Hansard, Monday, 14 October 2024

1 Ms Poh Li San asked the Minister for Transport with regard to the East-West MRT Line disruption in September 2024 (a) whether the faulty train causing damage to the rail tracks has been withdrawn in accordance with approved procedures; (b) what is the total number of commuters affected; (c) what is the estimated loss of fare revenue; and (d) what is the total expenditure on the bridging bus services.

2 Mr Lim Biow Chuan asked the Minister for Transport what actions are being considered by LTA to prevent a recurrence of the East-West MRT Line service disruption on 25 September 2024.

3 Mr Gerald Giam Yean Song asked the Minister for Transport (a) in view of recent major MRT service disruptions, whether the Public Transport Council will consider reviewing the fare increase scheduled for 28 December 2024; (b) if not, why not; and (c) whether service reliability in the period leading up to the date of the proposed fare increase can be considered as a factor in the fare adjustment formula to spur improvements in the reliability of bus and train services.

4 Mr Yip Hon Weng asked the Minister for Transport with the recent spate of train service disruptions including those affecting the East-West MRT line (a) whether the Ministry will conduct an overall review of the MRT network to forestall and minimize service disruptions; (b) whether there is a redundancy plan for power supply to keep trains running; (c) whether penalties will be imposed on the train service providers; and (d) if so, how are such penalties determined.

5 Dr Tan Wu Meng asked the Minister for Transport (a) what root causes have been identified for the train disruption along the East-West MRT line on 25 September 2024; (b) what are the reasons why a faulty train's withdrawal led to damage of the MRT track, running rails and third rail; (c) what precautionary measures are taken when the faulty train is withdrawn; (d) how can these precautionary measures be improved; and (e) what has been done to support affected commuters including students.

6 Ms Hazel Poa asked the Minister for Transport whether the Government will consider issuing a work-from-home advisory during major train disruptions in the future to reduce pressure on the public transport system and, if not, why not.

7 Ms Hazel Poa asked the Minister for Transport (a) whether commuters making connecting trips before and after travelling on closed MRT line segments will be charged twice if they exceed the 45-minute transfer time limit while using free bridging bus services; and (b) if so, how many commuters affected by the East-West MRT Line disruption on 25 September 2024 may have been charged twice.

8 Mr Leong Mun Wai asked the Minister for Transport whether he will convene a Committee of Inquiry to investigate the root causes of the East-West MRT Line disruption on 25 September 2024.

9 Mr Leong Mun Wai asked the Minister for Transport (a) what is the total cost of the repair works arising from the East-West MRT Line disruption on 25 September 2024; and (b) whether the cost will be borne by commuters.

10 Mr Ong Hua Han asked the Minister for Transport (a) how often do MRT trains undergo maintenance checks; (b) what are the standard operating procedures for maintenance checks and maintenance works on MRT trains; and (c) how will the Ministry review the current maintenance procedures to ensure that MRT trains are operating at a high standard to prevent future incidents.

11 Mr Liang Eng Hwa asked the Minister for Transport (a) whether the Ministry can provide details on the causes and findings for the recent train failure on the East-West MRT Line; (b) whether there will be a review and changes made to the train and rail maintenance regime; and (c) how can the overall experience for commuters during the prolonged train disruption be improved.

12 Mr Leong Mun Wai asked the Minister for Transport (a) what are the service standards for the free bus bridging services provided during train disruptions under the Bus Contracting Model; (b) whether the bus bridging services provided during the East-West MRT Line disruption on 25 September 2024 have met these standards; and (c) whether the disruption has resulted in a decline in service standards on regular bus services and, if so, what is the extent of the decline.

13 Mr Ong Hua Han asked the Minister for Transport (a) what support has been provided to persons with disabilities and the elderly during the train disruptions on the East-West MRT Line from 25 to 30 September 2024; and (b) what measures will the Government take to ensure more effective dissemination of information both online and at MRT stations during train disruptions to minimise confusion among commuters.

14 Mr Chua Kheng Wee Louis asked the Minister for Transport (a) what caused the train axle box that caused damages and disruptions to the East-West MRT Line to be defective; (b) why was this not detected prior to the incident; and (c) whether LTA is considering a comprehensive review of predictive maintenance capabilities and real time condition-monitoring of rail systems and operating assets at SMRT to identify potential lapses and prevent future occurrences.

15 Mr Dennis Tan Lip Fong asked the Minister for Transport with regard to the faulty SMRT train which triggered the multi-day East-West MRT Line disruption from 25 September 2024 (a) when was the last time the carriages underwent axle box functionality tests and related inspection and checks; (b) whether any preventive and predictive maintenance was carried out on its axle box and related parts; (c) if so, when was the maintenance last carried out; (d) why was the maintenance inadequate; and (e) what went wrong in the maintenance and checking processes.

