrims. This is unfair to those pilgrims who were registered with MUIS. MUIS is also greatly concerned for the safety of the unregistered pilgrims because should anything happen to them in Makkah, MUIS has no means of identifying them since they are not in MUIS' records. Moreover, MUIS plans its medical and welfare services according to the official quota allocated to Singapore. The additional unofficial numbers would therefore strain these services. MUIS therefore holds a serious view of the problem as it concerns the safety of all Singapore pilgrims. MUIS will take up the issue of overseas visas separately with the Haj authorities in Saudi Arabia. MUIS has made it clear that the practice of obtaining haj visas from outside Singapore undermines the haj quota system and adversely affects the welfare and interest of all Singapore pilgrims, apart from being unfair to the registered pilgrims. MUIS has issued letters of reprimand to travel agents who have flouted the quota. It is also considering taking appropriate actions against these travel agents. In the coming haj, travel agents will have to give an undertaking not to be involved in obtaining visas from outside Singapore when making their applications as approved travel agents.

Sir, is it true that pilgrims have to pay between $600-$1,000 for theses visas outside Singapore? And do we consider the amount paid as a form of corruption? If it is so, can we take action against the travel agents who are involved in bringing pilgrims who got their visas from outside Singapore?

Sir, MUIS has received information that amounts between US$600-$1,000 have been charged for these visas when, in fact, they are free. MUIS will be looking further into this to see what further action it could take.

Sir, in view of the problem that has been raised by the Minister and Encik Ibrahim, I wonder whether MUIS and the Minister have considered approaching the Saudi authorities to increase the quota. Evidently, based upon the amount that they are paying outside the official system, the pilgrims can well afford to pay for the packages that we have in Singapore.

Sir, in fact, for several years now, MUIS has been appealing to the Saudi authorities to increase the quota. For example, for the last haj, the quota was 3,000 and MUIS managed to get another 1,000 added to the quota. Even then, the number who went to the haj exceeded the number. For this year, we will do likewise.

asked the Minister for National Development whether the Housing and Development Board has any plan to conduct examinations for housing agents who do not qualify for the Common Examination for House Agents.

Sir, the Common Examination for House Agents (CEHA) is conducted by the Board of Examiners chaired by the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore (IRAS) with representation from the associations representing the different housing agencies. Since December 1995, the HDB has implemented the Listed Housing Agents Scheme (LHAS) to encourage housing agents to conduct resale transactions in a professional and above-the-table manner. To be admitted into the LHAS, housing agencies must ensure that their agents possess the relevant qualifications recognised by IRAS. There are now 416 housing agencies in the HDB's LHAS list. The Common Examination for House Agents conducted by IRAS has served the purpose of raising the standard of professionalism among housing agents. There is therefore no need for HDB to conduct another examination for the housing agents.

Sir, I understand that people who are qualified to take the CEHA examination must have at least 3 `O' levels. My question is: for those who do not have 3 `O' levels, will the HDB consider conducting a separate course for these people? I understand that if half of the staff of a company are not qualified, the whole company is not allowed to be a housing agency, thereby affecting the employment of a number of staff who have been doing housing agency work for many years.

There are several points. The first point is that housing agents are professionals. So there must be a minimum qualification, because they are dealing with buying and selling of a commodity that runs into hundreds of thousands of dollars. In a professional hand, a buyer and seller will have the peace of mind. This is the number one point. The second point is that it is true that since January 1997, only agents 21 years and above and who possess at least 3 GCE `O' level passes are allowed to sit for the CEHA. But some time back, HDB did make a one-off exercise to exempt experienced housing agents from this examination. In order to be exempted from the CEHA, the housing agent must be at least 50 years old as at 31st December 1995; at least 10 years' experience in the transacting of properties in the industry; must have closed at least 20 transactions for HDB flats; must have enrolled for the CEHA and attended 80% of the classes but unfortunately failed the examination. But they must submit the exemption before 1st July 1997. So those who have submitted before 1st July and satisfied these requirements have been given a one-off exercise of being admitted to the LHAS. Those who have come to Mr Ang might have come after the closing date.

Sir, if housing agents are professionals, what would the Ministry say about the professionals who are qualified and who allow their names to be used by non-qualified people to conduct business?

Sir, that is one reason why the HDB is tightening up the transactions of resale flats. Just to give Dr Toh an idea, the CEHA examinations are conducted by IRAS, as I said earlier on, and administered jointly by the professional bodies of the Singapore Institute of Surveyors and Valuers (SISV), the Association of Realtors (ASR) and the Association of Real Estate Agents (ASREA). In fact, the Singapore Institute of Surveyors and Valuers is the Secretariat to the Board of Examiners. Sir, these examinations are overseen by professionals.

asked the Minister for Trade and Industry if there is any immediate plan to provide power supply to the homes of Serangoon Garden Estate from underground cables as presently most of the homes in the estate receive their power supply from overhead cables which are unsightly and, if not, when he intends to do so.

Mr Speaker, Sir, PowerGrid has been converting and will continue to convert power supply from overhead cables to underground cables at the request of residents in private residential estates. Residents are required to pay a standard connection charge and engage a licensed electrical contractor to shift their electricity supply intake point to the front of their houses, and provide the necessary lead-in pipes up to the fence so that they can tap from the underground mains located along the roads. However, PowerGrid will not be able to remove the overhead cables if even one resident decides to continue with overhead supply. My Ministry will study whether to legislate such that PowerGrid will be able to proceed to convert power supply from overhead cables to underground cables if a large majority, say, 75% of affected residents agree to the conversion.

asked the Minister for Communications whether the Land Transport Authority will consider providing an underpass at the Central Expressway (from Towner Road to Whampoa Drive).

Sir, presently, there is an overhead bridge for pedestrians who wish to cross the CTE at the proposed location. The LTA has studied Mr Choo's suggestion but found that it would not be feasible to construct an underpass at the proposed location for two reasons. First, the construction work will cause widespread disruption to the traffic flow along CTE. Second, the underpass would not be cost-effective. The estimated cost of an underpass is about $2.6 million and it would duplicate the functions of the existing overhead bridge. However, I have asked the LTA to keep this matter in view and discuss other possible alternatives with Mr Choo and his grassroots leaders.

May I know what other alternatives have the Minister of State got in mind?

Sir, Mr Choo has earlier requested through appeal letters to build ramps for this overhead bridge. But the problem with the existing overhead bridge is that it has insufficient space to construct the ramps. So one alternative is to shift the overhead bridge to a different location where there is enough space for the ramps to be constructed.

I do not know whether the Minister of State is aware that the existing overhead bridge is one of the tallest, if not the tallest, overhead bridges in Singapore. There are so many aged people commuting between the two estates. Would it not be better if his Ministry were to consider installing escalators which would be more convenient to all, including the LTA?

I will ask the LTA to study the cost-benefit and to see whether it is feasible.

asked the Minister for Communications whether his Ministry has any plans to improve the public transport service in Whampoa Estate.

Sir, the Land Transport Authority has reviewed the bus services at Whampoa Estate and informed me that the estate is generally well served by public transport. There are currently eight services (5 SBS, 2 CSS and 1 Scheme B) originating from the estate. This far exceeds the requirement of a minimum of two trunk bus services for the estate, under the Public Transport Council bus service standards. In addition, four other services (3 SBS and 1 Scheme B) ply along Balestier Road and are within walking distance of the estate's residents. At the residents' request and at the request of the MP, SBS is considering diverting Service 139 from Balestier Road to ply along Jalan Rajah and Kim Keat Road and loop into Whampoa Estate when travelling to and from Toa Payoh. However, as this diversion would mean longer travelling time and higher fares for existing passengers, community leaders' views are being sought. In addition, LTA will also consider allowing private bus operators to run supplementary bus services. This was the question that the Member was going to ask earlier. When the North-East Line becomes operational in 2002, residents of Whampoa Estate would also enjoy the services of the MRT. The nearest station, Boon Keng Station, will be located at nearby Serangoon Road and Boon Keng Road.

Sir, is the Minister of State aware that Whampoa Estate is an isolated estate and I wonder whether LTA has conducted a comprehensive review of the public transport service in Whampoa?

That is why, as I have mentioned earlier, the number of services in Whampoa Estate far exceeded the basic standards laid down by PTC. On top of that, because of the MP's feedback, we are now trying to provide this more convenient link between Toa Payoh and Whampoa by asking SBS to look into diverting its services or allowing private operators who are prepared to run these services.

Sir, I wonder whether the Ministry could consider taking a more proactive approach in terms of reviewing transport needs, especially working in tandem with upgraded precincts. Every time we move around and meet some of the residents from the upgraded precincts, they are very happy with upgrading, but they are always unhappy about when the transport system will be reviewed and upgraded to move in tandem with the upgraded flats.

What is your question?

Could the Minister take a more proactive approach?

Indeed, we are adopting a proactive approach. The route planning process is a dynamic one, with constant reviews and fine-tuning by both the operators and the PTC, with inputs from authorities like HDB, URA, feedback from commuters, grassroots organisations and Members of Parliament. So the dynamic process ensures that the services serve the public well. For the Member's information, in 1996, PTC approved 24 new services plus 10 amendments to existing routes. So the Member can see that fine-tuning and improvement are being made all the time. Of course, with feedback from the MP concerned, we can look at how services can be improved with the new improvements taking place in the estate. Because the ridership pattern will change, we will also adjust accordingly.

Would the Minister of State agree with me that the LTA has been conducting the so-called reviews on a very haphazard manner? Why? Because, on the one hand, the Minister of State tells me that there are adequate bus services in Whampoa Estate but, on the other hand, I have been receiving complaints about the inadequate public transport service in Whampoa Estate. How does he reconcile that?

If you ask anybody on what kind of bus services they want, they would tell you that they want from Point A to Point B to serve their own needs. The specific request from the Member is to have this stronger linkage between Toa Payoh and Whampoa Estate because I have not heard of complaints about the inadequacy of other services. That is also a specific need. As I have said, we are actually asking SBS to do a diversion. If that can be done with the agreement of the grassroots leaders, then that would solve the specific problem of the residents.

Sir, if the Minister of State were to look at my question today, I never mentioned specifically about linking Whampoa and Toa Payoh. It was my previous request. My question today is: how is the Ministry going to improve the public transport service in Whampoa in its totality, taking the whole Whampoa Estate into consideration, and whether he has any plans at all?

I have mentioned that we have done a review and we see that the number of services is actually adequate, except for the services that Mr Choo has asked earlier, and that was the connection between the two estates. So this is the outstanding matter and we would like to help. Either we get a private operator who is prepared to run the services or we get SBS to divert one of its services. As far as the other services are concerned, we feel that they are adequate.

I disagree with the Minister of State. By diverting Service 139, he is telling us that it is going to cost the residents more money and more time. So it is not solving the problem.

If the grassroots leaders do not agree, then we will explore getting private operators to run the services.

Would the Minister of State consider having this light rail system in Whampoa Estate?

Again, we have to do a cost-benefit analysis and if the ridership justifies such a project, of course, it would be implemented. The LTA is currently looking at all the estates in Singapore and see which estate can justify such a project as early as it can.

May I know when the Ministry intends to conduct the study and survey and when will he be able to let us know?

The study is being done, but I cannot give the Member the answer when it will be ready.

It is peculiar, is it not? If the survey is done, why am I not told?

Not likely to be in the foreseeable future.

Why not?

Because ridership is not enough.

21st century!

asked the Minister for Communications what plans there are for the further development of West Coast Highway and Pasir Panjang Road, and when these are likely to be implemented.

Sir, the LTA will build an elevated semi-expressway along Pasir Panjang Road and West Coast Highway as part of an overall plan to increase the traffic capacity of the roads along the west coast of Singapore. This elevated semi-expressway will be the westward extension of the Telok Blangah Semi-Expressway which stretches above Telok Blangah Road from Kampong Bahru Road to Alexandra Road. Implementation of this road project will be staged. The stretches along Telok Blangah Road, Pasir Panjang Road and West Coast Highway are scheduled for completion in mid-2001, end-2001 and mid-2003 respectively.

Does the Minister envisage that this development will entail any acquisition of land from the private estates abutting these roads?

Sir, I do not have the details with me, but I would envisage that there may be some acquisition of land. As to what extent, I do not have the ready answer with me.

Would the Ministry or LTA consider briefing the private estates' representatives on the plans and any imposition on their property?

Definitely.

asked the Minister for National Development if there are any plans in the near future to sell by tender or otherwise, the shophouses located at Block Nos. 440 to 446 in Pasir Ris Central.

Sir, there are altogether 72 shops (including four eating establishments) at Blks 440 to 446 Pasir Ris Central. Of these, 25 shops (including two eating establishments) at Blks 442, 443 and 444 have been sold under the Sale of Tenanted Shops Scheme in May 1990. The remaining 47 shops (including two eating establishments) are under rental. HDB has no immediate plans to sell the rental shops at Blks 440 to 446 Pasir Ris Central. However, HDB will take note of the shopkeepers' interests and the Member of Parliament's concern in purchasing their shops.

Sir, if there are no immediate plans, are there plans at all to sell those remaining shops at Pasir Ris Central?

Sir, HDB reviews the sale of tenanted shops to sitting tenants throughout the island. When the plans for the sale of these shops in this region are more concrete, we will approach the Member of Parliament and get his feedback. 1.28 pm

"to provide for the establishment and operation of Community Mediation Centres to provide mediation services connected with certain disputes", presented by the Minister of State for Law (Assoc. Prof. Ho Peng Kee); read the First time; to be read a Second time on the next available sitting of Parliament; and to be printed.

"to amend the Customs Act (Chapter 70 of the 1995 Revised Edition) and to make consequential amendments to the Free Trade Zones Act (Chapter 114 of the 1985 Revised Edition)", recommendation of President signified; presented by the Minister for Finance (Dr Richard Hu Tsu Tau); read the First time; to be read a Second time on the next available sitting of Parliament; and to be printed.

"to amend the Tourist Promotion Board Act (Chapter 328 of the 1985 Revised Edition) and to make consequential amendments to certain other Acts", presented by the Minister for Trade and Industry (Mr Lee Yock Suan); read the First time; to be read a Second time on the next available sitting of Parliament; and to be printed.

"to require new houses and flats and new buildings which are subdivided into flats to be provided with civil defence shelters for use during a state of emergency, to empower the Commissioner of the Singapore Civil Defence Force to require civil defence shelters to be provided in new buildings owned by statutory boards and to designate any part of any building as a civil defence shelter, for use by persons needing to take refuge therein during a state of emergency, to regulate the use of civil defence shelters and to provide for matters connected therewith, and to make a consequential amendment to the Building Control Act (Chapter 29 of the 1990 Revised Edition)", presented by the Minister for Home Affairs (Mr Wong Kan Seng); read the First time; to be read a Second time on the next available sitting of Parliament; and to be printed.

Order for Second Reading read.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time." Sir, this Bill brings together amendments made to a number of written laws which are mainly of a procedural or administrative nature. The amendments are divided into two categories. The first deals with the exercise by the President of his statutory, non-discretionary powers on mainly routine or administrative matters. The second is a consolidation of various amendments of a procedural nature to various other written laws. Let me begin with the first category. Sir, in 1994, a Committee was established to review the laws where references were made to the President with a view to removing matters which did not need the President's attention. The President had asked for this review as he felt that routine matters need not be brought to his attention. The Committee's recommendations are implemented in the Bill through clause 7 and the Second Schedule. Sir, I should point out that the powers of the President which, under this Bill, will be exercisable by a Minister instead, are mainly of a routine or administrative nature. The Bill does not affect the President's discretionary powers at all. The review was carried out in consultation with the President's Office and he has agreed to the proposed changes. By clause 7 read with the Second Schedule, various written laws are amended to allow a Minister to exercise powers currently reposed in the President in areas such as appointing operational staff, setting fees and making subsidiary legislation. Many of them are historical in origin. They are currently exercised, in any case, by the President on the advice of the Cabinet or Minister. The proposed amendments will result in a more efficient administration. In addition, clause 3 of the Bill makes a number of amendments to the Pensions Act to enable the President to appoint one or more Pension Authorities and to delegate the routine functions to such Authorities. Such functions include approving retirement of officers on medical grounds and approving re-employment after retirement. In some instances, existing functions of the President under the Pensions Act have been transferred to Pension Authorities. These are either procedural or concern daily operations like payment of pension benefits. However, fundamental functions concerning matters such as basic eligibility to pension and quantum remain vested in the President. Hence, the Bill does not provide for, for example, the designation of pensionable services, making of regulation and fixing of pension commutation factors and discounts. Sir, the second category of amendments in the Bill consolidates various minor changes to our written laws. These amendments have been referred to the Law Society of Singapore which agrees with them. The main amendments are: Firstly, provisions in various laws are amended to limit the reception of English laws, practices and procedures into our legal system. At the Second Reading of the Application of English Law Bill in 1993, the Minister for Law indicated that there was a need to review our legislation to identify provisions which still import English Law and practices. The Attorney-General's Chambers have carried out this review. These amendments, set out in the First Schedule, will ensure greater certainty in our laws and put them in a local context. An example of these amendments is section 29(3) of the Legal Profession Act for which the phrase "precedence over Senior Counsel and advocates and solicitors" will replace "such priority as is customarily accorded to the holders of these offices in England" with respect to the priority accorded to the Attorney-General and Solicitor-General appearing personally in court. This amendment will place the provision in a local context and reflect current practices. Secondly, the Interpretation Act is amended to empower an authority which has the power to prescribe fees and charges under various subsidiary legislation to also prescribe the manner or mode of payment for these fees and charges. This will facilitate the implementation of more convenient and cost saving methods, such as GIRO, to collect fees and charges. The Act is also amended to enable designated public officers to signify the exercise of powers by their Minister. Currently, only Permanent Secretaries are authorised to do so. Thirdly, the Bill repeals and re-enacts section 37 of the Probate and Administration Act, so that intestate estates will vest in the Public Trustee instead of the Chief Justice, as is presently the case. This will avoid a situation where the Chief Justice has to be named as the defendant in a suit against the estate of a person who has died intestate. The amendment also caters for a situation where a person dies testate, but without an executor who is competent to prove his will. In such cases, his estate will also vest in the Public Trustee. This addresses problems that could arise in connection with real property transactions where there is no one who can or is willing to prove the will of a deceased property owner. Sir, I beg to move. Question proposed.

Mr Speaker, Sir, because of other matters which were claiming my urgent attention, I have not been able to study the various Bills that had been presented to this House and for whose Second Reading today was designated. But I took time to look at this particular Bill, the Statues (Miscellaneous Amendments) Bill. I see the Minister of State tries to gloss over this Bill by his statement that it is purely procedural and administrative. I am not sure that it is, in all the various clauses. There are particularly two clauses which cause me somewhat alarm, and that is, clause 6. Clause 6 is not purely administrative and procedural. Clause 6, Mr Speaker, Sir, if you look at the First Schedule, and if you look at the first Act, which is to be amended, proposes to delete the definition of "common law" and substitute the following definition: "common law" means the common law in so far as it is in operation in Singapore and any custom or usage having the force of law in Singapore;". As it presently stands, the definition of "common law" in the Interpretation Act is the common law of England. The explanatory note says these amendments are necessary "in order to stop the continued importation of English law, practices and procedures into the local legal system". And it says that they are a follow through of the amendments effected by the Application of English Law Act (Cap. 7A). But I have taken the opportunity to look at this Application of English Law Act which was passed in 1993. And by section 3 of that Act, it says: "The common law of England . so far as it was part of the law of Singapore immediately before 12th November 1993, shall continue to be part of the law of Singapore." And then by subsection 2, it is provided: "The common law shall continue to be in force in Singapore, as provided in subsection (1), so far as it is applicable to the circumstances of Singapore and its inhabitants and subject to such modifications as those circumstances may require." At the first reading of section 3, it did not strike me, Mr Speaker, Sir, that it prevented the importation of the English common law even where it was developed after 1993. All it purported to do was to make the common law of England before 1993 part of Singapore's laws, so that it is no longer the common law, it is the Singapore law. But it did not seem to me at any rate to prevent the importation of common law developed after 1993. I understand the purport of this new Amendment, although I do not know that it clearly specifies even that, is to prevent the importation of the English common law into Singapore. Mr Speaker, Sir, the common law is judge-made law as distinct from statutes or written law. And judges are continuously making new laws to keep apace with developments not only in their own country but abroad. The common law of England is now also the common law in a number of other Commonwealth countries, and they develop the common law as they see it. And why are we now shutting out the judges here from importing any common law that has been developed overseas, not only in Britain but other countries, from being made a part of the Singapore law? Mr Speaker, Sir, there is so much talk about Singapore being a global city and how it has to respond to what is happening in other countries to the laws and the practices there. But this Amendment would appear now to make Singapore enter into an isolationist stage as regards the importation of new ideas in the law. Is that the intention? May that be clarified - that after the passing of this Bill, judges may not look at the common law as it was developed in England or in other countries after 1993, but we are to stick to the previous common law? Law is not a static thing, Mr Speaker, Sir. Law continuously changes, adapts itself to the needs of the society and to the circumstances. It cannot be static. When the judges have decided that something should be done, then perhaps Parliament takes it on again and makes it part of a statute law. So I am a little alarmed at this blanket stopping of the importation of any common law, that is, common law and ideas developed by the judges overseas. The Minister of State says that it was referred to the Law Society. I, of course, was not aware of it. But was the Law Society asked to particularly address itself to clause 6 of the Bill? If they were, then I think, as a member, I have to query the Law Society Council as to what they did about it. I would also like to know whether this particular clause was referred to the various Chambers of Commerce for their views and comments about shutting out any principles of law developed in other countries after 1993. When I say "developed", it means "developed by the judges". I remember at one time the present Senior Minister when he was then the Prime Minister saying that one of the inducements for foreign companies to come to Singapore to do business was the knowledge that the laws would be in accordance with developments in other countries because there were appeals to the Privy Council. That is no longer a route that is available. So I would like to know whether the views of the Chambers of Commerce were asked about the importation of common law into Singapore. Finally, may I say a few words about clause 7. It seeks to transfer, as the Minister of State has pointed out, powers from the President to the Minister. I see, Mr Speaker, Sir, in the Medical Registration Bill, on which I shall not be speaking but I happened to glance at it, that the power is given to the Minister to determine the suspension of a doctor by a Health Committee and to make the Minister's decision final without any appeal therefrom. I have had occasions when I was here previously in Parliament to call attention to the danger of increasing the powers of the Ministers without any appeal or any redress given to the citizen from such decisions made by the Ministers. This was commented upon in 1926 by a committee in England which drew the dangers of giving Ministers too much power. I know the Minister of State has said in his speech that again it is purely routine and administrative. But even routine matters, Mr Speaker, Sir, can sometimes be important to the citizen. I would ask whether it is proposed, with the transfer of these powers, to provide an appeal from the Minister's decision to the courts. I think it is important that the aggrieved citizen must feel that he has a right to take a decision of the Minister, the Executive, to another independent body to question the propriety and sometimes even the merits of the decision made by the Executive. That is all I have to say, Mr Speaker, Sir.