16 Mr Dennis Tan Lip Fong asked the Minister for Transport with regard to the faulty SMRT train which triggered the multi-day East-West MRT Line disruption from 25 September 2024 (a) what was the initial reported fault which caused the cancellation of the service; (b) what was the cause of the dislodgement of the axle box from the train; and (c) what was the time taken by the train's driver or any personnel in charge of the tow to stop the tow after the dislodgement of the axle box.

17 Mr Dennis Tan Lip Fong asked the Minister for Transport whether LTA will conduct a review of the existing requirements on the maintenance regime and practices of all MRT trains including but not limited to older trains such as the first-generation Kawasaki Heavy Industries trains.

18 Ms He Ting Ru asked the Minister for Transport in relation to the six-day shutdown of the East West MRT Line in September 2024 (a) what has been the total capacity of bridging bus services put into effect compared to the average ridership of the stations that are closed; and (b) whether there is a need to mandate better maintenance and servicing requirements for train operators.

19 Ms Hany Soh asked the Minister for Transport with regard to the disruption of train services on the East-West MRT Line from 25 to 30 September 2024, whether the Ministry has considered requesting assistance and resources from the armed forces to ease human congestion and to ensure public safety.

Mr Speaker, with your permission, may I answer Question Nos 1 to 19 for oral answer and Question Nos 45 to 48 for written answer in my Ministerial Statement which I will deliver at tomorrow's Sitting?

Yes, you may.

Thank you, Sir.

I ask Members to be patient and wait for tomorrow's answer.

20 Dr Wan Rizal asked the Minister for Education (a) whether teachers are sufficiently equipped with the knowledge and skills to identify and manage bullying, especially in cases where victims do not report incidents; and (b) what measures are in place to ensure schools have adequate trained personnel, such as counsellors and disciplinary staff, to support teachers and students in handling bullying cases.

21 Mr Christopher de Souza asked the Minister for Education how are schools helping students who are bullied to restore their confidence and rebuild their identity and self-worth.

22 Mr Liang Eng Hwa asked the Minister for Education (a) what steps are taken by the Ministry and schools to prevent occurrences of bullying incidents in schools; (b) what is the level of collaboration between schools and the Singapore Police Force in cases where the bullying of students happen outside of the schools; and (c) whether there are adequate monitoring and surveillance to pick up early indications of bullying situations and what are the pre-emptive and preventive measures.

23 Mr Gerald Giam Yean Song asked the Minister for Education (a) in each year of the past five years, how many reports has the Ministry received regarding incidents of bullying that occurred within or outside of school premises; and (b) in view of the recent bullying incidents at an Institute of Technical Education campus, a secondary school and a primary school, whether the Ministry currently has in place an anti-bullying policy at all schools.

24 Mr Yip Hon Weng asked the Minister for Education (a) what specific criteria are used to determine whether an incident is to be classified as bullying that warrants action to be taken by the educational institution; (b) whether the Ministry has conducted any recent surveys among students to assess the prevalence of bullying in schools; and (c) what are the interventions and support provided to teachers to help them deal with bullying cases in the course of their work.

25 Mr Chua Kheng Wee Louis asked the Minister for Education (a) whether the Ministry tracks the number of reported bullying cases in schools; (b) if so, what is the number of bullying cases in each year of the last five years; (c) if not, why not; and (d) what resources and policies are being put in place in schools to enhance the detection, reporting and correction of bullying cases.

26 Ms Hany Soh asked the Minister for Education (a) whether the Ministry has observed a rising trend in bullying cases involving school students; and (b) how can the Ministry better prevent bullying of school students and support victims of bullying.

27 Ms He Ting Ru asked the Minister for Education (a) in the last five years, what are the observed trends relating to the number of bullying cases schools have received; (b) what is the breakdown between online and offline bullying incidents reported to schools; and (c) whether there are any special guidelines given or approaches taken for cases of bullying involving students with neurodiverse conditions or disabilities and, if so, what are they.

Mr Speaker, may I have your permission to take Question Nos 20 to 28, please.

Yes, you may.

Mr Speaker, Sir, my response will address the questions raised by Members Mr Zhulkarnain Abdul Rahim, Dr Wan Rizal, Mr Christopher de Souza, Mr Liang Eng Hwa, Mr Gerald Giam Yean Song, Mr Yip Hon Weng, Mr Chua Kheng Wee Louis, Ms Hany Soh and Ms He Ting Ru on the bullying incidents in schools and Institutes of Higher Learning (IHLs), that recently caught public attention on the Internet.

My response will also cover related questions from Ms Hazel Poa, Mr Sharael Taha, Mr Gan Thiam Poh and Assoc Prof Jamus Lim, which are scheduled for subsequent Sittings.