Mr Speaker, I crave your indulgence to speak as a person who studied the law in Singapore, the USA and the UK, and who has been teaching law at the Nanyang Technological University for some time. I would like to speak on a point that Mr Jeyaretnam has mentioned about the common law. I remember that one of the first things I learned as a first-year law student was that the common law was the common law of England as it first began, because we were a British colony and we therefore first used the laws that our colonizers imposed on us. This itself is a historical fact which is common to many countries of the Commonwealth and also the United States of America. In America today, lawyers, professors and judges talk about the common law but, in no way, if you ask them, would they define it as the common law of England. To them, the common law is a law that is common to the jurisdiction in America, in whatever state they practise in, or in the Federal Courts that they practise in. So the common law is the law that is common to the particular nation that is governed by that law. But it has grown from a system which was first planted in England, the concepts having been imported into the particular country using that law. So we find that countries like Canada, Australia and New Zealand too apply what they call the common law. They have also in recent years asserted their independence in this particular area because they feel that the common law that they borrowed and imported from England has to be modified and adapted to the circumstances of their own countries. So you will find that, in the past, they would have blindly followed precedents from the House of Lords and the Court of Appeal in England. But in recent years, they have deliberately and expressly departed from many English decisions. They have taken their own steps to stamp the authority on their own countries' laws. We are a sovereign nation, Mr Speaker, Sir, and I think our judges and our Parliament have to also impose and stamp their authority on our own laws. It is necessary, of course, in doing so, we borrow from every country in the world that has got good ideas. And I think our Parliament and our judges have continued to do so. Where a system of law or the provisions of the law are unsuitable because of culture, social circumstances and so on, we need to say that this is not an idea for this country. In delinking our legal system from the English common law, we are not saying that henceforth, we will not use English precedents. I think even as a first-year law student, we were told that the English, when they brought their English common law system to Singapore, developed this idea that the English common law has to be modified and adapted to our local circumstances. And in many instances, for example, in family law, the judges who sat at those times, they were English judges, mind you, trained in England, adapted the laws of England in respect of monogamous marriage, for example, and applied it to Singapore and said that the personal law of Singaporeans would have to prevail over the system that the English courts imposed. Delinking our legal system from the English common law system is also all the more important now because England and the United Kingdom have increasingly been importing legal provisions and laws from the European Union because of their treaty obligations and many of these are based on concepts and principles that are built on considerations which are very different from our own circumstances here in Singapore. I would urge Mr Jeyaretnam to remember that even though there are many good ideas in the English courts and the English Parliament, we must follow the examples of independent and sovereign nations like Canada, Australia and New Zealand and to rethink some of these things that should be changed. When Mr Jeyaretnam said that this amendment would shut out the common law, I believe that is a misunderstanding because nowhere in this amendment does it say that, henceforth, no judge in Singapore should look at the English law precedents. But I think the whole concept that I learned in my first year continues to apply even now to our courts, which is that our judges can borrow ideas from anywhere in the world that they wish to, so long as they remember to adapt and modify it for our circumstances, when necessary.

Mr Speaker, Sir, may I just clarify one or two things? Mr Speaker, Sir, the last speaker, Dr Toh, with respect, has not quite followed what I was trying to say. I am not against calling the law which is applied in Singapore as common law and not as the common law of England. I am all in favour of discarding the term "common law of England" when it is applied in Singapore. What I was trying to say is that if you look at the Application of English Law Act that was passed in 1993, it made the common law as applied in England until 1993 part of the common law of Singapore. It then went on to say what was to happen to the common law developed after 1993 and the judges, I think, continued to import the English common law as developed by judges. My question is: is this law, that is, the amendment that is proposed, intended now to stop our judges from considering the common law developed by judges after 1993 and in the future? I said it is not quite clear. Dr Toh thinks it will not, but may we know from the Minister what is the intention of the Government, whether the judges will be allowed to consider the common law of England as it now is and, of course, if it is applicable, it is suitable, to import it. I am not suggesting that every idea developed in England should be imported here, if it is not suitable for our needs.

Sir, the object of today's exercise is quite simple. It is an exercise where under the name "Statutes (Miscellaneous Amendments)", we are dealing with matters which are tidying up in nature, procedural and administrative. Mr Jeyaretnam brings up a point which really harks back to the Application of English Law Act which was debated in 1993 and, indeed, I think very eloquently put by Dr Toh See Kiat, all the reasons were canvassed at that time why we should have an Act like that so that there is certainty in the application of English Law in Singapore. If Mr Jeyaretnam will remember, maybe he has read about this doctrine of continuing reception, in the past, in so far as commercial law matter is concerned, a local court would decide an issue with respect to a commercial law matter as though an English court would have decided that issue sitting in England, and that was not satisfactory. Therefore, the Application of English Law Act was passed for certainty and indeed there was a cut-off as set out in section 3 whereby the common law of England became part of our law. That is for certainty sake, a cut-off in 1993. And amendments were also made to those statutes which are listed in the Schedule to the Act, to modify particular phrases, particular practices, so that they would apply in Singapore in the local context. And this is what this current exercise continues to do. On the common law of England, if a judgment is made by judges in England, and if a local judge so deems it to be applicable and can be applied in a local context and if the judge applies that law, then it becomes local law. In that sense, it is not a situation where a judge in Singapore is bound by the common law. I think Dr Toh has mentioned it very clearly. We have to develop our own jurisprudence, as we have been doing all along. Sir, it is open to the judge in Singapore, when he decides a case, should there be a doctrine or a principle enunciated by a UK judge which is applicable in the Singapore context, he can apply it. I think there is no doubt about that. That is the first point I want to make. Very clearly, the purport of today's exercise is not to change the substantive law. And this, in fact, relates to the second point that Mr Jeyaretnam makes, because it is not a matter of transferring powers from the President to the Minister with regard to the powers set down in clause 7. The powers of the President mentioned in that clause are powers where he acts on advice. In other words, matters which would have gone up to him for his formal assent would now not go to him, because these are matters which he in fact has said that he should not be burdened with. The President has asked for this exercise himself. We had very carefully sifted through many statutory provisions - 500, in fact - and recommending only about 70 provisions where it will not go to him. So the Minister exercises the powers, and the difference here is only whether the President has sight of these matters. In the past, he would have sight of these matters and because under Article 21 of the Constitution, he acts on advice, he will say yes. Now, the point is that they would not go up to him. Sir, it is not a matter of powers being transferred or whether there is a need for further appeal. It is a tidying up exercise where because of the nature of these powers, he will not have sight of the decision by the Minister. I think we have to see this exercise in this context. It is not an exercise to pull wool over anybody, even though it is "Statutes (Miscellaneous Amendments) Bill". We do not do this in the normal course of events. But here 70 statutes are involved which cover many provisions. If we were to amend each of them individually, it would be very taxing on parliamentary time. And in view of the nature of these amendments which are procedural and administrative, this is the approach we have taken.

Question put, and agreed to. Bill accordingly read a Second time and committed to a Committee of the whole House. The House immediately resolved itself into a Committee on the Bill. - [Assoc. Prof. Ho Peng Kee]. Bill considered in Committee; reported without amendment; read a Third time and passed.

Order for Second Reading read. 2.05 pm

Mr Speaker, Sir, I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time." The main amendments to the Singapore Totalisator Board Act are as follows: (a) Amendment to section 4, which relates to the functions of the Board. The Bill proposes to amend this section so that the Board can carry out other activities not covered under its existing functions, provided that these activities are approved by the Minister. The Board may, with the Minister's approval, offer facilities for recreation such as golfing, and carry out activities which are "requisite, advantageous or convenient for or in connection with the Board's functions" on land owned or held by the Board. (b) Amendment to section 5(1) which relates to the Board's powers to carry out its functions. The Bill proposes that this section be amended to make it clear that the Board's powers include the provision of technical assistance and advice relating to racing and gaming in Singapore or elsewhere; and the formation of a company or participation in a joint venture in pursuit of its functions or activities approved by the Minister. Similar provisions are found in the legislation of other statutory boards. These amendments will make it clear that the Board can now, provided the Minister's approval is given, go into activities not covered under its existing functions. For example, the Board has been offering golfing facilities, which under the existing Act, the Board may not have the explicit authority to do so. The amendments would also allow the Board some flexibility to make better use of its resources, ie, land, technical expertise, etc. Aside from the main amendments, there are minor technical amendments to the wording of the Act's provisions. Sir, I beg to move.

Question put, and agreed to. Bill accordingly read a Second time and committed to a Committee of the whole House. The House immediately resolved itself into a Committee on the Bill. - [Dr Richard Hu Tsu Tau]. Bill considered in Committee; reported without amendment; read a Third time and passed.

Order for Second Reading read.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time." This Bill seeks to provide for the registration of medical practitioners and for matters connected therewith, and to repeal the Medical Registration Act (Chapter 174 of the 1985 Revised Edition). The current Medical Registration Act (MRA) derived its origin from the Medical Registration Ordinance 1953. The title of the legislation was changed to Medical Registration Act in 1971. Other than some minor amendments in 1979, the MRA has remained essentially unchanged. We need to update the MRA as the medical profession and the practice of medicine in Singapore have undergone tremendous changes over the past 30 years. We need to enhance the role and structure of the Singapore Medical Council to enable it to perform its functions more effectively and raise standards of professional conduct and practice. Let me briefly explain some of the major changes in our medical sector over the past 30 years. Firstly, the number of doctors in Singapore has increased almost five-fold, from less than 1,000 in the mid-sixties to 4,800 today. Today, nearly 50% of the doctors are in private practice, unlike in the past where most of the doctors worked in the public health care sector. Secondly, about 40% of the doctors now have post-graduate qualifications today, compared to only a small number 30 years ago. The range of specialisation and sub-specialisation has also increased tremendously. For example, we only had general surgeons previously, we now have surgeons specialising in heart surgery, with further sub-specialisation in surgery for children with congenital heart diseases. Medical science and technology have also changed tremendously over the past 30 years. As a result, doctors now have a variety of effective treatment options for many medical conditions. For example, numerous operations can now be performed either as conventional open surgery or as minimally invasive surgery. Doctors are also able to offer drug therapy instead of subjecting the patient to surgical procedures for an increasing number of medical conditions. These changes have benefited Singaporeans. We now enjoy a standard of medical care that is comparable to the best in the developed countries. Singaporeans now have a much wider choice of doctors and treatment modalities. But because medical science has made so much progress, and the number of specialties expanded so rapidly, there is an urgent need to provide for an accreditation system for specialists that will ensure that they have undergone the necessary training and are continuing to upgrade their knowledge and skills. Another change is that, as Singaporeans become more affluent and better educated, their expectations of the quality and outcome of medical care also increase. Patients are now more ready to seek redress when they are dissatisfied with the performance of their doctors. Although the level of medical litigation in Singapore is much lower than that of the developed countries, there is, nonetheless, an up-trend in the number of complaints filed with the Singapore Medical Council (SMC) against doctors for alleged professional negligence, misconduct, unethical practice and so on and so forth. In 1996, the SMC received 66 formal complaints against doctors compared to only 18 in 1986. In terms of number of complaints per 1,000 doctors, these figures represent an increase from 6 complaints per 1,000 doctors in 1986, to 14 in 1996. In the sixties, formal complaints against doctors were rare. We therefore need to strengthen the Medical Council's structure to enable it to better handle the increasing number of complaints. We will need to increase the membership of the Council and improve the inquiry process so that complaints can be processed expeditiously. Another problem that we face from time to time is the illegal conduct of procedures and treatments which are to be performed only by qualified and registered medical practitioners. Often, these illegal procedures are done improperly, and patients need to go to qualified specialist doctors for corrective treatment. Some less fortunate patients may have to suffer for life because the damage to their tissues or organs was permanent and could not be corrected completely. Many of these illegal procedures are conducted by beauticians or other lay persons who unscrupulously mislead their clients into believing that they are qualified to undertake such procedures. One example is the recent case where a lay person provided colonic washout treatment to a member of the public resulting in permanent damage to her rectum and anus. The present MRA provides for a penalty of only a maximum fine of $500 for unauthorised persons providing treatments which only registered doctors are allowed to do. The current penalty is a grossly inadequate deterrent in view of the potentially large financial gains possible. I shall now highlight the major new provisions that are being introduced in this Bill. Larger Medical Council To widen the representation in the Singapore Medical Council and to expedite the processing of complaints, clause 4 increases the number of members in the Council from the current 13 to 17. Additional functions for the Singapore Medical Council (SMC) The Bill will broaden the functions of the Singapore Medical Council. Clause 5 empowers the SMC, in addition to its current functions, to also make recommendations to the appropriate authorities on: (a) the content and nature of courses of instruction and examinations leading to the Singapore Medical degree; and (b) the training and continuing education of registered medical practitioners. This is to ensure that our medical students and practising doctors are continuing to receive appropriate medical training, and are keeping abreast of medical advances and developments in order to maintain high professional standards. Compulsory Voting by Medical Practitioners Currently only about 15% of registered medical practitioners participate in the election of representatives to the Council. This is clearly not satisfactory. To ensure that those elected are truly representative of the medical profession, the Bill will make voting compulsory. Those failing to vote shall not be entitled to apply for practising certificates unless they have good reasons or unless they pay a fine. This is similar to the Legal Profession Act, which provides for compulsory voting of members to the Law Council. Vacating Office To ensure that Council members take their appointments seriously, clause 9 provides for the removal from office any member of the Council who is absent without leave for 3 consecutive ordinary meetings of the Council or its Committees. Conditional Registration of Foreign Medical Graduates The SMC currently grants conditional registration to foreign-trained graduates from Universities listed in the Schedule to the Act. The usual conditions are that they have to work for a minimum of two years under the supervision of a registered medical practitioner, and be assessed by the SMC before being granted full registration. This is to ensure that they have adequate knowledge, skill and competence before full registration is granted. Conditional registration is also practised in countries like the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand. Clause 21 formalises this practice. Full registration can, however, be granted immediately to a foreign-trained doctor if the SMC decides that he holds recognised qualifications, or has the knowledge and skills which we need. Specialists Accreditation Board Another new provision in the Bill is the creation of a Specialists Accreditation Board, consisting of not less than eight doctors. The Specialists Accreditation Board will: (a) determine the qualifications, experience and standards required for specialists registration; (b) define the specialties in medicine for the Register of Specialists; (c) determine and accredit the training programmes for speciality training; (d) grant certificates to persons who fulfil the qualifications for specialists registration; and (e) recommend to the Medical Council programmes for the continuing medical education of registered specialists. These provisions are in line with current practices in the United Kingdom and the United States. The provisions are not intended to restrict the doctors' practice to specialist practice only, as they are already qualified as registered medical practitioners for general practice. The Specialists Register will, however, ensure that only qualified specialists are allowed to practise in the field of specialisation in which they have been registered. Health Committee At present, a doctor who is unfit to practise because of psychiatric condition, drug/alcohol dependency or any other physical or mental condition, cannot be removed from the Register. Clauses 47 to 49 provide for the setting up of a Health Committee to review any doctor whose fitness to practise is impaired by reason of his physical or mental condition. It will be empowered to restrict or suspend the doctor's practice, or recommend that his name be removed from the Register. The Medical Act of the United Kingdom also provides for the establishment of a Health Committee with similar functions. Disciplinary Procedures Sir, let me move on now to disciplinary procedures. Presently, complaints are dealt with by the Preliminary Proceedings Committee (PPC) of the SMC, before being referred to the Council for an inquiry if so determined by the Committee. As the PPC is made up only of Medical Council members, their limited numbers inevitably slow down the processing of complaints. The PPC's authority is limited to either dismissing the complaint or referring it for formal inquiry by the SMC. To overcome the present limitations and to allow for wider representation, clause 39 provides for the establishment of a Complaints Panel, consisting of: (a) not less than 3 members of the Medical Council; (b) not less than 10 and not more than 40 doctors of at least 10 years' standing who are not members of the Medical Council; and (c) not less than six and not more than 40 lay persons. Clause 40 provides for the appointment of Complaints Committees, with the members appointed from the Complaints Panel. Each Committee will comprise two members of the Complaints Panel who are members of the Medical Council, a member of the Panel who is a doctor but not a member of the Medical Council, and a member of the Panel who is a lay person. The large membership of the Complaints Panel will enable several Complaints Committees to be formed should the need arise, and help expedite the processing of complaints. The concept of lay persons being involved in disciplinary procedures is also present in the Legal Profession Act and Accountants Act, and will make the disciplinary process more transparent and open. The Complaints Committee will inquire into the complaint, and upon completion of its inquiry, shall:-