Alright. Minister, I think you mentioned Question No 28. But it stops at Question No 27.

Sir, my apologies, till Question No 27.

The Ministry of Education (MOE) takes a serious view of all forms of hurtful behaviour, from once-off insensitive remarks to more persistent, intentional acts of bullying and even physical violence. Schools and IHLs have rules and regulations which prohibit any form of bullying. Our schools and IHLs educate students against these negative behaviours and work with families, the community and partners to intervene promptly and address them.

Members Ms Hany Soh, Mr Gerald Giam, Mr Louis Chua asked about the trends in bullying incidents. In the last five years, the average number of bullying incidents has remained steady. For every 1,000 students, there were an average of two incidents in primary schools and six incidents in secondary schools annually for any form of bullying, both within and outside of school. Of these, incidents involving the use of technology averaged less than one incident per 1,000 secondary students and even fewer in primary schools each year.

Members Mr Zhulkarnain Abdul Rahim and Dr Wan Rizal asked about how MOE educates our students and equips them to deal with threats of bullying. From young, students learn pro-social behaviours through lessons and role-modelling. Through the Character and Citizenship Education (CCE) curriculum and a school environment that emphasises values and respect, students acquire skills to be kind to their classmates, resolve disagreements respectfully and stand up against bullying.

Students learn what to do when they encounter unsafe situations. Stay calm, do not retaliate, but move away and seek help from adults nearby, and alert their teachers and parents. These lessons extend to the cyberspace. Through cyber wellness lessons, students learn to be respectful and responsible users online. Whether online or offline, they should report any incident of bullying to their teachers or School Leaders.

As students sometimes prefer to turn to their friends for support, schools have established peer support networks and trained students to help and look out for one another, and in conflict management.

These educative efforts continue in our IHLs, which raise awareness about anti-bullying through modules teaching respect and appropriate behaviour, as well as peer support structures.

Members Mr Yip Hon Weng, Ms Hazel Poa, Mr Christopher de Souza and others asked about the intervention and support for bullying victims and perpetrators, and how schools collaborate with families, community partners and Police to address them. Teachers are trained to create a positive classroom culture, recognise distressed students, and proactively address hurtful behaviours and bullying. All pre-service teachers receive this training, and new teachers are supported by experienced staff and school counsellors. In-service teachers also receive refresher training as part of their professional development.

When any incident of bullying within or outside schools is reported, schools and IHLs conduct thorough investigations before deciding on the appropriate course of action. We adopt a tiered approach based on the severity of incident. In cases arising from careless remarks and misunderstandings, teachers guide students to resolve their differences and reach a common understanding. For cases involving persistent, intentional acts of bullying, serious disciplinary actions are taken in addition to the restorative actions. For cyber bullying incidents, schools guide students to report these to the online service provider. When schools and IHLs come to know of any incident of severe bullying or fights, they work closely with parents and the authorities to ensure students' well-being and safety. They also mete out the necessary disciplinary consequences and guide students to change their thinking and behaviours so that they can learn to be responsible members of the community.

Similarly, our schools and IHLs consider the seriousness of the incident and take into consideration the profile and needs of the students involved, when taking disciplinary actions. Schools may put perpetrators on detention or even suspend them from attending lessons. Caning is used as a last resort for boys and carried out in an appropriate manner only by authorised adults. For severe bullying or fights, a Police report will be made and perpetrators will face legal consequences in accordance with the law.

Whenever a student is affected by bullying, whether as a victim or perpetrator, the teachers and school counsellors provide emotional support to help the student cope and mend relationships. Students who continue to be distressed will be referred to community resources such as the Response, Early Intervention and Assessment in Community mental Health (REACH) teams for more specialised support.

The objective of these educative and restorative efforts is to help students learn from their mistakes. These efforts are taken to turn the bully around, rather than just "expelling" or suspending them from school. When relationships are affected due to conflicts and misconduct, schools and institutions take steps to educate, discipline and restore relationships in the school community, and these efforts require parents' support and partnership.

Parental guidance and partnerships are vital in shaping children's character. Parents guide their children by role-modelling positive behaviour and interaction with others. When a child faces bullying, parents are encouraged to remain calm and provide emotional support, reinforcing pro-social values and coping skills. Similarly, when a child has bullied someone, parents can guide their child to learn from the mistake, apologise sincerely and make amends. As mending relationships and improving behaviour require time and practice, parents are encouraged to collaborate closely with schools to address the situation effectively.

When students witness bullying incidents, they are reminded not to record and share the incidents online to avoid further hurting the parties involved. Similarly, when videos become viral, everyone should exercise care in responding to them. Circulating such materials, trying to doxx the student perpetrators or calling for them to be ostracised, could isolate them even more, drive them to extremes and make it harder for them to mend their ways. The bullying perpetrators often also need help to turn over a new leaf. As a society, we must be careful not to normalise such behaviours unintentionally. Let us stand together to discourage copycats and attempts to out-viral the last bullying video.