Mr Speaker, Sir, I would like to declare my interest. I am a family medical practitioner. Mr Speaker, Sir, there are 63 clauses in this Bill, excluding the Schedule. Of these 63 clauses, only 12 are similar to the old Act. The rest are either amendments or new provisions. I have gone through this Bill and I support this Bill. In fact, it is long overdue as medical practice in Singapore has changed tremendously and this Bill will bring it up to date with the many developments in medical practice. However, there are a few clarifications I would like to seek and suggestions which I would like the Minister to consider. As this is a long Act, I will approach this in sections or parts, as laid out in the Bill. Mr Speaker, Sir, Part II deals with Medical Council. It relates to the Constitution of the Medical Council and it makes voting for election of Medical Council members by registered medical practitioners compulsory. I will take the two clauses (4 and 6) of this Part II. Mr Speaker, Sir, there are 17 members on the Singapore Medical Council (SMC) Board. Of these, nine are nominated and eight elected. If you introduce compulsory voting, I would have thought that we would follow the example of the Law Society where there are only three nominated members out of a board of 19. Is there any particular reason for a majority of nominated members over the elected ones for the medical profession? I support the compulsory voting system to be introduced because it would allow the members to send in the representatives of their choice for the wider medical body. But it does appear odd if compulsory voting only permits the elected doctors to have a minority representation on the Board, like I said, eight out of a majority of 17. Is it because the Ministry has less confidence in the medical professional group? Unlike the Law Society, this Bill allows only doctors with at least 10 years' experience in the practice of medicine to stand for election. If you want a better representation of the Council, allowing them to vote their representatives with their own band age of practice would be better. Here we have to take the example of the Law Society where those with less than seven years' practice can have their representation. Similarly, those practising between seven and 12 years will do the same, and those more than 12 years have their own representation. I do not know whether there is any particular reason why voting along the respective band years of practice is not being considered for the medical profession. We could have two bands - one for those with less than 10 years of practice and another band for those with more than 10 years of practice. On the question of compulsory voting, the Minister just mentioned that only 15% voted in each exercise for election into the Medical Council, in the present format. I think this is because voting is quite cumbersome. Each time a medical doctor wants to vote, he has to get two signatures from two other doctors before he can vote. So I hope we can change this pattern of voting for doctors into the Medical Council. Mr Speaker, Sir, I would refer to Part III of the Bill which is on pages 8 and 9. I support this upping of fines and imprisonment for those who purport to be medically trained doctors. In the past, as the Minister has mentioned, the fines were too low and therefore many non-medical Singaporeans dared to take a chance. And I am sure many of you must have heard that there are so-called foreign doctors who practise out of homes of Singaporeans or even from hotels. We must therefore discourage these practices. Moreover, practices of medicine like skin peeling and use of sophisticated medical machine, for example, ultrasound, to impress gullible Singaporeans should not be in the hands of non-medical personnel. These practices must be under supervision of the doctors, and I am glad the Minister mentioned that. There are also, if the Minister is not aware, roadside laboratories being set up where they do laboratory tests for your cholesterol, triglycerides, sugar, and these gullible Singaporeans will subject themselves to these tests and the practitioner would then advise them to seek treatment from him or persuade these Singaporeans to go and seek treatment from their own quack doctors. So I am glad this Bill takes into account this factor. Let me refer to Part IV which deals with registration of medical practitioners. In general, I have no quarrel with this Part. However, can I refer you, Mr Speaker, Sir, to pages 17 and 18, clause 33(1) and 33(1)(g). This refers to the power of the Medical Council to remove names from registers. Clause 33(1) states: "Notwithstanding the provisions of this Act, the Medical Council may, upon such evidence as it may require, order the removal from the appropriate register the name of a registered medical practitioner under any of the following circumstances:" There are many circumstances listed out. But there is one particular circumstance, clause 33(1)(g), that caught my attention, and that is this: "if he has failed to serve the Government or such other body or organisation as directed by the Government for such period as may be specified in any undertaking given by him to the Government." This would mean that he can get deregistered. Let me explain further, Mr Speaker, Sir. Our medical students are bonded to serve the Government. Upon graduation, he gets a provisional registration to practise as a house officer. Once he has completed his housemanship, he gets full registration and can practise as a doctor. This clause, which I have just quoted to you, and unless my interpretation of this clause is wrong, allows the Medical Council to remove his name if he breaks his bond. Can I ask the Minister if this young doctor who for whatever reason decides to leave the Government service and go into private practice, let us say, after serving only three years of his eight-year bond, will he be deregistered? Under this present clause, he can be deregistered. I think this is a very serious matter as a young doctor cannot practise medicine unless he is fully registered. The issue here needs clarification. I see the conflict because his registration as a doctor was based on his professional competence and the fact that he holds a degree from the National University of Singapore or any of the recognised medical schools, as stipulated in page 10, clause 20(1) and (2). And throughout the Part, the key for registration was professional competence. In this clause, his deregistration was based on a breach of contract for failing to serve his bond. We deregister doctors for professional incompetence, negligence but, I am sure, not for a breach of contract. I want this clarified because it has serious implication for young practising doctors. Mr Speaker, Sir, Part V deals with Specialists Accreditation Board. I support this establishment. We need a proper list not only for doctors but also for patients. However, there is one question that I want to ask the Minister. Having established this Board and having doctors accredited along the line of specialisation, does it mean that such accredited specialists can see only patients within their area of expertise? In other words, a heart specialist can also see and treat a patient with an abdominal problem, or a breast cancer, or the common cough and cold? Must he only see referred patients by family doctors for his expert opinion and perhaps management? Or can he also see patients off the street like any other general practitioner or family practitioner? I am not sure whether the Ministry is moving towards a proper referral system as practised, for example, in Australia and Britain. If not, what is the other reason for setting up this Accreditation Board? There are implications should we move into a referral system. It has good and bad points. Good for patients for it means a better maximisation of our health care delivery system. There will be less wastage. Because in such a system, patients wanting to seek specialist care can go through their family doctors who then refer the patients to the proper specialists. But when specialists see patients off the streets, there is a chance the specialist might be seeing a patient not within his field of practice. This is very possible in Singapore because Singapore patients are very gullible. They usually listen to friends. Many good specialists in Singapore normally refer such patients to the GPs for assessment and proper referral. But a few will send the poor patient on a merry-go-round, passing from one specialist to another, and the patient is very much the poorer. It is bad for the specialist's practice because he now depends on the family doctors for referral. But, on balance, a proper referral system is good because medical practice in Singapore will be better organised and will help Singapore develop into an efficient medical regional centre to benefit locals as well as foreigners. Finally, Mr Speaker, Sir, Part VII deals with disciplinary proceedings and the Health Committee. A great deal of this Act is spent detailing the disciplinary proceedings and as it is fairly well done, I will not dwell into it because it will be just repeating what is in the Bill. However, the inclusion of lay persons into the Committee is a good move. For too long the medical profession has been accused of protecting its own interest. I am sure the lay people in the Committee will provide another dimension into the discussion of disciplinary actions on doctors. It makes it more transparent. The setting up of a Health Committee is something new. It is again a right step. It provides a check on doctors who may be, as the Minister said, physically and mentally not well enough to practise. It also places on practising doctors to report such doctors to the Health Committee. And as pointed out by the Minister, at present there is no law to disallow such doctors to practise. This present Bill clearly states that the Health Committee can recommend to the Medical Council to deregister a doctor if the Health Committee finds him unfit to practise on medical grounds. Mr Speaker, Sir, as I said in one of my speeches, most of our primary healthcare is in the care of the private clinics. And some of these clinics are now banding together and forming companies to get listed in the Stock Exchange. The implication is very simple. Doctoring is now a business and the bottom line is very important for such companies. As I said before, I dislike calling the medical profession a business. As such, medical practice, medical culture, doctor's behaviour will all change with all this listing of clinics. Various kinds of treatment and equipment, not available in the past, are now available. Doctors, for example, have to turn to skin peeling. It is a treatment for skin problems. GPs are using ultrasounds, X-ray machines, ECG, doing colonic washouts and sigmoidoscopy procedures. There must be more control on the use of these equipment. While we should not discourage doctors from offering more choices of treatments, there must be some degree of caution. The use of ultrasound, for example, should always be accompanied by a report. Not only ultrasound, but the use of any other medical equipment. This report is very important because it reveals the competency of the doctor when he makes such a report. He must be competent enough to put it down in writing that this is what he sees on an ultrasound picture, or this is what he sees on an X-ray picture. But many a time, as a practising doctor, I come across patients presenting me with an ultrasound picture or an X-ray. I tell them honestly that I am not competent enough to read because I am not well-trained in that field. So Mr Speaker, Sir, may I ask the Minister to consider my request to make it compulsory for anyone who wants to make use of these sophisticated machines to at least give us a report. You can put this as a condition for the renewal of his certificate. Mr Speaker, Sir, many of our private hospitals are now in the hands of a foreign-owned public listed company. They are now run by non-medical personnel who are not interested or aware of the ethics of medical practice. Their main concern, of course, again is bottom line. Doctors in such establishment would be under severe pressure to perform to meet the bottom line, or probably they would be removed. Doctors not in their payroll would have to meet certain requirements or lose out on the use of the facilities that these hospitals are providing. Therefore, there are going to be more cases of professional misconduct and unethical practices. Thus, at this point, I would suggest there must be in place, and I hope that they are already in place, medical audits, tissue audits and hospital audits. I think we need to have all these in place because we need to audit how the hospital is functioning. We need tissue audits. Maybe this House is not aware what is tissue audit. Tissue audit is very simple. Every time a surgeon removes a tissue from the body, you must subject this tissue to an audit. In other words, the tissue must be examined by a pathologist to ensure that normal tissues are not being removed. We can remove things from the body. But to the non-medical people, they all think opening up an abdomen is such a great thing. But to the surgeons, it is the easiest. So when you remove something from the abdomen, we must make sure the tissues removed are not normal. This is a good check for unnecessary surgery. So this tissue audit is only one aspect. Medical audits are important. I do not want to go through the details. For hospital audits, you have got to make sure that the hospitals are being audited very carefully because there are so many procedures. You will see that there are many things happening and I am sure the Minister may be aware too. Mr Speaker, Sir, as I said, the Bill, on the whole, is a very good Bill and I support this Bill.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I rise to speak in support of the Medical Registration Bill. As I am a medical practitioner, I would like to declare that I do not have and do not anticipate to have any pecuniary interest through this Bill. On the whole, this Bill is comprehensive and is suitably up-to-date for the immensely changed scene in the medical profession. I must say that the introduction of this Bill to modify the Medical Registration Act is very necessary and is very timely. It is to be noted that a number of amendments and additions are broad-based. This is appropriate in view of the present state of rapid change. I reckon that room for modification is necessary so as to have adequate and better control of the whole profession when newer developments take root. However, I would like to seek assurance from the Minister that, when they are being finalised, the details of these amended and new clauses will not unnecessarily prejudice or penalise any particular practitioner or group of practitioners. Sir, I would like to highlight and comment on a few of the new clauses in the Bill. Firstly, Sir, I note that clause 17(1) in the Bill has been amended from the previous Act to deal with the offence of acting as a medical practitioner by any person who is not authorised to practise medicine. I welcome this long overdue amendment. This clause would now enable the authorities to more effectively address a few unfortunate situations which happened recently and which many felt were not adequately dealt with. For instance, as mentioned by the Minister for Health earlier on, a 57-year old man was charged in court this month for practising medicine without registration. He was accused of performing colon-cleansing amongst other health treatments on patients between 14th and 18th January this year. This colon-cleansing procedure can be dangerous and did result with perforation of the colon in one person. It is possible that unqualified practitioners will do any procedure and some of these could even be life-threatening. The case of a bogus doctor who worked in the General Hospital last year for more than six months is another example of note. Sir, perhaps it would be prudent for us to delineate clearly the sort of treatment which practitioners in traditional medicine or beauty-care should not be administering so that they do not unwittingly violate the law. The maximum penalty that can be meted out to any unqualified practitioner in medicine or surgery was a fine of up to $500 and a further fine of $50 for every day during which the offence continues. This indeed is absurd and, especially, when even cruelty to animals is punishable with both a fine and also a jail sentence. The potential mental trauma and danger to life should not be punishable by a mere pittance of a fine. This Bill now provides that an unauthorised person acting as a medical practitioner shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $100,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding one year or to both and, in the case of a second or subsequent conviction, to a fine not exceeding $200,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years or to both. I return now to clause 39(1)(c) of the Bill which requires the Medical Council to appoint not less than six and not more than 40 lay persons as part of its Complaints Panel. Many of you will be glad to know that this means that there will be lay people in the Committee of Complaints. Besides the three or more members of the Medical Council and the 10 to 40 registered medical practitioners over 10 years' standing, there will be six to 40 members from the public in the Panel. Some people have argued previously that there may be bias in the assessment of complaints from patients because the Panel is derived from medical practitioners only. This new addition in the Bill will address peoples' desire to know that open and representative assessments are carried out for all the complaints of any improper acts or conduct by doctors. It will also resolve the perception that doctors who bring disrepute to the medical profession are only subjected to "internal audits" by medical practitioners themselves. The clause provides for up to 83 members to be in the Panel. This is a large number. Perhaps this will help eliminate the element of bias and prejudice. Clause 22 of the Bill is totally new. The registration of specialists is now necessary to cater for the changing times. There was no necessity to have this clause in the past as, even just 10 years ago, the number of specialists was limited. The need for a Register of Specialists becomes obvious when we note that a whopping 40% of our doctors now are specialists. The registration of specialists will allow for the public to be better informed on the availability of the specialities and the specialists. Also, this will enhance the reputation of Singapore as a centre of medical excellence with a large number of specialists in wide ranging medical specialities. This will certainly boost the promotion of Singapore as a major medical centre in this region. I would like to suggest that specialists can register themselves into broad categories. Registration under sub-specialities should be carefully chosen and limited. I would also like to suggest that whilst it may be unwise for a specialist to perform cross-speciality work, their practice of medicine should not become so restrictive that their basic tenet as a doctor is lost and forgotten. In other words, they should still be able and be entitled to treat simple ailments, such as flu, diarrhoea, headache, and so on, in their patients without having to refer them elsewhere. Excessive and unnecessary referrals will only increase healthcare costs. Clauses 36, 37 and 38 in the Bill are new and concern the introduction of a Practising Certificate which will be granted to every registered medical practitioner. The validity of this certificate is for a period not exceeding two years from the date of issue. In future, the Medical Council will have full control over the practising doctors in Singapore because the application for a Practising Certificate shall be made in such form and manner as the Medical Council may require. This can become one control too many for the doctors. Sir, the point I want to make is that this is definitely an extra "bitter pill to swallow" for all the doctors. I would like to urge our Government to practise restraint and not to use this Practising Certificate as a tool to pressurise and to cause extra demands on the medical profession. I would also like to suggest that the Government practise prior consultation and feedback with all the parties involved before implementing new ideas as laws. This is especially for rules that can affect the livelihood of some of the doctors. Yes, we want medical excellence but we must still retain some respect and compassion for human expectations and limitations. Please do not subject doctors to go back to "school" and do examinations every two years! Well, I am sure the authorities will not have such unfair and authoritative demands. Sir, I support the Bill.

Order. I suspend the Sitting and will take the Chair again at 3.25 pm. Sitting accordingly suspended at 3.00 pm until 3.25 pm. Sitting resumed at 3.25 pm

Debate resumed.

Mr Speaker, Sir, thank you for allowing me to join in the debate. I must first declare that I am a practising medical specialist. I welcome this Bill by the Ministry of Health. I think it has made many important changes which keep up with the changes in medicine. The Bill covers three main areas; firstly, matters pertaining to Medical Council; secondly, matters pertaining to accreditation and registration of doctors; and, lastly, disciplinary action on doctors. I would like to take this opportunity to touch on a few points regarding this Bill. Firstly, matters pertaining to the Medical Council. Clause 6(2) states that: `Every registered medical practitioner who is required to vote for the election of members of the Medical Council in accordance with subsection (1) and who fails to do so shall not be entitled to apply for a practising certificate unless he satisfies the Registrar that he had a good and sufficient reason for not voting at the election or unless he pays to the Medical Council a penalty prescribed by the Medical Council.' I think this point was brought up by Dr Tan as well. I support the Ministry in making voting compulsory because it means that the medical fraternity will take a more active interest in the Medical Council which has significant powers over the medical profession. However, I feel that clause 4 does not do justice to the spirit of clause 6 which makes voting compulsory. As pointed out by Dr Tan, out of the 17 members of the Medical Council, only 8 are elected members. The other 9 members are appointed by the Minister. If we take the Singapore Parliament as an analogy and voting in Singapore during elections is compulsory, I think it would make a mockery of the system if there were more nominated Members of Parliament than elected Members of Parliament. Likewise, if voting is to be made compulsory for Medical Council elections, it stands to reason that elected members should outnumber nominated members. I am not certain why the Ministry wants to appoint so many members chosen by them. I am also not sure that the Minister himself is familiar with the members of the medical profession and the process of appointing members is not clear or transparent to members of the medical profession. Those within the fraternity will know the members very well. It does not mean that if a certain member is a head of department or even holding a very senior position in a hospital that this person is suitable to sit as a member of the Medical Council. I think the Minister should clarify this point as to why there is a need to have more nominated members than elected members. The second point pertains to another point which Dr Tan has also raised in clause 33(1)(g). Medical students who are entering medical school - I stand to be corrected - if I am not wrong, are bonded for five years or a certain period of time. And if they break this bond, they have to pay certain liquidated damages. If the student, upon finishing his examinations and practises as a doctor, decides to break the bond and pays the damages, I want to seek clarification whether there will be penalties imposed upon him. It stands to reason that if he pays the liquidated damages, there should not be a need to punish him further. Next, I would like to move on to registration of specialists. Part V, clauses 34 and 35 deal with the establishment of the Specialists Accreditation Board. I welcome this move by the Ministry to establish a Specialists Accreditation Board. Currently, most specialists are accredited with the Academy of Medicine which maintains the Specialists Rolls. With the establishment of this Board, the function of this Board will supersede the establishment of training requirements and the accreditation process for specialists which are currently being carried out by the Academy of Medicine. Again, the Board members are appointed by the Minister. Perhaps, I think the Minister should explain to us what is the process of choosing suitable people to sit on this Specialists Accreditation Board, as these people have significant powers to affect the appointment of people for the specialists register. Is there a pre-appointment period so that members of the medical profession can write to the Ministry to comment about those whom they deem are unsuitable? Furthermore, for those currently accredited by the Academy and those on the roll of specialists, will the list be transferred or will everybody have to be re-registered again? With increasing advances in medical technology, I think the Ministry has to go beyond just simply accrediting someone, for example, as a general surgeon, a cardiologist, an obstetrician or a gynaecologist. Because medicine has advanced so rapidly, within a certain specialty there may be very high-tech services where only certain specialists are trained and not all specialists within that specialty can perform these procedures. I think it is good that the Ministry should look at this so that appropriate people who are trained should be allowed to do this procedure and those who are not trained should not be allowed to do this procedure. For example, if you do not do this, in a restructured hospital, if you are a very, very senior doctor in the department, and there is a new procedure which your junior doctor who has gone overseas for training has come back and started performing this new procedure, you can say that you are competent to do this procedure because of your years of training, but you may not actually be competent to perform this procedure. An example of this is what the Minister mentioned just now, laparoscopic surgery. Many of these surgeries are performed mostly by the younger doctors. But what is there to stop a very, very senior doctor who is not trained to do it to perform it. There are no safeguards at this point in time. I also welcome the move by the Ministry to bring more discipline to the medical fraternity, but I beg to differ from Dr Tan Cheng Bock in some points where he says that doctors in private hospitals have to perform many procedures to make the owners of the hospital happy. I think this is not true because the specialists there do not own the hospital and the hospital does not own the specialists either. There is no pressure to use more facilities so that you can be accredited. In fact, I would say that having practised in both restructured and private hospitals, I was pleasantly surprised when I went out to private practice that they have accreditation processes not only for specialties but down to the type of procedures that you can do. This is something which is not very apparent in our restructured hospitals. Every time you want to attempt to do anything new, you have to clear the Ethics Committee, the Credentials Committee, and the Medical Advisory Board in the hospital before you can even write to the Ministry to ask for approval to do any new procedures. But when I was in the restructured hospital, this was not the usual practice. So I think it is good to instill discipline in all the hospitals, whether they are private or Government hospitals, if we want to become a regional centre of excellence. My next point refers to the Complaints Panel (clause 40(21)). Again, the members are appointed. Are there any ways for the person who has been complained against to write to the Ministry or to the Medical Council if he feels that the member on the Complaints Committee is biased or prejudiced or there is a conflict of interest? As Members know, even within restructured hospitals, there are rivalries between departments and sometimes the rivalries can be fairly bitter. There might be certain instances where a person feels that he may not get a totally impartial hearing. Again, with regard to the appeal to the Minister, if the person is reviewed by the Complaints Committee, how would the Minister be advised? Will there be an independent panel that would look into the facts of the case and advise the Minister or will the Minister just make a decision solely on the report of the Committee? I think the same applies to the Disciplinary Committee as well in clauses 42 to 45. Again, there must be a way in which a member can express concern if he feels that the members on the Disciplinary Committee have certain biases or prejudices. Further, I feel that members should be allowed to represent themselves because members may not represent themselves or submit explanations unless the Complaints Committee in its absolute discretion otherwise allows. This is in clause 40 (21). I think this is not fair. For a doctor, the moment he faces any disciplinary action, even though he is totally innocent, the publicity that is generated is sufficient to cost significant harm to his reputation and his practice of medicine. Lastly, if a doctor is sent to the Disciplinary Committee and eventually the charges are either dismissed by the Disciplinary Committee or they are referred to the High Court and dismissed by the High Court, will the Medical Council pay for the legal costs incurred? I think it is not fair to the medical practitioner if, on top of suffering harm to his reputation and the effect on his practice, he has to incur costs on a case which is found without basis by the Disciplinary Committee or the court eventually. I hope that the Minister will look into these points.

Resolved, That the proceedings on the item of business under discussion and the remaining items on the Order Paper for today be exempted at this day's sitting from the provisions of Standing Order No. 1. - [Dr Lee Boon Yang].

Mr Speaker, Sir, unlike the previous three speakers, I am not a doctor. So I hope I can give a non-medical practitioner's view. I just want to make two comments on the Medical Registration Bill. The first refers to clause 4 where the composition of the Medical Council is spelt out. The Council has quite wide functions in terms of the fact that they are deciding on the issue of practising certificates for medical practitioners, including foreign doctors. It also regulates the conduct and ethics of registered medical practitioners. I notice that all the Council members are medical practitioners. There is no lay person in the Council at all. There is always a temptation for a professional group, whether it be doctors or lawyers, to resort to a certain degree of closed-shop practice, and the registration of medical practitioners can be construed to be a closed-shop practice in the sense that they may want to shut out certain people whose qualifications may not meet with the approval of the practitioners. If there is no lay person in the Council, there is no so-called check and balance. It would also appear from the Bill that the Council is the final authority. There is no recourse for appeal. I wonder whether the Minister will consider, in the event that a medical practitioner who is barred by the Council from being registered to be a practitioner, whether he has recourse at least to the Ministry to have a second opinion. Otherwise there is a tendency for the professionals to shut them out. I am not saying that it is happening now but there is a possible danger in that. The second comment I would like to make is on the disciplinary proceedings and Complaints Committees. Again, although there is a lay person in these committees, the lay person is an observer. By definition, an observer is not supposed to say anything. He only observes. How will his views be taken into account in the Committee? Or will his comments, in fact, be accepted or will he have a deciding factor in matters that require a decision? Dr Tan has mentioned quite eloquently that the number of cases of complaints on doctors is increasing and the Minister has also confirmed that. As the expectations of our population increase, the need to make sure that disciplinary cases are fairly conducted and be seen to be conducted is very important. We have seen in the newspapers in the past years that there have been a lot of disputes but there is always a perception by the public that whenever a case is being referred to a professional body to judge one of their peers, there always seems to be an element of cover-up. To be fair to the doctors concerned, when they judge their peers, it could be difficult. So could the lay person be given at least a bit more say in these committees and could the Ministry provide an avenue for appeals to be heard in the sense that the final decision may not rest with the Medical Council where one of their own members has been judged? This will go a long way to convince our population that in cases of malpractice or neglect, the cases are fairly conducted and at least publicly seen to be so.

Sir, thank you for allowing me to catch your eye. First, let me declare that I am not a medical doctor so that I would not be charged for falsely pretending to be one. My only interest in this debate is that of President of the Consumers' Association and I would like to address two concerns of consumers. First, under clause 17, any unauthorised person who practises medicine is guilty of an offence. "Practising medicine", I notice, is not defined and perhaps it is important to allow the judges to develop the meaning as the cases come along. But I would like to point out that there is a particular situation which clearly cries for attention, and this is the beautician who perhaps applies astringent to the skin or prescribes herbs or beverage type food-based laxatives and using non-controlled drugs in a practice that would allow him or her to prescribe slimming treatment (they even use the word "treatment"). This person may or may not be practising medicine. I believe that there should be some provisions to cover this sort of situation, because such so-called treatments can cause severe skin problems - I have actually encountered cases like that - and sometimes even health problems like bulimia and anorexia. Clause 17(b) talks about an unauthorised person who wilfully and falsely pretends to be a duly qualified medical practitioner. The people who are doing this kind of business are experts in skirting the grey areas of the law and they will look at this and say, "Well, if I do not do something that clearly is labelled as practising medicine, then I will be okay. And yet what I really want to do is to convince the consumer that I am highly qualified to prescribe this item." So we have actually - this is not hypothetical, Mr Speaker, Sir - cases of people who have Ph.Ds in unrelated sciences or even arts, promoting products like herbs, royal jelly, mushrooms, evening primrose oil - name it, you have it. And they are very much in the eyes of the consumers pretenders - wilful, false, all the elements, except that perhaps they have not been practising a branch of medicine. It is like, for example, with respect to Dr John Chen, instead of worrying about clogged arterial highways, he decides now to sell some kind of oil to unclog cholesterol in human arteries, because he is a "doctor". I think people will say, "Ah ha! Okay, I will buy it." Perhaps there are others who would call themselves something else. Instead of cosmeticians, they call themselves cosmetologists. Instead of beauticians, they call themselves acnetologists. And these people are clearly falsely pretending to the gullible and unaware consumer. Again, I would suggest that there is provision needed for such situations. Clause 17(c) talks about practising medicine or any branch of medicine, under any name, title, addition or description implying the practice of any branch of medicine. It is easy for a medical professional to say, "I see this name "cosmetologist", I know it is not a medical profession." But the man-in-the-street sees a big long word like this and he says, "I give it the benefit of the doubt." And so he or she gets conned, you might say, and I think we need ways of preventing the consumer from becoming a "conned-sumer". You have situations, for example, where this particular business might register a name in the Registry of Companies and Businesses as the "London Institute of Trichologists". I have confirmed with my colleagues in the House, the medical professionals, that trichology is not a medical speciality, but the man-in-the-street does not know. And up to this moment, I did not know until I asked them. So you have people who do things that seem to be practising medicine and the Act does not cover them. So I would like to suggest, Mr Speaker, Sir, that the Minister consider provisions that would cover these situations. That flows on to what I want to say about clause 22, which is the registration of specialists. Under this Bill that will be passed, there will be registration of specialists and there will be a highly qualified panel to decide who is one and who is not. But it is very easy for a person to advertise in circumstances that make him look like he is a medical practitioner. I have in mind, for example, lots of what we call "infomercials" that are screened past 12 midnight. I am an owl, so I watch them. And they have got this guy who is "Dr So-and-So", MD (maybe he is a real MD, but he is not a recognised medical professional in Singapore). He is a MD, he wears a white frock, he carries a stethoscope, perhaps even an injection needle, syringe, and then he says that, "Well, I recommend this particular thing." or "I recommend this exercise machine." And people would then gladly think that he is a specialist in this area and buy that product. I think these people deserve to be penalised. If not these people, because they are overseas, then their local promoters should be penalised. I would therefore urge the Minister to consider a provision that penalises a person who pretends to be a specialist either by conduct or perhaps by allusion to certain things. He could, for example, set up his business looking like a medical clinic with people walking around with white masks and white frocks. And I would say that there have been instances even of businesses that call themselves "The specialists from Harley Street". And, of course, you and I know that Harley Street is the famous London street of doctors. Other than that, Mr Speaker, Sir, I support the Bill.

Mr Speaker, Sir, as I indicated earlier, I had not intended to speak on this Bill, but having listened to the speakers in this House, I feel I should put in what they call here two-cents worth of my views on this Bill. There are some provisions in this Bill, Mr Speaker, Sir, that again alarm me. One, of course, is this deregistration of practitioners who do not perform their bonds. If I may say so, Sir, it is a dangerous thing to do. It is to bring about a compliant society which we are almost becoming, and one sees it in other spheres as well. When somebody wants to renew their business licence registration, they are told, "Oh, you haven't paid up your CPF Medisave account. Unless you go and do that, we are not going to renew your business registration.", and it goes on. This is trying to produce a compliant society. I would ask the Ministry to reconsider this. There is sufficient punishment provided by the bond itself - the requirement that the doctor repays whatever has been spent in training him if he decides to leave the service. Secondly, and what is worse, Mr Speaker, Sir, is that there would appear to be no appeal provided. I have said earlier about the danger of giving Ministers too much power. There is also the provision, as I now heard, that if the Council refuses to register a doctor who seeks registration, there is no appeal again. It is a man's livelihood. Should he not have some redress? Should the Council not be asked to state publicly its reasons for refusing registration? And should that not be challenged in a court of law? Such a system, Mr Speaker, Sir, will point to a government and an administration which is accountable, which is prepared to submit its decisions to an independent body and particularly the Judiciary. The other point that concerns me is this compulsory voting. I know we have had it in the Legal Profession Act for some years and the Minister says they have decided to follow what is in the Legal Profession Act. I did not know whether the Minister has consulted lawyers as to whether this compulsory voting has done any good to the legal profession. As I heard the Minister say, it is to encourage doctors to take a greater interest in the affairs of their Council and their profession. I am not sure that this compulsory voting that was introduced in the Legal Profession Act has had this effect. I know several lawyers who are not really interested in what is going on because they have a feeling that there is very little they can do about changing anything. So I do not know why we have to have compulsory voting for the doctors as well now. And the principle is you do not compel persons to do something. You got to treat our doctors, our lawyers, and our people as adults who would be able to make their own judgement. We do not have to spoonfeed them and say, "You got to do this. You got to do that. You got to do this, otherwise you're out." That does not make for a mature responsible society. So I would ask the Ministry to reconsider this compulsory voting as well. Finally, Mr Speaker, Sir, this provision for nominated members exceeding those elected members, as pointed out by Dr Tan, would be a great incentive for doctors not to vote or to spoil their votes. What good is it going to do if there is going to be an excess of nominated members on the Council, nominated by the Government, without consulting them? Will the Ministry see that all nominations are first submitted to the doctors to ask whether they agree with the nominations? Let us have some form of democracy in this place.

Mr Speaker, Sir, first, let me thank the five elected MPs who have spoken in strong support of the Bill and, of course, the NCMP for his remarks which I will respond to in an appropriate manner afterwards. Sir, Dr Tan Cheng Bock spoke very strongly in support of the Bill. He has raised quite a few questions which I shall endeavour to answer one by one. Sir, he has talked quite a fair bit about compulsory voting which Dr Michael Lim and Mr Jeyaretnam have also spoken about. I will take them altogether. He has asked why should the majority of the members of the Council be nominated members rather than the reverse. Let me explain that the compositions of the governing bodies of the different professions vary. For example, for the Professional Engineers Board, the Board of Architects and the Public Accountants Board, in fact, all members are nominated members. For the Law Society, 15 out of 19 are elected. For the Singapore Medical Council, it has always been that half of the Council are elected members, half are nominated, and one is ex-officio, which is the Director of Medical Services. The system has worked well mainly because whilst the Government is responsible for nominating half the Council, we have always made sure that those nominated members are professionals of the highest standing and of the highest reputation as well.

You don't trust the doctors.

Sir, this has always been the case and if any of the Members have information to the contrary, I will be very happy to hear about that. In terms of the election, Dr Tan Cheng Bock has said that actually it is because many doctors found the election process very cumbersome, that they have to get two names to countersign. Sir, I think he has got it mixed up. The need to have two names only applies to the nomination process. If you are nominating somebody, you need a proposer and a seconder. But if you are voting, the vote is supposed to be secret, so therefore you submit your vote without the need to have another peer checking whom you have voted for, and this will still apply under the compulsory voting. If Dr Michael Lim is worried about the standing of doctors who are members of the Council, then I think it is even more important that for the half who are elected, they are people who have withstood the scrutiny of the entire membership of the medical profession. I think to have only 15% vote in half the membership of the Council is definitely unsatisfactory. If you want to have people of good standing, then they must be people who have withstood the scrutiny of all the members.

May I clarify?

Yes.

Mr Speaker, Sir, the point I wanted to make was that, in making these changes in this Bill which I personally welcome, if you want to compel members of the profession to vote, it really does not make sense if having undergone such a big exercise by compelling everybody to vote and penalising them if they do not want to vote, then at the end of the day, the members who are elected are the minority, not the majority. As it stands now, voting is optional under the present system and so those who want to vote for the members can vote on who will get in. But if we know that the majority of the members are nominated members and if you want to compel people to vote, it really does not make sense. As I said in the analogy which I gave, if you want to make voting of Members of Parliament compulsory in the elections, then it is really a mockery of the system if there are more Nominated Members than Elected Members. The same analogy will follow too.

It is very easy for someone to use an analogy which has got no comparison at all. This is a Parliament that is responsible for the entire affairs of the country. As I said, for professional bodies, there is a whole variety of options. Of course, if Dr Michael Lim feels that it is not worthwhile to have half the members, people whom he has chosen, I would be quite happy in future amendments to convert the SMC into something more akin to the engineers, accountants and architects and I think it would be to the great disadvantage of the profession. The key thing now is the profession has the advantage of being able to elect half of the members of the Council, make sure that those half are people of high standing and integrity who would be prepared to listen to the complaints and conduct the inquiry in a fair and unbiased manner. It is not the people whom he is afraid of, people with biases, people with axes to grind, who would inevitably get in if only a few members of the profession vote because they will then get their best friends to vote for them. If that is what Dr Michael Lim is worried about, then he should welcome this. Because under this system, it is less likely that those people whom he fears very much, and apparently, he has got many people whom he fears, these are the ones who will not be able to get in. Dr Michael Lim Chun Leng rose ---

Sir, let me move on. If he has any other points, he can bring them up later. Dr Michael Lim Chun Leng resumed his seat.

On the point about the Law Society having different bands, the key thing to appreciate is that what we are looking for is to have a Medical Council that comprises people of not just integrity, but people who have enough expertise, knowledge and skills who can then sit in judgment of their peers. Where should that dividing line be? Should it be 10 years? Should it be 15 years? Should it be 5 years? I think there will always be contention. The key thing to note is that for the medical profession, even for specialists, it takes at least seven years to train a specialist. So based on past experience, 10 years appear to be a workable and satisfactory dividing line. It has worked very well so far. Let us keep to it. It makes the system a lot simpler for everybody. Dr Tan has asked whether we could require doctors who have conducted tests like ultrasound tests, and so on, to give their reports in writing. Sir, it is a proposal which I would be happy to ask my officials and the SMC to look into. Several Members have spoken on clause 33(1)(g) about the removal from the register for having failed to serve the Government or any such body as may be specified in any undertaking given by him to the Government. Sir, the key operative word there is "undertaking". When a medical student enters into a contract which allows him to go through medical school, he also signs a bond that requires him to serve the Government or any other organisation, as stipulated by the Government, in lieu of which he has to pay liquidated damages. That is the total undertaking. He either serves or pays liquidated damages. This clause applies to those who break the undertaking, ie, they refuse to serve the bond and they do not pay up the liquidated damages. Because of this clause, we have not had to apply it. But it is a useful deterrent. So in answer to Dr Lim's point, if he pays up his liquidated damages, he is allowed to practise. That is why we have so many medical officers who have broken the bond, left to join the private sector and they are practising quite happily.

Mr Speaker, Sir, can I seek a clarification?

Mr Yeo, are you giving way?

Yes.

First, I thank the Minister for his clarification. But I am still not clear because I am not a lawyer. However, if we were to read this clause very carefully it does give people the impression. For the benefit of all in the House, I will read it: "Power of Medical Council to remove names from registers Notwithstanding the provisions of this Act, the Medical Council may, upon such evidence as it may require, order the removal from the appropriate register the name of a registered medical practitioner under any of the following circumstances: (g) if he has failed to serve the Government or such other body or organisation as directed by the Government for such period as may be specified in any undertaking given by him to the Government." As I said earlier, when you register somebody, you register him based on his professional competence. That is the criterion and that is the key for registration of doctors. He must be competently qualified. He must come from the National University of Singapore or any of the medical schools recognised by the Government. In this case, the medical student has broken his bond. That is a breach of contract. It has nothing to do with the very reason he was registered. And the Minister said that if he can pay his liquidated damages, he would not be deregistered. I still think that it is wrong. That means you are actually removing him from the register for a different reason, and not for the original reason. I am not a lawyer. I am sure this needs clarification because this was carried over from the previous Act and we cannot perpetuate a wrong if it is a wrong.

Sir, Dr Tan Cheng Bock has unduly limited the scope of the current Act and this Bill. He has limited the definition of the grounds for which to remove registered practitioners from the register only on professional grounds.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I know that a doctor can be deregistered for many other reasons. I am sure all the medical doctors here will know. What I am saying is that, in this particular case, the reason for his deregistration is a breach of contract. It is not for professional misconduct or negligence. It is because he does not like the working condition, he left. And what happens if he has got no money and cannot pay the liquidated damages? He will be deregistered. So I am saying that this particular section could be in the Act already and maybe the Ministry officials overlooked this and passed it over to this new Bill. The Minister thought it is correct. So everybody says it is correct. But we are perpetuating a wrong.

Sir, far from it. In reviewing the clauses in this new Bill, we went through every clause and made sure that for those clauses which were adopted from the existing Medical Registration Act, we justified why that clause should be retained. In this particular case, we have decided to retain it for a very good reason. Doctors are meant to be people who are responsible and they have to be, because they are responsible for the lives of the people. They should have a sense of dedication. Responsibility also refers to the undertaking that you have made in pursuing a medical course. That is why it is important for them to realise that they have an undertaking. They have to reflect that they are responsible because if they cannot even be responsible for the first five years of their working life, what guarantees do we have of the future? And that is why this clause is there. Also, we have students from abroad who study here and who could easily walk away from us the moment they graduate. The ability to deregister them is a great deterrent and that is why, as I said, so far, based on my enquiries, we have not had to use this provision. So let us keep it, because it is a very effective deterrent.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I take it that the Minister agrees that this Bill does allow you to deregister a doctor based on the reasons he has given. Sir, I do not want to go on discussing this. Perhaps we could get the Minister for Law to study this carefully because it is very important. For a young doctor, just imagine he is deregistered because he dislikes the working conditions of the hospital and he cannot pay up. His clarification may be good enough for them not to remove the doctor now. But I hope that for legislation in this House, it is better we get all the things properly done. I hope the Minister for Law (he is not here) could have helped us out.

Mr Yeo, could you allow Dr Toh to clarify?

Yes.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Just a quick point. I do support Dr Tan on this point. It is because of my training that, as a lawyer, justice must not only be done but it must be seen to be done. When we deregister a person from a professional register, it casts a pall of something unsavoury. And it would perhaps be less draconian if we suspend him. Because he has breached his contract, we suspend his practising certificate until such time he pays up, rather than deregister him from the professional register.

Point of clarification. I heard the Minister say that if the doctor pays up, he will not be deregistered. Is that provided in the Bill itself? Dr Michael Lim Chun Leng rose ---

Dr Michael Lim, is it on the same point?

Sir, I support Dr Tan's point. I think the point that Members must note here is that as a medical student, you have to sign a bond. It is not as if someone gave you an option and say, "Would you like a scholarship? Would you like a bursary? You make a choice." Yes, I take the scholarship. I break the bond. I am penalised. Here, you do not have a choice. You go into medical school. You sign the undertaking and you are subjected to these rules. I think there is a distinction here in that we are not looking just at people who are given an option. They do not have an option, unless you say you do not want to do medicine. I support Dr Tan's point. I think we need to look at this clause very seriously, because it not only can be applied in this situation but it can also be applied in other situations as well.

Sir, maybe we could allow a conditional registration in those cases. Give the young doctor a chance.

Sir, Dr Michael Lim says the student has got no choice. He has a choice, as he pointed out. He can either decide to do medicine or not to do medicine. Just as he can decide whether to take on a scholarship or not to take on a scholarship. It is the choice he has to take. And once he has made the choice, he sticks to it. What Dr Tan is concerned about is whether we apply this provision immediately a medical officer resigns from Government. I would like Members to realise and understand that actually my Ministry is made up of many compassionate people. Doctors are compassionate. Dr Tan Cheng Bock rose ---

Order.

Sit down please, Dr Tan. Usually, when medical officers apply to break their bonds, we do hear them out. And if they request for time to pay the liquidated damages, quite often, we do allow them the time. So there is no need for conditional registration or otherwise. But if after having given their commitment to pay liquidated damages per their undertaking, they just walk away and do not pay up, if when given adequate time then, of course, the final step must be taken. But in getting to the final step, there are a lot of intermediate steps which need not be spelt out in this Bill. And that is why this provision has never had to be applied. As regards referring it to my colleague, the Minister for Law, the Bill is drawn up by the Attorney-General's Chambers and, therefore, it has been fully vetted. I can also assure him that all Bills which are drawn up by the Government have the consent of the Minister for Law. But we will definitely draw this particular provision to his attention and ask him for his considered advice too.

Sir, the Minister has asked his Ministry's boys to be compassionate. At least, he is now a little bit more compassionate!

Sir, I am always very compassionate. On the Specialists Accreditation Board, Dr Tan was concerned that a specialist would still be allowed to see cases that do not fall within his specialty. I think there are two aspects here. One is cases which fall into other specialties. For example, if he is a heart surgeon and a cancer patient comes to see him, will he be allowed to treat? The answer is no. If he is also not at the same time registered as a cancer specialist, he will not be allowed to take on the job of a cancer specialist. But because he is already a registered medical practitioner, as Dr Lily Neo had pointed out, he will be allowed to take on cases for which his undergraduate training has given him the necessary expertise and skills on managing patients with abdominal pains, headaches, colds. If the patient has those conditions, he is, of course, free to treat the patient. He has also asked whether we should go to a referral system where specialists only see patients who are referred to them. Sir, this has happened in countries where the main payment is a third party payment. In the UK, US, Australia, it can be enforced. In Singapore, it also happens to some extent. Patients who are being treated and who are paid by an insurance system or who are paid by the companies or by the employers, normally, these bodies, whether they are employers or insurance companies, would require that that patient is first seen by a GP and referred to a specialist, if need be, rather than allowing the patient to go directly to a specialist. The same thing applies to the Government sector. For the subsidised patients, they go to the polyclinics first and if necessary they are referred to the specialist outpatient clinics. Dr Tan has also made the point that because of the fact that doctoring is now being turned into a business there is a lot of pressure from hospitals and other employers on their doctors to do more tests, investigations and whatnot and, therefore, whether we have enough safeguards in place. I would like to inform him that in terms of tissue audit, yes, it is now compulsory. We made that compulsory when we passed the Private Hospitals and Medical Clinics Act. The same Act also requires hospitals, both restructured and private, to establish medical audit committees. Of course, in terms of medical audit, it is still in an evolutionary stage and we would definitely be looking to see how those audit committees can be enhanced. Dr Lily Neo has also strongly supported the Bill. She has asked whether the definition of "specialists" would be fairly broad so that we do not allow a whole range and proliferation of sub-specialties. That is indeed our intention. The Specialists Accreditation Board will define what are the broad specialties that will be accredited. She has asked that the practising certificates not be used as a tool to create additional loads on the doctors. That indeed is not the intention. It is not meant to be a pressure point. It is just to make sure that doctors are suitably qualified and they have also kept up to date when they are given their practising certificates. Dr Michael Lim asked whether the Minister is familiar with all members of the medical profession, since the Minister is responsible for appointing half of the members. I think no Minister can expect to be familiar with all members of the profession, just as no single member of the profession can be expected to be familiar with all members of his own profession. But what Dr Michael Lim can be assured about is that most Ministers will be familiar with the leaders of the profession, and with people who are outstanding, people with good reputation, people with the necessary expertise. And because of that, whether it is the Singapore Medical Council, statutory boards or other bodies where Ministers as responsible for making the nominations and appointments, we have always made sure that only people of standing are appointed, and this will continue. He has asked whether those people who are on the Register of the Academy of Medicine would automatically be recognised as specialists. I think the intention must be that there must be a "grandfather system" where people who are already recognised and practising as specialists and who have sat for the necessary examinations and have undergone the necessary training would be recognised for registration in that specialty. On the process of defining what is a "specialty", we will leave that to the profession. As the Bill provides, the Specialists Accreditation Board would be setting up different committees which are made up of people who are specialists and people from each specialty to help them carry out their work. So it will be done by the profession itself and the leaders of the profession will be the ones who will be chosen to make the decisions. He has talked about the need to accredit doctors for procedures. I agree with him. In fact, when I was in the United States in the late 80s looking at some of the hospitals, there was a system of accreditation that impressed me very much. And we have asked for that to be instituted here. But I think more can be done and we should strengthen that process and make sure that it is enforced. He has asked about the composition of the Complaints Panel; firstly, whether a doctor can object to the membership of the committee because he may be afraid that someone on the committee is biased against him, which is why we have three doctors and one lay person. So even if one person is biased, the other three members will make sure that this bias is counteracted. In any case, I think the fundamental approach must be to make sure that only people of standing and integrity are members of the Medical Council and members of the Complaints Panel, which is why the full participation of the medical profession is important, in terms of choosing those eight members who are going to be on the Council. He asked how the Minister would review appeals to him. Just as the Minister reviews appeals on other matters, the Minister will take advice from a group of senior people who may comprise officials of the Ministry as well as members of the profession. It will change from case to case, but this is how the whole system works. We do not just sit down and do a very arbitrary job. It is a proper review and a considered decision is made in the process. The Member said that members should be allowed to represent himself and be heard. He is referring to clause 40(21). That subclause has to be read in conjunction with the rest of the clause, because there is another subclause (16) which says, "a Complaints Committee may [amongst other things] require the registered medical practitioner concerned to give all information in relation to such book, document, paper or other record .". The key thing to bear in mind is that in reviewing a complaint, the Complaints Panel, just as the current preliminary proceedings committee, will make sure that they get to hear both sides of the story, because that is the only way to investigate the complaint. It cannot be a one-sided investigation. Inevitably, the doctor complained against would either be asked to submit in writing his response to the complaint or, if there are still some other issues or matters which are not clear, he would be asked to appear. What this means is that the doctor cannot demand to appear because sometimes the written submission may be adequate. In any case, if the Committee finds that the complaint is warranted, the complaint is then referred to the Disciplinary Committee where formal inquiries are conducted. In this case, the doctor automatically is heard. Mr Bernard Chen talked about the lay member and he asked what is his role in the Disciplinary Committee. His role there is that of an observer but he is free to participate in the hearing. It is just that he cannot vote. So his views will still be heard, but he cannot participate in the vote. Whereas in the Complaints Committee, the lay member participates as a full member and he can vote. He also talked about the registration of doctors. Sir, I think he has missed out the clause that states that doctors who are aggrieved by the decision of the SMC not to register them may appeal to the Minister within 30 days. So there is always an appeal process and the Minister is the appeal process. Dr Toh See Kiat talked about clause 17 and said that "medicine" is not defined in this Bill and that it would be left to the judges to decide. Sir, the practice of medicine is so broad that it is very difficult to define precisely what is medicine and what is not medicine. But what can be taken for granted is that any invasive procedure and any prescription of controlled drugs is the practice of medicine. So if a person is practising traditional Chinese medicine, that is provided for in this Bill. He is not infringing on this clause. If a person is selling herbal medicine, that is allowed. But, of course, it would be very difficult for us to come out and say, "People who are advertising cannot wear white frocks and white masks." If we do that, I think there will be a lot of professions, not just the medical profession, who will be affected. People in the catering business, many of them do wear gowns and masks as well. I think there are lots of complications. The key thing is to understand the whole spirit behind this Bill and to ensure that the message is clearly given to those who are inclined to stretch their business into fraudulent areas, including the carrying out of medical procedures just for financial gain.

I just want to clarify that when I talked about people with white masks and white frocks, yes, they could be in a lot of professions, including science, research and development. But when you are trying to sell a product that is meant to do some good for the body, which is referred to as a treatment for something, and you wear white frocks and white masks, and sometimes hanging a stethoscope around the neck, you clearly are alluding to the fact that this guy who is recommending the product or giving a testimonial for the product is giving it in his capacity as an expert. I was particularly referring to a situation where this person is also identified, on top of that, as so-and-so, MD, and that is really a situation where we must clamp down.

Sir, the particular example he gave just now was an advertisement for an exercise bicycle. There are recognised health benefits from exercising. Should we prevent a doctor from saying, "Look, you should exercise and this machine can help you to use up so many calories." I would rather not get into such peripheral areas. The objective of this Bill is to make sure that unauthorised people who carry out medical procedures, and therefore threaten the health of the person they are treating, would be facing very heavy penalties. At the end of the day, we must educate Singaporeans to rely on their family doctor and that when they have a problem, they should consult their doctor. Do not self-refer. Do not self-prescribe and self-medicate. See your family practitioner. That is the message that we are trying to educate Singaporeans on, and what they are talking about herbal cures and so on similarly applies. If there is any interest in all those products, when they next see their doctor, they should ask him. It is not possible for the Health Ministry to be responsible for all the wide range of products that are available in this world.

Sir, I just wanted to refer also to that example that I gave of a person who is a Ph.D in something and not a doctor, but of course we call him a doctor too. "Doctor so-and-so promotes this product that does good to your skin." Actually this happens. He is not a medical doctor at all. But the context of that advertisement makes people think, "Oh, he is a medical doctor and he is recommending this. Therefore, I must buy this." There is also the situation where a doctor who is not a registered medical practitioner in Singapore promotes something like an exercise machine. We do not allow our own doctors to promote things that are not related to medicine. Why should we allow a foreign doctor to do this?

Perhaps CASE might want to look into it. Mr Jeyaretnam waxed eloquence about many things without even studying what the Bill is all about. He talked about the unfairness of not registering applicants without any recourse to appeal. Sir, if he had read the Bill, he would have found that that is provided for. As for compulsory voting --- Mr Jeyaretnam rose ---

Order.

Is there any appeal to a Judge of the High Court? That is what I want to know.

Sir, it is the Medical Council that is responsible for registering or not registering applicants who are medical practitioners. If the Medical Council refuses to register, there is an appeal process. The appeal process is the Minister. What Mr Jeyaretnam was talking very emotionally on just now was that there is no appeal process, that it is unfair, undemocratic and so on.

An independent body.

The point is that there is a body that is responsible and there is a process and the process is the Minister who shall thoroughly review that appeal. He also talked about compulsory voting that if it is only for half of the Council, therefore there should be no great interest. I have already answered that in great detail and I shall not prolong except to tell him that it is precisely because of the fact that although it is important for them to vote, only 15% are voting shows that we are not there yet. We have to make it compulsory so that people will value their vote and make sure that they choose people of standing, reputation and integrity and vote them into the Council. Sir, I think I have answered all the points raised.

Can I clarify? Can the Minister tell me how does the Ministry monitor unauthorised people practising medicine, for example, using lasers, injections and other instruments on the patient?

Sir, it is not possible for the Ministry to conduct spot checks on all premises in Singapore. For those who are using equipment that requires licensing, they of course have to obtain a licence. The question is: what about those people who obtain those equipment illegally, bring them into Singapore quietly and therefore use them without a licence? The only way for us to know about that is if the members of the public lodge a complaint, or if they have to go and see a medical practitioner for corrective work to be carried out. We would appeal to such patients to let us know so that we can do the proper investigations and take the necessary enforcement actions on such people.

Can we do improvement in that area because by the time they complained, scarring and abnormality are permanent by that time?

If the Member has got any suggestion, I would be very happy to listen to her.

Question put, and agreed to. Bill accordingly read a Second time and committed to a Committee of the whole House. The House immediately resolved itself into a Committee on the Bill. - [Mr Yeo Cheow Tong]. Bill considered in Committee; reported without amendment, read a Third time and passed.

Order for Second Reading read. 4.45 pm

Mr Speaker, Sir, I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time." Background Sir, in January 1996, I came before this House to seek approval for the setting up of a statutory board called the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore, or MPA in short. At that time, I also made known the Government's intention to corporatise and eventually privatise the Port of Singapore Authority (PSA). On 2nd February 1996, MPA was formed. In addition to taking over the statutory functions of PSA, MPA is responsible for economic regulation of the port industry after PSA's corporatisation. Over the last one and a half years, MPA has worked out a regulatory framework and built up the necessary expertise and standing to perform its role as regulator and promoter of the port industry. The setting up of MPA was the first step towards the corporatisation and eventual privatisation of PSA. Today, we are about to take another step towards reaching this goal. Sir, the Bill before this House seeks to dissolve the Port of Singapore Authority and to repeal the Port of Singapore Authority Act. The Bill will transfer PSA's existing property, rights and liabilities to the successor Company, the Government or the MPA, and make the financial arrangements for corporatisation, and eventual listing. Reasons for corporatisation Mr Speaker Sir, first allow me to explain the reasons for corporatising PSA. Singapore has been the world's busiest port in terms of shipping tonnage since 1986. PSA operates the world's largest single container terminal, with a throughput in 1996 of nearly 13 million boxes in terms of twenty-foot equivalent units, or TEUs. To put this in perspective, apart from Hong Kong, which handled 13.5 million TEUs with three terminal operators, the next largest port Kaohsiung handled 5.1 million TEUs, less than half. Next in line were Rotterdam, Pusan and Long Beach, which handled 4.9 million, 4.7 million and 3.1 million TEUs respectively. Singapore is also one of the major transhipment hub ports in the world. Mainline vessels from all parts of the world call at Singapore, where cargo is collected from and distributed to the rest of the region through an extensive network of feeder ships. On a typical day, PSA handles about 40,000 boxes, or TEUs, which come from about 25 mother ships and 30 feeder ships. The complexity of transhipment operations is not only because of the large volumes of boxes handled, but also due to the large matrix of connections. To give the House an idea, typically, say, a modern third-generation container vessel would load boxes from 45 other ships and discharge boxes to another 60 carriers. So it is an extremely difficult and complex process. Despite the complexity of this process, PSA is able to handle a large volume of containers within a short vessel turnaround time because of its very highly automated and computerised operations. For example, third generation container ships are serviced at an average rate of 86 containers per hour, which is the highest service rate in the world. Transhipment has brought to the region benefits which would not be possible if each country were to operate its own port, serving its own cargo. Transhipment allows shipping lines to lower their costs by operating fewer but larger vessels. Shippers enjoy greater frequencies of calls, more choices in shipping connections and therefore more flexibility in terms of carriers, routes and time-tables. Manufacturers and traders in the region also have more frequent sailings and faster transit times and this translates in turn into lower inventory costs, shorter time-to-market, and increased competitiveness. Lloyd's List, which is an authoritative shipping newspaper, had a recent article, 29th May 1997, and it summarises the situation in this way, and I quote, "Singapore's predominance as the main gateway has been a fact for decades and not just because the Lion City is clearly the natural port at the tip of the Malay Peninsula, but also because it has historically provided the most efficient manner of entry and exit.". But history and geography are not the reasons why Singapore will remain the region's preferred port. It will only be so because, and I quote again, "of sound commercial reasons like the fact that cargo is still shifted much faster there and finds its way into the global transport chain more quickly than from anywhere else in the region." So by consolidating cargo and putting them into the global transport chain more efficiently and quickly, PSA not only brings substantial commercial benefits to shipping lines and shippers, but also contributes significantly to the economic prosperity of Singapore and the surrounding region. The PSA's efficiency and status as a world-class port has been recognised both locally and internationally. This year, at the Asian Freight Industry Awards, Singapore was given the title of "Best Seaport in Asia" for the tenth consecutive year. PSA was voted the "Best Container Terminal Operator" for the eighth year. However, all these awards and PSA's long and continued history of success should not lull us into a sense of complacency. Neither should it blind us to the challenges ahead. Our past achievements and our traditional way of doing things are not a guarantee of our future success, especially in a future which is not a straight-line extrapolation of the past. The shipping industry and the environment in which we operate are no longer the same. First, the shipping industry has been undergoing a major restructuring and rationalisation in recent years. Due to falling freight rates, profit margins for shipping lines are narrowing. For example, the average freight rate for the Singapore/Europe trade today is about one-third the rate in 1991. To cut costs, shipping lines are re-aligning themselves into large consortia and alliances. Naturally, these major consortia will have greater bargaining power to negotiate lower port rates and better terms of service with all ports, including PSA. Second, competition from other ports for a share of the booming container transhipment business in the region is increasing. Existing ports in the region are expanding their facilities and urging shipping lines to make direct calls. New ports are being planned or are being built. Some of these ports have plans to ship cargo direct to their destinations, instead of transhipping through PSA. Others have openly declared their intention to challenge PSA as the transhipment hub in the region. The competition is not confined to regional ports. Ports further afield are also competing with Singapore for calls by mainline vessels. These are fundamental changes in the industry. We must recognise their impact. We must respond to them boldly if we are to maintain and consolidate our position as the leading hub port in the region. One way to do this is to change the fundamental way we manage our port. We must free PSA from whatever encumbrances that a Government statutory board might have to face the new challenges boldly, flexibly and creatively. The corporatised PSA will have to be more customer-oriented and market-oriented. It must provide value-for-money services to all customers with even greater speed, quality, reliability and flexibility. It must be more nimble in responding to competition. It must be quick to seize overseas opportunities with good growth potential, by leveraging on its experience and expertise gathered over the past decades. The promise of corporatisation has already resulted in many positive developments. Recently, PSA successfully concluded long-term contracts with several major alliances and shipping lines. PSA has also ventured overseas, starting with port investments and development projects in China and Indonesia. In 1996, PSA set up a joint venture company with Dalian Port Authority. In February 1997, PSA signed a MOU to develop the Cigading Port in Indonesia. In April of this year, it signed another MOU with the Fuzhou Port Authority, again to manage and operate container terminals. And just recently in June, PSA signed a contract to build a container terminal in Aden in the Republic of Yemen. Plans for the corporatised PSA Mr Speaker, Sir, I would now like to describe briefly the plans for the corporatised PSA. The corporatised PSA will be known as PSA Corporation. Its core business will be the operation of the container terminals in Singapore. In addition to this, PSA Corporation will expand into two new strategic areas: one, investment, development and operation of international port terminals and related harbour-front developments; and two, warehousing and logistics where PSA already has relevant expertise. Based on its track record, PSA was recently appointed the manager of the new exhibition centre "Singapore Expo" at Changi. In addition, PSA Corporation will continue to manage the World Trade Centre, or the WTC, as well as the existing cruise centre and ferry terminals. The Government has allowed PSA to retain the WTC because over the years, PSA's successful development and management of this harbour-front complex has built up PSA's brand name. The international maritime community has come to identify the WTC with PSA. Allowing PSA to retain and re-develop the WTC as a world class project will enhance PSA's credentials and boost its chances of securing other harbour-front projects, which may be integrated with port and cruise centre developments. Although PSA owns quite a few properties as a statutory board, it will be returning to the State properties which are not germane to its core businesses. At corporatisation, PSA will only retain properties related to its businesses in container and cargo handling, warehousing and logistics, harbour-front development, facilities for its own staff, and properties for essential services which it will have to continue to provide after corporatisation. Economic regulation Mr Speaker, Sir, to ensure the provision of adequate and cost-effective services at good service levels, and to safeguard the introduction of new operators where appropriate, some form of economic regulation will be put in place. MPA, as the regulator of the port industry, will license the port and marine services provided by PSA Corporation. MPA will not regulate the tariffs of transhipment cargo since there is sufficient international competition to provide the necessary checks. However, MPA will regulate the tariffs of local cargo until such time as competition is introduced in the local port industry. This is to ensure that tariffs for local cargo remain competitive to safeguard the interest of local exporters. In view of strong external competition, the Government sees no need to introduce another operator in the container port industry as yet. PSA is already operating at a high level of efficiency and PSA should continue to have the flexibility to operate at maximum efficiency with economies of scale. However, as the industry and the operating environment continues to evolve and the future is uncertain, it is prudent that we keep our options open. Hence, there will be no exclusivity clause in PSA Corporation's licence or in any public listing document. However, in areas where liberalisation will enhance Singapore port's competitiveness, MPA will allow services to be offered by other operators besides PSA to create competition. One example is the provision of tug services at our port and shipyards. In July this year, MPA permitted shipyards to order tug services from operators other than PSA for servicing internal movements in the shipyards. Tomorrow, MPA will announce plans for the further liberalisation of tug services. The liberalisation will take place in phases over a few years and should bring about more competitive pricing and higher service standards in the industry. Mr Speaker, Sir, PSA Corporation will first operate as a wholly Government-owned company for a period of time. It will be listed some time later on the Stock Exchange of Singapore as part of the Government's plan to build up the assets of our citizens by giving them a stake in one of the country's major assets. The PSA (Dissolution) Bill Sir, let me now address the key provisions of the PSA (Dissolution) Bill. Clause 1 of the Bill anticipates the setting out of the operational date of corporatisation. The Minister for Communications will appoint the date at which the Act will come into operation and PSA dissolved. Clause 3 provides for the transfer of property, rights and liabilities from PSA to the successor Company, the Government or MPA. Clause 4 provides for the issue of securities in the successor Company to a wholly-owned Government company, on terms as directed by the Minister for Finance. Clauses 5 to 7 describe the financial structure of the successor Company and the terms of issue in relation to the Companies Act and Trustees Act. Clauses 8 to 10 provide for the transfer of PSA employees to MPA or the successor Company, as appropriate, on terms no less favourable than those they enjoyed immediately before their transfer. The rights of former and present employees of the PSA under past or present pension, gratuity or allowance schemes will be preserved. PSA's liability to pay the same will be transferred to MPA or the successor Company, as appropriate. The Bill allows for the continuity of existing agreements and pending proceedings involving PSA at the operational date. It also makes the necessary provision for continuity of port tariffs and rates fixed under the repealed PSA Act until such time when new tariffs and rates are fixed by the successor Company. Conclusion Sir, in conclusion, let me say that the corporatisation of PSA is part of a fundamental shift in the way we manage our port and this is in response to the fundamental changes in the industry. This shift is necessary in order to ensure that Singapore remains a major transhipment hub in the region. It represents many months of intensive work by officers of various Government Ministries, MPA and PSA. I am confident that PSA Corporation will grow from strength to strength, and transform itself from being an operator of a world class container port to a world class corporation and a leader in international port terminal operations, management, and in logistics services. Sir, I beg to move. Question proposed.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I would like to speak in support of the motion in the name of the Minister for Communications. This Bill seeks to dissolve PSA which its predecessor, the Singapore Harbour Board, has been running our port for decades. As we have learned from the Minister, it also seeks to enable the privatisation of the successor Company. We read very often in the papers and, I believe, in the news that the port has been facing very severe competition, not just in the region but also from as far as North or East Asia. And I believe, with this formation of MPA that the Minister has mentioned, that the organisation has been gearing up for this privatisation and corporatisation effort. I think the time is now really crucial in the face of globalisation of the world economy and this competition that we are facing today is quite different from what the competition that we have been hearing about for years. This is because the regional economies have been making good progress and there are economic developments over the last decade or so with foreign trade and investment growing. The governments and the port authorities have become more and more confident of their expertise and they have continued to invest and build up this expertise. In the face of globalisation now, the competitive element is really crucial, and this is where all shipping companies and freighters are looking at. In the past, we used to exploit our locational advantage as an international port in the sea route and the trade route fully. But today, cost competitiveness is fast becoming the decisive factor in the face of telecommunications and other facilities which enhance information flow. Hence, we should be mindful that the goal of privatisation effort that comes with this dissolution of PSA should really be looking at competitiveness and efficiency. It must not be just a privatisation in form but of necessity be one in substance. Downstream services which the Minister has just now mentioned should rightfully be open to private sector firms to compete in providing such services. He has just mentioned tugs and barges but there can be many others in warehousing, distribution centre, logistics, and so on, and, of course, not forgetting the possibility of berth operations so long as these private companies or private sector firms can do it cheaper, faster and better. Otherwise the privatisation effort of state charters in such a case runs a danger of substituting bureaucracy for an old boy's network of subsidiary company's interest. I am sure the Minister is aware of this pitfall which has happened in many cases of privatising statutory agencies in overseas countries in Europe. In Rotterdam, for example, berths are privatised and run by different companies. Just now, the Minister mentioned that he does not want to implement this separate company for berth operation as yet. Therefore, he has included a non-exclusivity clause in the provisions. I think this is the right approach that we should take to ensure competition and to do better even within the different business units of the organisation is important. I am sure there are other services that can and could be open to private sector business to contribute and compete. Only through this process can efficiency and lowered cost down the line in the port service be engendered. I hope the Minister will consider this when setting the perimeters and the organisation and structure of the privatisation process. It is important at this stage to take a long and hard look at this issue while we are at this crossroad in dissolving the Port of Singapore Authority which has run the port so effectively and efficiently for so long. The Minister may consider requiring the successor Company to re-engineer its business process and benchmark itself against the best practices and productivity performance indicators of other efficient and well-known ports elsewhere in special niches of their activities - not just overall, we know that overall the Port of Singapore is one of the best ports, it is probably the world's best port - in order to face this coming serious regional challenge. In this regard, I must say that I have every reason to believe the successor Company will be up to the challenge. After all, the people who run this port here do not achieve the world class organisational standing that they have been having for years. There are three points that I would like to comment on this Bill. Clause 7 of the Bill is on the application of the Trustees Act in relation to investment in the successor company. I am not really fully apprised of the rationale of why it is necessary to deem the investments in securities of the successor Company during the financial year to have paid dividends for the past three years when, in fact, there is no such successor Company. Why can we not have a provision where the Minister can waive certain requirements if the aim of it is actually to satisfy some contingent requirements later on, maybe for listing, and so on? Clause 9 is on the pension and gratuity of transferred employees. I am glad that the Minister has just now mentioned that such liabilities to pensions and gratuities which the Port of Singapore Authority has will be novated to the new successor Company. But specifically, I would like to ask about the other benefits of retirement, perhaps medical or housing, which there may be such outstanding issues. I am not sure but perhaps the Minister can clarify. The third point is on retiring workers or near retirement-age workers. How are they going to be treated? Have provisions been made for such a group of people who are near retirement that they can be novated to enjoy the continuing terms of benefits that they have been working and their service to the PSA in the past will be fully recognised even when they are nearing their retirement age? There has been some experience with corporatising efforts in the past where people, who have a long service and who are nearing retirement age, were conveniently asked to retire early and they might not get the full benefits of their retirement. I would like the Minister to comment on this.

Mr Speaker, Sir, may I first declare that I am currently serving as the Executive Secretary of the Singapore Port Workers' Union and also serving on the PSA Board. Sir, we have heard what Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong said about Dalian last night at the National Day Rally. Notwithstanding what the Mayor of Dalian, Mr Bo Xilai, said about the beautiful people of Dalian, for me, Sir, Dalian reminds me of the PSA flag flying high. Yes, Sir, PSA successfully wooed Dalian's port business. I felt indeed very proud of Singapore and PSA last April, first, in Beijing when Premier Li Peng and Mr Goh witnessed PSA exchanged documents with the Chinese shipping company and then when PM Goh officiated PSA's topping ceremony at the Dalian container port. PSA indeed has come a long way from its early humble beginnings. Almost as old as modern Singapore, present day PSA started as Tanjong Pagar Dock Company (TPDC) in 1864 and only in 1912, it became known as Singapore Harbour Board and 100 years after the Tanjong Pagar Dock Company took shape, it finally took the name of Port of Singapore Authority (PSA), the name it will continue to carry proudly as it sails forth to become a world class corporation. Sir, listening to Dr Yeo Ning Hong, the Chairman of PSA, talking to his staff last month on vision PSA 21, one cannot but be convinced that not only is PSA in good hands but the leadership at the helm knows what it is doing. Sir, I agree with the Minister that the 7,000 management and non-executive staff handling 770 million tons of shipping and 12.9 million TEUs or boxes last year is a no mean feat. Singapore after all is the world's busiest port. Despite that, PSA, like SIA, as what Prime Minister Goh told us last night at the National Day Rally, cannot rest on its laurels. The challenges of globalisation can make PSA vulnerable. PSA will have to be nimble, as stressed by the Minister just now, as it searches for its new niches. Corporatisation, and eventually privatisation, will be the answer if PSA wants to remain competitive and successful. It cannot wait for the boxes here. It has to go where the boxes are and serve the three billion in Asia and in fact we should also search for the six billion people in the world to serve. Dalian in North East China, Fuzhu in Central Eastern China, perhaps five or six more ports in ASEAN, in South Asia, the US$187 million contract to build a port in Aden, and I am sure more to come, will testify to this need for PSA to prepare itself for the challenges of competition and globalisation. As more and more people and countries progressively go for outsourcing, PSA will also grow in terms of logistics handling as a new niche. PSA's confidence in its core competencies, as in handling large volumes of container boxes, will also stand in good stead. I am glad to note that PSA will get customer-focused, through team work, innovation and open communication within PSA, as again emphasised by the Chairman of PSA last month. Allow me to take this opportunity to say that the Singapore Port Workers' Union (SPWU) and its members are whole-heartedly behind any move to strengthen PSA's position. They are geared to face the new wave of challenges in globalisation squarely. The relationship between management and the union has been excellent and SPWU looks forward to working together with management to make a success of corporatisation. However, the workers also expect equitable and fair sharing of the returns. Fortunately for PSA, it is not the first statutory board to corporatise. PSA can learn from the experiences of those who have been through this process. The SPWU has been exchanging notes with the Health Corporation of Singapore Staff Union (HCSSU), the Union of Telecom Employees of Singapore (UTES), Union of Power and Gas Employees (UPAGE) and the Singapore Union of Broadcasting Employees (SUBE) to learn from their experiences too. At the end of the day, I am confident PSA's process and product out of this corporatisation will be a model for others to follow. Nevertheless, with any major change, there are anxieties and concerns which need to be handled sensitively. Among others: will there be retrenchment? Job security is indeed uppermost in the minds of the workers. What will liberalisation and deregulation mean? Will greater competition mean displacement and major redeployment of staff? What will restructure mean? However, I am most glad to note that the management and the union have had dialogues to manage the changes and concerns together. Sir, PSA is not short of creativity. It has had to be bold to come to where it is now, as No. 1. I trust it will also be bold, creative and generous when it comes to handling staff concerns related to corporatisation. PSA needs staff goodwill and should do all it can to motivate staff to face the challenges of corporatisation together. After all, they are in the same boat sailing full steam ahead towards PSA 21 and the world class corporation it deserves to be. Sir, I support the Bill.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I thank the Members for speaking in support of the Bill, particularly for their understanding of the competition that is facing the Port of Singapore Authority. Mr Chay Wai Chuen is totally correct in saying that the competition that PSA is facing now and in the future is quite different from what it used to face in the past. PSA has grown on competition. In fact, I would like to make a point that in the transhipment business, PSA is not a monopoly. It has to fight very hard for each and every transhipment box that comes into the port of Singapore, because this box could easily have gone to another port or it would not have been transhipped in the first place. So PSA is not operating as a monopoly. And it is this very reason that has motivated the Government at this point in time not to invite other port operators into Singapore. However, as I have said in my speech, we do not rule out the possibility that we will do so in the future, as and when the situation changes. The new Pasir Panjang Terminal is going to be built as a long-term project over many, many phases. And if the port grows, as we expect it will, there will be, in the future, room for other players in the market. However, at this stage, I repeat again, there is already competition. The competition is there. It is keen. It is strong. As a first step in the life of PSA Corporation, we do not intend to subject it to any competition in terms of port operations. However, there will be opening up and deregulation in downstream activities. For a start, we have done so in tug and pilotage services, and MPA will be looking into other areas where such downstream services can be further liberalised and deregulated for greater efficiency in the port of Singapore. In terms of benchmarking for best practices, I would like to assure the Member that this is what PSA is currently practising. In fact, I receive a report on a regular basis comparing not just one criterion but many, many facets of port operations; how does PSA compare with the other ports in the world, in terms of speed of loading of containers, in terms of productivity of quay cranes, productivity of land use, and productivity of manpower and equipment. It is this kind of meticulous benchmarking against best practice throughout the world that has made the PSA the most efficient port operator on most, if not all, the benchmarks in the world today. And I say this having looked at other port operators and looked at the way they run their ports and looked at the facilities that they have. This is something that PSA has every reason to be proud of. I do not see that it will forsake this practice and, in fact, the process of corporatisation is going to motivate it to search for even greater and more innovative ways of improving productivity. Mr Chay asked some very specific questions about two of the clauses. I would like to enlighten him, first, on clause 7 as to why we have deemed the investment in securities of the successor Company to have paid dividends for the past three years. This clause is necessary in order to immediately qualify investments in the successor Company, in this case PSA Corporation, as permitted under the Trustees Act. Without this provision in clause 7, trustees would not be able to invest in PSA Corporation's shares until the shares meet the criteria stipulated in the Trustees Act. And one of the criteria stipulated in the Trustees Act is a requirement that a company must have been paying dividends in the previous three years. So what this clause does is really to give the Government more flexibility in terms of privatisation, which is the next step of the process. If we decide to privatise PSA Corporation, we would need to have this particular requirement. Just for the information of the Member, this stipulation was also carried in the Act when we corporatised Singapore Telecom and Singapore Power. Mr Chay also asked about other benefits including medical, housing, etc. As I mentioned in my speech just now, the transfer of employees from PSA, the statutory board, to PSA Corporation, the company, will be on terms which are no less favourable than what they are currently enjoying. This applies to all the various terms and conditions of service pertaining to the employee at that particular point in time. It means pension, gratuity and all the allowances. It means medical benefits, etc. Pensionable officers, for example, will not lose any of their pension benefits or their seniority when they are transferred to this company. For future pensioners who also have a right which is guaranteed under the present statutory board's Act, PSA's liability towards them will also be preserved and will be transferred to PSA Corporation. In other words, PSA Corporation will be responsible for their medical benefits and all the other benefits. Mr Zainul Abidin spoke very eloquently about the progress of PSA. I think all Singaporeans should be and, in fact, all Singaporeans are proud of the achievements of PSA. When PSA celebrated its centenary a few years ago, I attended the ceremony and when I saw what the original Harbour Board was like in the old days, I could not help but feel a tremendous sense of pride and achievement, and a sense of gratitude to all the men and women who actually brought PSA to where it is today. In particular, the men and women who worked in the unions and who worked in the management at that point in time. The way that they worked together to achieve this transition, from Harbour Board in the old days to PSA today, speaks volumes. In fact, not too long ago, we saw the operations and we saw pictures of how Harbour Board used to run these operations, the amount of manpower that was involved, the kind of machinery that was employed. When you see the PSA of today, when you compare and contrast the two, one cannot help but feel, as I said, a tremendous sense of pride and gratitude to all the people who made it possible. So I think Encik Zainul Abidin's tribute to PSA is well founded, not just because he is a member of the Board or Executive Secretary of the SPWU. I wholeheartedly endorse his comments. In fact, I think we have, in PSA, the potential for another Singapore company to become a world class corporation, to be a recognised world class brand name in the mould of SIA, for example. And this is a promise which I am sure the new PSA Corporation will fulfil in the years ahead. Of course, there will be anxieties on the part of the staff concerned. The members of the union and the management committees have been working together over the last 1(r) years in order to explain the purpose behind this move, in order to allay the anxieties and fears that the Member spoke about, and these anxieties and fears are quite natural. Any organisation undergoing such a fundamental change will elicit such fears among its staff. But I am very pleased to say that after a long process of explanation and consultation, there is a very, very strong team spirit in the organisation. They want to make this new company succeed. They know that this is a move that is necessary and essential, and they want to be part and parcel of this process. I think there is absolutely no doubt in my mind that the level of cooperation and understanding of this move among management and union is extremely high. However, having said that, I think the management will have to demonstrate in concrete terms that after corporatisation and eventually privatisation, the interests of the members will be protected. In this respect, I would like to assure the Member that all the staff of PSA will be retained at the point of corporatisation. There will be extensive retraining and upgrading programmes put into place. I think the management will, in all fairness, not be able to preserve or keep every single person in his or her job because the nature of the industry is changing. It is precisely because of this that the corporation will have to change. So Members will have to accept that there would be some dislocation in terms of jobs, but the staff would be retained. They would be given adequate training and skills upgrading programmes in order to prepare them for the new PSA Corporation. Of course, over time, the terms and conditions of service of PSA Corporation will have to be readjusted in line with the terms and conditions of service in the private sector. But if, as we all expect, and I am confident that it will, as PSA grows, the terms and conditions of service will similarly be enhanced. So I hope that those assurances will serve in some way to allay the fears and anxieties of the men and women of PSA.

Question put, and agreed to. Bill accordingly read a Second time and committed to a Committee of the whole House. The House immediately resolved itself into a Committee on the Bill. - [Mr Mah Bow Tan]. Bill considered in Committee; reported without amendment, read a Third time and passed.

Order for Second Reading read.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time." Members of the House would remember that during the recent Budget Debate in this House, the Minister for Education outlined the Ministry's vision for "Thinking Schools, Learning Nation" to prepare the next generation of Singaporeans. The key to achieving this mission is a strong and forward looking Education Service: a body of professionals dedicated to the education of our younger generation, responsive to change and headed by able and good leaders. The Director-General of Education stands at the apex of this body of professionals. This change in designation from the Director of Education to the Director-General of Education reflects the broader and heavier responsibilities he will have to shoulder as we restructure the Education Service and the way that we manage our schools. The "Thinking Schools" of the future must have principals and teachers who will manage the process of continuous learning and change in their schools in line with our changing economic, social and technological environment. While the Ministry will continue to provide the vision for education and lay down the broad guidelines for achieving this, the principals and teachers, on their part, must be able to tailor their own solutions to their students' and the schools' particular needs to bring out the best in their students. As new programmes are introduced, they will have to decide how best to integrate them into their schools. To achieve this, the Ministry intends to devolve more autonomy to our schools. We will restructure the way our schools are managed to give more authority to principals and school cluster heads to design and use the most appropriate education strategies. We will give them more authority to decide on the allocation of resources, and will hold them accountable for achieving the desired objectives. The principals and school cluster heads are answerable to the Director-General of Education for delivering the educational outcomes. The Director-General of Education will be responsible for defining the overall education strategies and managing the resources required for our goal of providing high quality education for all Singaporeans. The Director-General of Education will take ultimate responsibility for the educational outcomes achieved by our education system as a whole. In line with this, more of the decision making authority for the allocation and use of human and financial resources, currently under various other divisions within the Ministry, will be put under the Director-General of Education together with the professional staff branches such as curriculum planning and development, research and testing and educational technology which already report to the Director-General of Education. Giving the Director-General of Education more decision-making authority over the allocation of funds and manpower resources will enable him to provide more responsive and effective support to the schools. We will also want to move to a structure where the Director-General of Education will have a greater say in the advancement and career development of Education officers. This would include the identification, professional development and appointment of strong leaders to run our "Thinking Schools". As the top professional in the Education Service, the Director-General of Education will set the tone and professional ethos of the service, and play a bigger role in charting out its future direction and shape. The new nomenclature proposed - Director-General of Education - will reflect better the broader and heavier responsibilities that he has to shoulder, as well as give recognition to his relative seniority in relation to the other Directors in the Ministry Headquarters. I therefore ask the House to support the amendment to the Education Act to re-designate the leader of the Education profession as the Director-General of Education. Sir, I beg to move. Question proposed.

Sir, I rise to support this Bill and I would like to say that my support comes from the fact that this is but the precursor of many more changes to come. It is really part of a restructuring which makes the flat structure we have in school right now into a more manageable organisation where the leadership can be clearly shown. As part of this change, we are going to have a new concept called the cluster school concept. As I understand it, this is the way of making a group of schools to share resources and be led by a strong leader. The Senior Minister of State has said that schools have got to be headed by good and able leaders and I strongly support that. I would however say that when we have a system of many schools pooled together, it would require some kind of hierarchy and perhaps some kind of administrative support. We cannot just leave these clusters of schools to a super principal who would perhaps be a first among equals, because the way I understand it, "first among equals" usually has the last say of anything. I would say that the title "Director-General" inspires me to use another analogy. Our schools currently are basically battalions in the education service and the battalions are headed by principals who are the battalion commanders. Immediately after that, we have no other structure all the way up to the general who heads the service. Perhaps, we could have intermediate structures and the cluster schools could instead be called "school districts". I remember that when I was a school boy, we used to have school districts. I was very proud to be in the City District because we always used to beat Bukit Timah District in sports and all the other activities. That was really just for sports. But I think it is time to revive this concept and have it for the whole education service and that person who is going to be the leader of the cluster of schools would not just be one of the other principals but would really have an office, administrative staff and a budget to support his work. I would really think that is the way to go. I see this Bill as the point of a wedge that would open the door for more breath of fresh air.

Sir, in the recent Budget debate, the Education Minister, RAdm Teo Chee Hean, saw the importance of the teachers, principals and staff and the Ministry of Education is taking steps to make the Education Ministry into a thinking entity. Earlier, the Ministry has proposed decentralising its decision-making down to the autonomous cluster schools, as Dr Aline Wong has said. The changes proposed in this Bill are in line with the changes that are envisaged. However, change of names and designations is the easy part. The main changes to the system proper are more difficult. It will require commitment, hard work and proper management. As the Ministry passes more decision making responsibilities down, it is important that the decision makers at this level are properly trained to make this decision and take responsibilities for the added duties. This is easier said than done, as habits are difficult to change. In situations where decisions are centralised, as the Ministry of Education set-up in the past and now, decisions are transmitted from top and executed at the bottom. We can have very good implementers at the bottom and the system can work well. However, to change the mindset of an implementer to that of a decision maker is not easy. But the success of the change and ultimately the system, depends on changing this mindset. We must bear in mind that whatever changes that we need to make to our education system is not one of choice but of survival dictated by forces beyond our control. We will in future have a new breed of teachers and students in a new world environment. They will be more inquisitive and assertive. If we do not change our education system, the teachers and the students will be frustrated and employers will not get the type of workers and the nation will not get the type of citizens that we need. The Prime Minister has painted the vision of Thinking Schools and a Learning Nation. To make this a reality, we must restructure our education system into one where our teachers and principals are encouraged to think, to make decisions, to implement and to take responsibilities for a decision taken and implemented. Power must devolve downwards. Choosing the right people to take on responsibilities is critical to our success. Here, I must caution that if we are looking for a manager, we should be choosing people with good management skills. Here, I must put people management skills as very important. There has been a nagging suspicion that teachers who are good in teaching are more likely to be selected to take over this management position. This is not good. A good teacher may make a poor manager. In doing so, he or she may not perform well as a manager and make everyone else unhappy. Once a teacher is chosen to take on a management position, he or she must be given training and not to be expected to learn by fumbling through. Finally, I would like to emphasise that the main purpose of education must be to produce a nation of educated citizens to meet the needs of the nation. Management is incidental to achieving this goal. Management must therefore exist because of their clients, the teachers, students, parents, employers and Government. They do not exist of their own rights. They must not see the needs of their clients as chores to be performed. Here, I would refer to the entire education system: the Ministry, the schools, ITE, the polytechnics and the universities. Administration exists to support the primary functions of teaching, not the other way round. Sir, I support the Bill.

Sir, I thank the two Members of the House for their support of the Bill. I would also like to thank them for giving us some ideas for thought. I agree with Dr Tan Boon Wan that training for the school leaders is very important and not all teachers are necessarily good managers. This is why I emphasised in my speech that we would be selective in choosing strong leaders to lead in our effort to devolve autonomy to the schools. As for Thinking Schools, how do we materialise our vision for Thinking Schools? The way to go forward is to devolve decision making to schools where the action is, and that is why we want to restructure the school system and to group the schools in clusters to give them the opportunity to share resources, to deploy personnel in a more efficient manner and to develop school programmes that are catered to the particular needs of the schools in the local context. It is actually not a flat structure, as Dr Toh said. Heading the cluster of schools would be a group senior principal who actually is not one of the principals from the cluster. He would be someone with a specific mission, who would be posted to head a cluster of schools and to bring it forward. He would help the staff to develop. He would be monitoring and also assessing the staff at the same time. So it is not a flat structure. As to his idea that perhaps we could group the clusters of schools into districts, regions, and so on, certainly we can consider this suggestion. The cluster schools pilot project has been in existence for a few months now. We have had a preliminary assessment of its success and we are quite confident that this is the way forward. With this, I think I have answered the points made by both Members.

Question put, and agreed to. Bill accordingly read a Second time and committed to a Committee of the whole House. The House immediately resolved itself into a Committee on the Bill. - [Dr Aline Wong]. Bill considered in Committee; reported without amendment; read a Third time and passed.

Order. I suspend the Sitting and will take the Chair again at five minutes past six. Sitting accordingly suspended at 5.50 pm until 6.05 pm. Sitting resumed at 6.05 pm

The motion is subject to signification of support by at least one Member. Does the motion have the support of any other Member?

I support the motion.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I beg to move, That an All-Party Committee of Parliament with power to summon witnesses be set up to examine the justification for the recent increases in:-

6.45 pm May I move on to the waste disposal charges? Again, there is no explanation given as to why the fees have to go up for waste disposal. If I may give you my own example. I stay alone and because there is very little cooking that is done in my apartment, there is hardly any waste that is thrown out every day. Very little is put out by a maid who comes in about three times a week to do a little bit of ironing and cleaning the apartment for me. Yet, I see on my bill that my waste disposal charges are $21.

60. I do not know why. I am not complaining about my own bill, but what I want to know is how this is arrived at. Next, the price of water. This, Mr Deputy Speaker, Sir, we were told, was introduced to teach Singaporeans a lesson, and the lesson that Singaporeans had to be taught was that water is a precious commodity and it should not be wasted. We all agree with that. But who is being taught a lesson? Have we tried to think about this? Is it not obvious that the people who are being taught a lesson are the poorly paid, those who earn below $1,000 a month, those who earn, as I said in the Budget speech, $600 a month? They are being taught a lesson. How are our millionaires being taught a lesson? Will it lead them to use less water? Will it lead them to economise on the use of water? No. So it is our lower income citizens who have to be taught and punished. They have to be told, "You should not have too many baths perhaps, you should not be doing so much of washing, you have to cut down on all that now", whereas the rich people can go on using it and pay. My Party, in making a public statement on this, suggested that if that was the real reason, ie, to teach Singaporeans that they have to conserve water, the Ministers should set an example and they should have the supply of water to their homes cut off for four or five hours a day. I see there was no response at all to my call. That would have taught our Singaporeans to do something saying, "There, we have our Ministers setting us an example. They realise the need to save water and they are prepared to do without water for four or five hours a day. So we also must play our part." But that was not responded. No other reasons were given because we have not been told that we have been asked to pay more for our water from where we are getting the water. Again, there is no explanation given apart from teaching people a lesson. May I move on to the hospital charges that we are charging? I have got that in the second half of my motion. Sir, I have got the schedule for hospital charges from the Singapore General Hospital, and for our C class patients, we charge the standard ward a daily fee of $25, and we add to that a daily treatment fee of $11. So that is $36, and it does not include any other examination or treatment that has to be done, such as X-ray examination, laboratory tests, specialised tests and service, and whatnot. That is for our C class patients, standard ward. Tan Tock Seng Hospital is a restructured hospital. I am not talking about private hospitals. The C class patients have to pay $30 $20 for the bed that they sleep on and a daily treatment fee of $10. Sir, again, if I may go back to the amount of time and labour that was lost last year in the Select Committee hearings into whether there was a subsidy or not in the health service provided. Of course, there has to be a subsidy. No one doubts that. But the question is: is it something to be flaunted about by the Government saying, "We are subsidising."? Or should it not be looked upon as an investment of our monies in our people. That is what it is. It is not a subsidy. It is an investment of our public money in, what we have always said, our only resource available to us, our people. So the question is not whether it is a subsidy but whether we are making enough investment in our people who are our only resource available to us in this country. I have talked about the bed charges. May I talk a little bit about the outpatient charges? I have with me the bills that were rendered by the hospital to one of our senior citizens, 68 years of age, unemployed, no income at all, and I think he lives with his son and he had a sprain in the neck. He has to go regularly to the hospital because he suffers from other complaints. I think diabetes is one. But he has to go regularly to the hospital for check-ups. In June he had some sprain in his neck and he went to Tan Tock Seng Hospital where he was registered. For the three visits, he had to pay a total of $129.

50. This is for outpatient charges. Of course, he had to find the money to pay. But he could ill-afford it because, as I said, he does not work. He has no income. I see the SGH consultation charge is $17 for subsidised patients. C class comes under subsidised patients. For every consultation he has to pay $17. Mr Deputy Speaker, I have also got the figures for a private hospital just across the causeway, not a Government hospital, not a Government restructured hospital. This is a specialist hospital in Johor Baru. I have got the charges because my sister is there at the moment and she is in a 6-bed ward and her daily fee comes to $55 ringgit. It is not a C class, but they call it according to the number of beds in the room, and a 6-bed room is the lowest. She has to pay $55 ringgit. If you take it at the exchange, that is lower than what our C class patients have to pay. But, as I said, it is a 6-bed room and I think in our hospitals we also have 6-bed rooms in B2, and what do we charge? $50. I have been to this ward and I must say that I thought they were running it very professionally in the treatment and the nursing care that is given to her. Why is it that we are unable to keep our costs down? Has there been an examination into this? But more, has there been an examination as to whether instead of passing the increased cost to our people why it cannot be absorbed by savings from other expenditure? All these need to be thoroughly looked at and we have not looked at them at all. Then we have got, in my list, fees charged by Government departments and statutory boards for administrative services. We pay taxes, income taxes, and yet the citizen is called upon to pay a fee under the Fees Act for all kinds of services supplied by Government departments and statutory boards. Take the police, for example, Mr Deputy Speaker. If you want a report, on behalf of an accused person, made against him, you have got to pay what they call a search fee first, $14. It does not matter whether the report was only made yesterday and you write today. So I do not know what search they have to make. But you have to pay $14 search fee first. And then you have to pay the copying charges and they come to $30, $25, or something. You write to the hospitals for reports, treatment, diagnosis of people who were admitted because they wish to pursue a claim, they might have been involved in traffic accidents, and what do you find? For the doctor to give his report, it will cost the patient - I stand corrected - I think, more than $100, just for an ordinary report to be given by the doctor of what he diagnosed and what the prognosis was. And if you want a specialist to report, then you have got to pay a lot more. I could go on, Mr Deputy Speaker, giving examples of the fees charged by Government departments. That is not only Government departments, but also statutory boards. You go to HDB, ask them for something - administrative fee, my boy, down. "You pay administrative fee first before we give you the answer." Are all these necessary, making our citizens' life more difficult? They find life very, very hard. I know this because I talk to them and they tell me. They do not hesitate to speak to me. They tell me how they are finding life in Singapore. Finally, there are the rent and selling prices of HDB apartments. Again, there has been really no examination as to the costing of these apartments for sale and about the rentals that are charged. Should there not be a costing done and this House acquainted and apprised of all these? So it is my proposal, and I urge this House, to say this afternoon that the Government should afford this House an opportunity to examine all increases in essential services supplied to our people, that we, this House, as the representatives of the people, should be given a chance to look at the increases and to pronounce on them, and not to be left to boards and the Government to increase charges. I have proposed that this should be an All-Party Committee. It would not serve its purpose unless it is a Committee that comprises all the parties represented in this Parliament. It is for the Opposition MPs also to be consulted so that they can put forward their views as they know it from the voters and the Committee can then report to the House. And I have proposed in this motion that the Committee should have power to summon witnesses. That is essential if you do really mean to do something about this. The Committee should have power to summon the directors, managers of these bus companies to bring their accounts, examine them, and to answer questions as to why they need the increase, equally with the university. We do not know the university accounts. But, above all, I keep saying this House should examine whether --

Order. Mr Jeyaretnam, your one hour is up.

Is an hour up, Sir?

Yes.

I am sorry. Question proposed. 7.05 pm

Mr Deputy Speaker, Sir, I rise to speak against the motion raised by the NCMP, Mr Jeyaretnam. Sir, over the last few years the issue of cost of living in Singapore has become a cause of concern for many Singaporeans. In moving this motion, Mr Jeyaretnam has struck a sensitive chord among Singaporeans, especially those in the lower income group. In speaking against the motion, I do not intend to trivialise or be insensitive to the public's concerns over the cost of living. These concerns are real and have to be addressed in a dispassionate and objective manner. Sitting as I have done in the last hour or so and listening to the speech made by the NCMP, I am certainly glad that he is not representing the Government for I think what he suggests is a surefire way of bankrupting this nation and all that we have built in the last 30-over years. Sir, the issue of cost increases is a serious matter certainly. The Government has on its own accord given this matter much consideration. If indeed life is not going to get any better but worse for Singapore, I think this matter is something which we all should take seriously. In 1992, the Prime Minister announced at the National Day rally that he would form a committee to review the concern that many had felt about the rising cost. The committee included representatives from all relevant segments of society, unionists, employers, academics, journalists, and MPs, including the Opposition ones. Mr Jeyaretnam's colleague, Mr Low Thia Khiang, was a member of that committee. In August 1993, the committee published its report. It found that prices had risen in Singapore but it was not price increases which had contributed to the perception that the cost of living had gone up faster than income grew. It was in fact spending patterns that had changed. It does not take much to know that a double scoop of ice cream must surely cost more than a single scoop, and more people want double scoop ice cream today. Sir, in 1996, arising from the misleading reports published by the SDP which tried to distort and confuse the price issue for political advantage, the Cost Review Committee was reconvened. The Workers Party was invited to join but it declined. I find it ironic that Mr Jeyaretnam, a WP member, would now seek to move this motion when it was his own party, together with the SDP, which declined to join the reconvened CRC in 1996 even though it was invited to do so. They had deliberately passed up an opportunity to contribute to the efforts to tackle the very problems and concerns of our citizens which he now claims to champion. With or without the presence of the Workers Party, the reconvened Cost Review Committee duly met and came to the same conclusions, and that is, prices had not risen faster than incomes. It is only natural that we all should want a higher standard of living. We all work hard and we feel we deserve it. But a higher standard of living comes only from creating more value-added jobs. When our salaries go up, the cost of goods and services, especially those that contain high labour content, will also rise. The things we buy will cost more. If we work smart, our salaries will rise faster than the cost, and our standard of living will at the same time go up. Sir, the way forward is for us to focus on productivity and innovation. For nine days, at the recent Budget debates, we had made proposals, raised suggestions, pointed out problems to the Ministers. I noticed that Mr Jeyaretnam had not submitted any question for oral or written answer by the relevant Minister on the subject of cost increases that he says he is concerned with. I find this extremely odd. It only leads me to question his real motive for pressing for an All-Party Committee to look into cost increases. But it is not too late. The window to ask questions is always open. Mr Jeyaretnam knows this better than I since I am a rookie in this House. Each time Parliament sits, there is opportunity for Mr Jeyaretnam to question Ministers and have his concerns raised and heard. He has raised this as a philosophical basis for his concern, and that is, Parliament, and not the Executive, must be accountable to the people. The fact that he is present in this House today shows that he has every opportunity to raise questions of his concern with the relevant Ministries and the relevant Ministers as to these cost increases. What is he here for today if he is not given the opportunity to raise such concerns that he has now raised today? The Government is accountable to the people, I agree, and has never shied away from a reasoned justification of its policies. And I am sure that if Mr Jeyaretnam has good ideas on how increases in productivity can lead to higher wages for the people, the Government will be more than pleased to hear them. The Government has taken the recommendations of the Cost Review Committee very seriously and has taken up, in fact, the recommendations made by the CRC in its reports made in 1992 and 1993. Sir, the openness with which the Cost Review Committee has dealt with the rising costs of living, the cooperation given by the Government Ministers and the Ministries, the fact that the CRC has been given full access to all relevant data and the Government's implementation of the recommendations of the CRC show that the Government takes the cost of living issues very seriously, contrary to what Mr Jeyaretnam has suggested. Sir, I agree that we should take the issue of costs seriously in this House. We do not want to be caught in the rat race. But we cannot develop a handout mentality or take the easy approach of complete subsidy or handouts to the people. I think, if you want to be able to provide more for the people, the way forward is to ensure that our people continue to be productive and that the salaries of our people will continue to be commensurate with the productivity output of the employees and workers. And we can do this by being more competitive and by working smarter. The formation of an All-Party Committee for the purpose which Mr Jeyaretnam has outlined will only waste time and resources. I think we are better off focusing our time and energy on suggesting new initiatives in education, in building our transportation system, health care and infrastructure. Sir, for these reasons, I do not support the motion.

Mr Deputy Speaker, before anyone else talks, I wonder whether we have a quorum in this House. I think the quorum is 22. It shows the interest. I am told by the Clerk that the quorum is 22.

Yes, there is a quorum.

We have.

There is a quorum. Resume your seat, please. Mr Jeyaretnam resumed his seat.

Mr Deputy Speaker, I rise to answer one particular point by Mr Jeyaretnam, and that is, actually it is a very unfair sideswipe at the Consumers Association before he launched onto this tirade. As far as the statement he made about CASE is concerned, he said something to the effect that CASE somersaulted on the public transport price increases. I believe this was a mis-report in the papers which a couple of days later the Straits Times, in its page 3, corrected and clarified, and the New Paper, on page 2, also ran a story explaining my point of view and describing my views at that time that there was certainly no somersault as far as CASE was concerned on the position on public transport increases. In our first press release, what we had done was that we highlighted the fact that transport prices were watched by a watchdog called the Public Transport Council. They had seen all the figures. They had seen all the prices. They had seen all the justifications. And we were not going to second-guess them. Without the benefit of looking at those same figures and reasons, we felt, however, that it probably was justified but we were unhappy about certain issues which we then proceeded to raise. This had to do with the quality of service and the need for greater improvement before the commuter is convinced that there is justification. This was indeed why the Straits Times and the New Paper had to run corrections immediately. As far as CASE is concerned, however, we have got a role which, I think, has been very badly misunderstood and I beg your indulgence, Sir, to explain for the benefit of Mr Jeyaretnam what CASE should do and has been formed to do. CASE is essentially a members' organisation. It is not a Government body. It is not a statutory body. It is run by volunteers, like myself. We feel that certain things have to be done for this cause of consumers. And we have members who think likewise and they pay $25 a year to support us. We have got unions with thousands of members, 600,000 to be exact, and they support us by giving subscriptions to run the consumer services that we run. Where CASE is concerned, we are therefore a private body, just like any consumers association around the world. We have no legislative power nor function to control prices, in other words, unlike in a command economy where you have a bureaucracy that fixes prices and controls price increases, Singapore is a market economy. In a market economy, the forces of supply and demand determine whether prices go up or down. The function of a consumers association is to monitor the prices and to inform the consumer public what these prices are so that they can choose places where they can buy cheap things and avoid the places that are charging excessively. There is also the function of educating consumers that there is no need to buy from a certain shop because you can stretch your dollar by doing certain other things like, for example, buying house brands, and we do that too. We monitor prices and when we see sharp or unjustified increases, we call for a reason why this is done. When the reason is unjustifiable, we ask the price increaser to step down. And we have done this successfully too. There was once when pork prices were suddenly increased overnight allegedly because there was a shortage of pigs. We found out from the Primary Production Department figures which are publicly available that there was no shortage of pigs and therefore when we exposed that fact, the merchants had to back off. Our job after highlighting unreasonable increases is to activate the consumer either to boycott those particular products or services, or to push for legislation to ensure that the consumer is protected, or to give adverse publicity, such as we have done with the pork prices, so that in the end people will back off by themselves. So this is the role of CASE, not to control prices, but to review what prices are so that the public together with us can move for changes. If we do not get the support of the public, then invariably we will fail in our pushes because we would be one voice against all the combined voices of the cartels and businesses that speak against us. As far as Government increases are concerned, the Prime Minister has openly and publicly declared that CASE will be given full cooperation if CASE wishes to examine any Government increases and we are certainly ready to take on that challenge. However, price increases, whether it is the Government or private, come about because of several reasons, not all of which CASE should be speaking on. First of all, an increase could be because of higher costs. So if the higher costs are justified and the increase in price is commensurate with that higher costs, then in a market economy, we have to let it go. Secondly, price increases could go up because of a better quality of service or product. As Mr Sin has mentioned, somebody wants a double scoop of ice-cream or perhaps he wants a Haagen-Dazs rather than Magnolia. Then he pays a different price for it. A third reason why prices go up is that it is very often as a policy tool by the Government. CASE reserves the right every time this is done to speak up if we feel that there is a need to. But invariably, in most of these instances, where the Government has decided, as a policy, to impose a fee or a price, it is for me, as a Member of Parliament and a politician to raise it in Parliament. The political aspect of the price increases is not for CASE to raise because CASE is bound by its constitution not to speak on political matters. All the consumers associations around the world are bound by a similar charter which has been laid down in the constitution of the Consumer International. As far as political prices are concerned, Mr Jeyaretnam says that there must be an All-Party Committee, and I fully agree with him that there should be an All-Party Committee to review costs. Typical of Mr Jeyaretnam, however, being a Rip van Winkle, having slept for the last few years, he does not realise that this all-party committee already exists. Mr Sin has pointed out one very key committee and that is this very House because Mr Jeyaretnam can stand up at any time and question any Minister for figures. He says he could not get any figures on the university. He can ask for Written or Oral Answers and all the figures will be given to him. Mr Jeyaretnam, together with his other colleagues in the Opposition, is able to raise a motion to review any particular price increase. In fact, this House is an All-Party Committee to review any Government policy, prices, anything that Mr Jeyaretnam or his colleagues wish to raise. So we do not need to waste time debating the setting up of an All-Party Committee that already exists. There are also other all-party committees that Mr Jeyaretnam may not realise. Mr Sin mentioned the Cost Review Committee. The Cost Review Committee invited both the Workers' Party and the Singapore Democratic Party to participate. If they declined, they could not cry wolf. They were summoned before the Cost Review Committee to give their part of the story and to give evidence to counter what the Cost Review Committee had said. They did, but they could not convince anybody. It is again not the fault of this House that that has happened. The Cost Review Committee also had all kinds of participation from the labour unions, Government, academics, and, as I have mentioned earlier on, witnesses came from the civil service and the political parties. In a small way, I might also say that, in its review function, CASE has got an all-party element too. Of course, in this case, they are not political parties but they are parties from all round Singapore because CASE is an organisation that is available for membership to any person above 18 years old who lives in Singapore. So if Mr Jeyaretnam wishes to join CASE, I will extend him my welcome.

Mr Speaker, Sir, I actually did not plan to speak. But since Members refer to me, particularly the Cost Review Committee, I wish to clarify certain things. I do not know whether Mr Sin Boon Ann has read the 1992 Cost Review Committee. Have you? You have. Have you also read about my Minority Report inside? If you had, because you were quoting some conclusions from the Cost Review Committee, you will realise that in my Minority Report, I also stated that "I regretted that in particular in the case of housing prices, the HDB has failed to provide materials or data I requested to enable me to make a full review as to why there was a sudden increase in HDB prices." As regards the 1996 Cost Review Committee and why I had decided not to sit in the Committee, I had made it quite clear publicly that I did not think it was correct to reconvene the Committee in the first place. I think there was a political purpose in convening such a Committee. It was not just purely to review the costs concerned. However, by not going into the Committee does not mean that you will lose the right to question any cost increases. As what Mr Sin Boon Ann and Dr Toh had mentioned, you can ask questions in Parliament and Mr Jeyaretnam has not raised about the cost increases during the Budget debate. That is the usual PAP rhetoric. If you do not ask you lose your right. Let me put it here clearly. We will choose the time and the place to raise any question we like. So let us not take it that if we do not raise a particular question, we will lose our right and we cannot raise it again. You cannot equate the Cost Review Committee with an All-Party Committee which is being proposed by my Party. The Cost Review Committee is basically an ad hoc committee. It was convened on a specific agenda in 1992 by the Prime Minister and, again, reconvened with a specific agenda. It is not a standing committee. Therefore, you cannot equate the Cost Review Committee with an All-Party Committee. For instance, I was a member of the Cost Review Committee, but I was not notified beforehand of any increases. And similarly, I share the same sentiments that Mr Jeyaretnam has, ie, why such increases of the various fares, as listed out in the motion, and what is the rationale. Some were reported in the press, yes, but there were some other questions. Mr Deputy Speaker, Sir, I do not want to go on as many points have already been covered by Mr Jeyaretnam. Mr Sin is also worried that the committee, if it is formed, will somehow become a committee involved in giving handouts. Why must it be so? We are proposing a Committee to review prices. The decision of the Committee may not necessarily be that everything is free. It may not be the case, because we have to face the hard facts and figures and data. So we should not have a fixed mindset that when the opposition proposes such a Committee, it must be like that. That is what Members perceive it to be so.

Mr Deputy Speaker, Sir, I did not intend to speak but since Mr Jeyaretnam mentioned that our Secretary-General, Mr Lim Boon Heng (Minister without portfolio), has said some things relating to workers, I feel compelled to respond. Sir, as a new MP, I come to this House to try to do my best to serve the people and, at the same time, to learn from the other MPs on how we can do even better. So whenever any MP speaks, I will listen very intensely to see what I can learn from him. When Mr J.B. Jeyaretnam spoke just now, I paid a lot of attention because I wanted to know exactly what is his concern and whether there is any valid ground for his concern. The picture that Mr J.B. Jeyaretnam painted is one whereby the lives of the people have not gotten better, salary is low and the Secretary-General of NTUC has called on everybody to keep wages low. He said that we take in more foreign students at the expense of our local students, our public transport companies operate on the basis of profitability, we do not care about the people, the Government accumulates all the surpluses so that we can boast to the world that we have the highest budget surplus, and so on. When I listened to the way he described Singapore it really puzzles me. If Singaporeans today were to live in such a sad state of development, how come every four or five years when there is a general election, the people still return the PAP into power. And that reminded me of a story -

I will give you an answer.

Please let me finish.

Allow him to finish, Mr Jeyaretnam.

That reminded me of a story. One day, my son asked me, "Daddy, there are three ants lining up in a straight line, all facing the same direction. The first ant said, "There is one ant behind me." The second ant said, "Yes, there is an ant behind me." The third ant said, "There is also an ant behind me."" My son said, "Daddy, how do you explain?" I tried to give all kinds of theories like the world is round, therefore, the first ant is behind the last ant. My son said, "No, daddy, the answer is very simple. Because the third ant didn't tell the truth." Sir, having listened to Mr J B Jeyaretnam, I came to the same conclusion. Mr Jeyaretnam, basically, painted that kind of scenario which is, in my mind, highly illogical. And the only possible explanation is that he was not telling the truth. I like to quote a few examples because from these few examples, we can see whether he actually told the truth. He quoted Secretary-General Lim Boon Heng, who is absent, and said that Secretary-General Lim mentioned that our Government policy is to keep wages down, and that the Secretary-General said that we should not increase wages, and to keep wages down. That obviously cannot be the case. I know what the Secretary-General said. Secretary-General Lim Boon Heng said that during times when the economic growth is slower, we have to keep our wage increase down. There is a big difference between keeping wages down and keeping wage increase down. For example, if a worker is earning $1,000 today and last year the wage increase was 7%. This year, we tell the worker that the economy is not doing as well as last year, competition is stronger and so on, therefore, accept maybe 5%-6% wage increase. What it means is that this year, with a $1,000 salary, go for $1,050. $1,050 is still higher than $1,000. But Mr J B Jeyaretnam twisted the words of the Secretary-General and said that the Secretary-General said that we should keep the wages down. When the man-in-the-street hears this he will say, "Wow, how can the Secretary-General of NTUC tell the workers this year you earn $1,000, next year keep it at $1,000, better still at $950." That obviously is not the case. We are talking about managing our wage increase. This is number one. Number two is what Mr J B Jeyaretnam did not mention. He said that in Singapore 40% of our population have an average household income of $1,492. But what he did not say is that the real income of the Singaporean workers has been going up 5-6% every year for the last 10 years. What he did not say is that if you look at the world today, at all the OECD countries with high income today, in Europe, US and Japan, have their real wage increase gone up 5%-6% a year for the last 10 years? I dare to challenge Mr J B Jeyaretnam. Take a look at the number and I can assure him that the wage level in Singapore is going up by at least twice the rate in all these countries. Sir, the bottom line is this. I would submit that, yes, many residents in Singapore obviously are concerned with cost of living. The reason is not so much because they feel that they are not able to sustain the present standard of living. They are talking about wanting to have a better standard of living and they want to have more of the better and faster. And I think there is nothing wrong with that. After all, what is the role of the Government? The role of the Government is to make sure that every Singaporean can live better tomorrow than today. And it is very good that Singaporeans aspire to have a better life because that aspiration is a driving force behind the progress of Singapore. And as responsible Members of Parliament, I feel that it is our responsibility here to understand the aspirations of the people and to work with the people of Singapore and see how Singapore can move forward faster and better, so that we can realise this vision of having a better life, rather than to turn this into something negative. Sir, let me conclude. I learnt a lesson today that there are three types of people in this world. The first type are people who make things happen. The second type are people who let other people make things happen. And the third type ask, "What happened?" As Members of Parliament from the ruling party, our mission in life is very straightforward. We want to make things happen and we are charging forward all the time. As Members of the opposition party, I can understand that they choose not to do their best to make things happen because of their political interest. But I hope, at least in this House, they would behave as responsible Singapore citizens, at least let other people make things happen, rather than to keep on asking what happened and propose forming an All-Party Committee to try to slow us down. Because at the end of the day, if we cannot work together as one united country to move forward at a pace that we want to move forward, eventually, all Singaporeans will end up worse off.

Sir, may I seek clarification from the Member?

Yes.

The Member says that an opposition Member in this House would not want things to happen and he urged that we should move forward as one united nation. Would he explain how this proposal of an All-Party Committee would not make things happen, and would not move the nation forward? On the contrary, I believe that an All-Party Committee is to make things happen.

I am more than happy to respond to that, Sir. Take, for example, in this House, opposition Member Mr J B Jeyaretnam just now mentioned again about the workers and appears to be very concerned for the workers of Singapore. When I first came into this House, I gave the benefit of the doubt to the opposition Members when Mr Chiam See Tong and Mr J B Jeyaretnam commented about the importance of training workers. I said very good. At least, we have opposition Members of Parliament who are equally concerned for the workers of Singapore. [Interruption].

Mr Jeyaretnam, do not interject.

Let me highlight this point. In this House, many Members of Parliament proposed cuts to the budget of the Ministry of Trade and Industry. Why did we propose cuts? Because we wanted the Minister for Trade and Industry to give a very specific response on what the Government is doing to retrain and upgrade the workers. Sir, it is sad to say that on those days when we were discussing workers' upgrading and training, I did not see Mr Jeyaretnam in this House. Firstly, I do not think he is very sincere about his interest in the upgrading of workers. Secondly, if he showed interest about that, why did he not propose a cut on the budget of the MTI? From that, when Mr J B Jeyaretnam proposed the setting up of an All-Party Committee to review costs and so on, it is very clear in my mind that the real interest in his mind is not the interest of Singapore citizens but his political interest. On that note, Sir, I cannot but submit to this House that we must reject this motion soundly.

Mr Deputy Speaker, Sir, there is no need to set up an All-Party Committee of Parliament to examine fee increases by Government or Government-related organisations. Such fee adjustments are the responsibility of Government and have to be fully justified to the public. If necessary, they can be brought to the attention of Parliament and thoroughly debated. Members of Parliament, including elected and non-elected Members, are free to ask questions and to probe, query and criticise the Ministries concerned for their action. Ultimately, the Government is answerable to the voters who can give their verdict of the Government's performance at the ballot box. The Government must have the political courage and conviction to govern well and decisively for the benefit of all Singaporeans. Many countries are in a log jam and are unable to extricate themselves from their structural difficulties, because their political leaders are unable or unwilling to act decisively in the interest of the country. For example, more and more cities are getting snarled up with traffic, not because their government officials do not know what to do, but because their political leaders are afraid to upset voters by taking unpopular but crucial action to remedy the situation before it is too late. Singapore would have been faced with a similar situation years ago if the Government had not taken drastic action to control the vehicle population besides investing heavily to expand the road network, build the MRT and improve public transportation. Unpopular measures had to be implemented despite their political cost to the PAP. The end result is that the traffic has continued to flow smoothly, the economy has grown strongly and the voters have reaffirmed the confidence in the PAP Government. All the recent fee and rate adjustments have been fully justified and explained to the public. Bus and MRT fares were raised by 10 cents per trip for cash payment. For payment by farecards, the fare for non-air-conditioned buses was raised by 5 cents per trip, but there was no increase for air-conditioned buses and the MRT. These adjustments are necessary to ensure that the bus companies and MRT remain viable as fares have not risen in tandem with the rise in operating costs over the last few years. University fees have been increased slightly every year to reflect the cost increases and to move towards recovering 25% of running costs. University students constitute only about 6% of our student body but they use up about 20% of the education budget. With the target of recovering 25% of running costs, it means that taxpayers will continue to subsidise university undergraduates heavily to the extent of 100% of fixed costs and at least 75% of running costs. Water rates have to be increased sharply to reflect the much higher cost of producing water by desalination. Water is a vital resource which must be priced correctly to encourage conservation and to enable us to reduce our dependence on external sources. Coming close together, these fee and rate adjustments may appear to the public to have a large impact on our cost of living. However, it is actually not so. My Ministry has been monitoring these cost increases and their total impact on our consumer price index (CPI) and the impact is actually quite small. For the lowest 20% income group, the fee increases will raise inflation by 0.6 of a percentage point. Including the projected cost increases for non-governmental items, such as food, clothing, etc, the CPI for this group is expected to rise by 2% this year. For the middle 60% income group, the corresponding figures are 0.4% for Government fee increases and 1.8% total CPI increase for this year. For the highest 20% income group, the corresponding figures are 0.3% for the fee increases and 2.5% overall. If we include other secondary effects, the overall inflation this year is estimated at 2-2.5%. This is close to the average of 2.4% over the past six years and is one of the lowest inflation rates in the world. The Government is mindful of the impact of the fee and rate increases on lower income Singaporeans and has implemented various schemes to assist them. These include the rebates for utilities, rentals and charges for service and conservancy. The rebates extend even to those living in 4-room HDB flats. For those who do not live in HDB flats, there is the CCC assistance scheme which has a $3 million fund to help them. Families with less than $1,500 monthly income can apply under this scheme. As for the university, polytechnic and ITE fees, there are various loans, bursaries and scholarships to assist needy students including those awards funded by Edusave and the CCCs. The Government reconvened the Cost Review Committee last year to relook at the issue of cost of living in Singapore. Unfortunately, both the Workers' Party and the SDP declined to have their MPs sit on the Committee. During this year's budget debate, the opposition Members had ample opportunities to raise the fee increases for debate but failed to do so. Under these circumstances, we can only conclude that Mr Jeyaretnam's proposal for another committee to examine fee increases is mere politicking. Sir, I would just like to respond briefly to some of the points that were made a while ago in the debate by Mr Jeyaretnam. I do not want to take up much time because it is getting late and, if need be, we can always have another discussion on another day. And I am quite sure that we will not hear the end of this. We have got quite used to listening to Mr Jeyaretnam and he is always going back on the same old issues. He quoted a lot of figures on incomes. I cannot dispute them because I do not have the figures here, but I presume that they are accurate. He claims that because about 62% of Singaporeans earn less than $2,000 per month, therefore, our incomes are low. Low compared to what? He said that foreigners find Singapore expensive. Yes, this is because they live in hotels, they drive around in cars, they eat in restaurants.

They live here.

They live here. It goes to show that they are willing to come here and work on our local wages. Australians and New Zealanders find that our wages are attractive enough and that it is worth their while to come here and work, and not in their own countries. Let me give him another example. I do not want to go into figures. But it is a fact that teachers in Singapore are paid higher than teachers in UK. He can check this out. Another example. He may have read this sometime back. A foreign maid working in Singapore is paid about $300 a month, some may be more, $350. There are stories of Filipino maids in Singapore who are able to bring back their income and employ maids in the Philippines and still have income left over for their families. That goes to show where our position is. It is no point quoting figures and giving his opinion. What is the factual situation? He goes on to say that Singaporeans work two or three jobs to survive. Where are the figures to show this? This is another example of just exaggerating and basically telling a lie. Another instance of untruth. He says, "Is it a case that because there is no explanation, because we are going to cut down the fees for foreign students to encourage more to come in, from 50% add-on to local fees for ASEAN students and 100% for non-ASEAN students, down eventually to 25% and 10%, that this means that our students are subsidising them." That is not true. It means that the Government will be paying more for these foreign students. That is a fact.

Why not for our students?

Also for our students. We are paying. The costs are going up. The Government is bearing its share of capital cost entirely and about 80% now of the running cost. And as costs go up, both Government's share and the parents' share go up. But it is a matter of policy, and I think it is a good policy, that we get our students to pay 25% of the running cost, because they are using up a lot of resources and eventually they will earn high incomes. We are giving them a long time to pay. They can borrow from the universities at zero interest rate until they graduate, and thereafter they repay the loan over 20 years. I think we are generous enough. Many countries, including UK, which Mr Jeyaretnam is always looking towards, are trying to raise fees. Otherwise their universities will go bankrupt. Another instance of falsehood. He said, "Oh, the poor are affected by the water rate increases." Does he not know that in fact we have increased the rebates for PUB bills, service and conservancy charges, so that they more than cover the fee increases for 1-room, 2-room and 3-room flats? For 4-room flats, they cover about half the increase. So please get the facts right. Do not come here and spread falsehoods. He goes on, but I do not want to go into too much detail. Basically, what he wants is to have an All-Party Committee. To do what? This is already an All-Party Committee. In fact, the Members of Parliament are being very patient with him. We have stayed back until almost 8.00 pm to listen to him for one hour, and he is not even an elected Member. He is an NCMP. How many opposition Members of Parliament are there in this House? Three Members, including him. How much time have they taken up? We have been very patient listening to him - MPs' time, journalists' time, wasting our resources, always going over the same issues. I think if he were to summarise his points, think them through carefully and not spread falsehoods, he will make a greater impact on this House. On that note, Sir, I would like to ask the House to resoundly reject the Member's motion.

Mr Speaker, Sir, may I seek some clarification from the Minister?

You may.

Sir, the Minister said just now that eventually the Government is responsible for whatever increase and the voters will decide through the ballot box. Is the Minister implying that since Singaporean voters have supported the PAP in the last election, therefore, Singaporeans will also accept whatever increases that are imposed by the PAP Government? That is the first clarification. My second clarification is this. Mr Jeyaretnam mentioned about people who need to take on two jobs. He said this was a lie. Is it not true that over the years the number of double income families has increased significantly, although they may not need to do two jobs? But the fact is that the number of double income families has increased significantly over the years. Many of these families, from what I know, both husband and wife need to work to sustain their standard of living here.

On the first point, it is obvious that at every election the public will judge our performance in totality, the pluses, the minuses. These fee increases have not gone down quietly. There have been so many letters in the press. When we meet the people in the meet-the-people sessions, they complain to us. No fee increases are popular. But they are able to see the total picture. Have their lives improved? Has the Government been honest? Have we run away with public funds? Have we improved the overall structure of our economy and moved forward? They must take all that into consideration and cast their votes. If, as the Member says, we have done so badly, at the next election, they can throw us out. On the second point whether there are double income families, as he spoke he realised that it is not quite the same thing, is it not? To say that one person is doing two or three jobs is quite different from saying the husband and wife choose to work or have to work. It is quite a different thing. Each of them is doing one job. And they are doing it because there are a lot of job opportunities. Incomes are good. They want to invest in properties. They want to move from a 3-room flat to a 4-room flat to a 5-room flat and to private properties. They buy a 3-room flat from HDB for maybe $30,000 in the past. Now they sell it for $200,000. That is what people want to have. They want to invest. That is why they feel that their cash flow is rather tight. They also want to have a higher standard of living. They want better things in life. These things cost money.

Mr Jeyaretnam, would you wind up the debate?

This is my reply, Sir?

Yes. Please do not repeat what you have said earlier.

Yes. But may I assure you, Mr Deputy Speaker, that I do not intend to take one hour. The reason is this. Let it be made clear that I have not found anything with respect to all the speakers, including the Minister, on which I should have to spend an hour to reply. By the way, the Minister contested Cheng San and he thinks he won because of the voters choosing to vote them. If he would like to have an inquiry, I would be quite happy to assist, as to why the PAP candidates were elected. Let us have a public inquiry. May I come back? We have the first speaker and what do we hear from him? Nothing new. It is a repetition of what we hear from the PAP ad nauseam, taken up by the press, taken up by the radio and television, "Productivity must go up". That is all. Nothing about the concerns of the people. Then we have Dr Toh from CASE making a spirited defence of CASE. I have to mention this because despite what he said, I have yet to come across CASE really taking up the Government on any increases. Dr Toh See Kiat rose -

Do you want to answer that?

Yes. I can ask him to refer to the newspapers for the year 1990 and count how many times CASE brought up the issue of Government fee increases.

I have not seen CASE challenging the Government trying to produce convincing arguments to the Government as to why it should not go up. I know they talk whenever our prices go up in the shops and markets.

They were Government fee increases I am talking about, Sir.

Perhaps you can send them to me and I will look at them.

I would be pleased to do it.

Then we have a Member, I do not know whether he is from the NTUC, who wanted to speak up for Mr Lim Boon Heng. Again, I am sorry, I am afraid I do not think I could follow him through his speech. I was not saying anything false about what Lim Boon Heng said. What I saw reported was that he was telling the workers that it would be wrong to pass on the increases to the employers, that they should not expect wages to go up because of the increases. That is what I was attacking. He missed the point. That is coming from the Chief of the workers. Finally, to answer the Minister. Again, he talks about falsehoods. It shows, Mr Deputy Speaker, Sir, that the Ministers and the PAP Members are out of touch completely. If Mr Lee Yock Suan is serious, I will ask him to come and see the grass cutters of whom I spoke at Budget day, and ask them whether they work in two jobs at all. Do not be so easy with your accusations of falsehoods. I have heard from a number of people who work two jobs -

How many grass cutters?

How many? Well, several told me. Have you tried to make a survey?

Does that mean many Singaporeans are doing double jobs, triple jobs? Two, three, four reasons? Therefore, a lot of Singaporeans are doing many jobs?

Please try and understand. Have you made a survey of how many people hold down two or three jobs? Have you tried to find out the numbers? Have you? I cannot do it. You are the Government.

Order. Please address your views to the Chair.

All right, Mr Deputy Speaker, I am sorry. This is the sort of talk that we hear from the PAP. My Party's Member in Parliament asked a simple question of the Member on my left how this motion does not go forward in doing something and he does not answer that. He completely skirts it. Mr Lim Swee Say rose -

Mr Jeyaretnam, would you give way?

Yes.

I just want to clarify. Sir, if the purpose of setting up this All-Party Committee is to make things happen for Singapore, I will be the first to vote for it. But if the purpose of this All-Party Committee, which I think it is, is to try to make things happen for the political interest of the Workers' Party, I see no reason why the people of Singapore, including the Members of this House, want it to happen. An hon. Member: So something happened. It still happened, right?

But it happened for the wrong reasons.

With respect, I am sorry. Maybe it is me. I am unable to follow this kind of reasoning. Maybe it is just me. But frankly, I am unable, Mr Deputy Speaker, to follow the kind of reasoning that we are hearing. But what all the speakers miss, what all the speakers overlook, Mr Deputy Speaker, is this. Why should the increases not be brought to this House? If the increases are justified, there should be no problem of bringing the increases to this House and justifying them. Why should they not? Is this House, is this Parliament, not the supreme authority for Singapore? We get this lip service of accountability. But accountability means that Government is called into question in Parliament and Government answers to Parliament on everything. That is what it means. It does not mean Government makes the decisions and Parliament should not be consulted about it. It is the very antithesis of accountability. Reference was made to the Cost Review Committee. As my Party's member colleague in Parliament explained, that was formed, was it in 1990 first?

1992.

1992. Thank you. That was formed for a specific purpose. And at the end of it, when it submitted its report, it ceased. It was what we lawyers would term functus officio. It had no more life. It was not a standing committee of Parliament. And then last year, an attempt was made to recall that committee, and the Member consulted with me and I told him that the committee was functus officio. "You cannot just revive a committee which is functus officio. You got to appoint a new committee. Parliament should again appoint a new committee if it wanted it. And that is why the Member did not take part in that committee. But what I am proposing is something quite different. I am proposing, as the Member said, a permanent All-Party Standing Committee of Parliament which will monitor all increases in the services that I have listed - the university fees, the transport fares, and all the other charges. And that All-Party Committee will submit its report to Parliament and Parliament can then ratify the increases. What one forgets is that, under the Constitution, Government may not levy any tax, any charge without the approval of Parliament. Of course, these are not taxes, but they are analogous to taxes, because most of the population will be called upon to pay these taxes. Therefore, should Parliament not be consulted? Should Parliament not have a chance to discuss and say what it has to say on it? And more so, what the opposition has to say on it. Were the opposition parties consulted about the increases? The trouble about Singapore is that for the last 36 years, this country has been governed by just one party - a party that believes that it can do no wrong, a party that thinks that what it does is best in the interest of Singapore, a party that does not allow any dissenting views, a party that does not call for valid contributions from any other persons in Singapore. It takes all its decisions by itself. And this is an attempt now to correct that. Not just have one party making all the decisions but letting the people of Singapore make the decisions through their representatives in Parliament, and that of course means not only the ruling Party but the opposition Members in Parliament. And that is why I say it is important that opposition Members be on that committee. Finally, it is said, if the PAP has not done well for Singapore, has not served Singapore well, why is it at every four years or so they are returned to power? That again, Mr Deputy Speaker, is another story. And if we are sincere in wanting to find the answer to that question, I suggest that we have a public inquiry and I will be very, very happy to assist at that inquiry.

Question put, and negatived. Motion accordingly negatived.

Dr Lily Neo, Member for Kreta Ayer-Tanglin GRC, who has obtained the right to raise a matter on the motion for adjournment, as shown in today's Order Paper, has given notice that she wishes to withdraw her right.

Resolved, "That Parliament do now adjourn to a date to be fixed." - [Dr Lee Boon Yang]. Adjourned accordingly at Nine minutes past Eight o'clock pm to a date to be fixed.