MOE will continue to work with schools to share good practices and review the strategies to manage bullying. We will continue to update these education and intervention measures and partner parents to create caring and safe learning environments for our students.

I thank Members of Parliament and members of the public for showing their concern about this issue. With your help to monitor community and online spaces to keep our students safe and to stop bullying incidents among students when you witness them, we will be that village that raises our children well.

Finally, Mr Speaker, Sir, bullying is a multi-faceted issue that defies one-size-fits-all solutions. It requires a nuanced approach that carefully considers the well-being and reform of both victims and perpetrators. We all hold the power and duty to support each other and to foster an environment where healing and change are possible. We want to steer clear of actions that might hinder or deny a perpetrator's chance for rehabilitation, such as counter-productive social media behaviours. True justice blends punishment with rehabilitation.

Dr Wan Rizal.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I would like to thank the Minister for sharing on the efforts in trying to tackle bullying in schools. While it is reassuring to hear the efforts that we have made to equip teachers in schools with the tools to manage bullying, the recent cases of both physical and psychological bullying highlight the need for us to have continuous evaluation. The long-lasting emotional impact on victims is vital to ensure schools have adequate resources to address these challenges effectively. Furthermore, the detection and reporting processes must remain robust to prevent unreported cases from escalating. Over the years, I have seen students who have been bullied, but they are afraid to come forward, simply because of the retaliation.

With that, I would like to ask the following supplementary questions. Firstly, could the Minister provide more details on how it evaluates the effectiveness of the teacher training in detecting unreported cases of bullying, especially psychological and online bullying? How does the Ministry ensure that schools maintain an adequate ratio of counsellors to support students, particularly those schools that may have a higher incidence of bullying? And finally, what are some considerations that the Ministry would take before anti-bullying policies are being reviewed to ensure continued relevance and effectiveness?

Mr Speaker, Sir, I will make three short responses to the three supplementary questions. First, I do not think there is an easy or simple, and certainly, we do not want simplistic, way to measure the effectiveness of our measures. Ultimately, the test of the pudding is, do our students feel safe in school, do our students feel that they have a good school environment where they can interact with their peers with respect?

Second, on the ratio of counsellors, as I have mentioned in my speech and before, we allocate the number of counsellors based on the following considerations. One, while all schools have a baseline number of counsellors, they are reinforced according to the specific needs. There are some schools with higher needs and we will reinforce them with the necessary numbers.

Third, it does not mean that we depend only on counsellors. All teachers are trained to a certain extent and we work in partnership with the community and the teachers.

On the third supplementary question about when we will review the policies, we constantly review the policies and we apply the measures according to the needs of the respective schools as well.

Mr Liang.

Thank you, Sir. I would like to follow up on my Parliamentary Question (PQ) on the schools' monitoring and surveillance of bullying cases, whether in school or outside and whether the schools collaborate closely with the Police.

I believe the monitoring and surveillance is important to pick out early indications, telltale signs that there are situations of bullying. And so, I would like to ask the Minister in terms of resourcing for the schools, whether the schools are equipped or resourced enough to be able to do that monitoring and surveillance.

Also, given that the cases now are increasingly more complex and with the workload of the teachers as well, one would really have to step up resources to be able to reduce the cases of bullying.

Mr Speaker, Sir, on the first supplementary question, certainly, MOE and our schools collaborate with community partners and the Police, where relevant, to help monitor and also to counsel our students on such issues. We will continue to do that.

On the second point, Mr Liang Eng Hwa says that issues are becoming much more complex. Indeed, it is so. The environment has become more complex. Part of it is that, today, we live in a hyperconnected world. Students have access to many things on the Internet, relationships are becoming much more complex, not just between and amongst students, but relationships and expectations are also becoming much more complex with parents.

So, if I can point out something: when students have issues, we try to mend the relationships, guide the students on the positive trajectory. Very often, we will also need the partnership of the parents and, sometimes, in very unfortunate circumstances, the adults can also be a complicating factor when children quarrel.

Mr Gerald Giam.

Sir, I thank the Minister for his replies. Will MOE consider implementing nationwide school programmes that encourage and guide students who witness bullying to not just be bystanders, but upstanders, where students learn ways to identify, intervene and support peers who are being bullied and report the bullying?

This could shift the peer culture by making it clear to the bullies that they do not have the approval of their peers and assuring the victims that they are not alone.

Secondly, does MOE have clear baseline anti-bullying policies across all schools and IHLs, and do these policies spell out actions that should be taken in response to reports of bullying and measures to protect both victims and upstanders from retaliation?

Mr Speaker, Sir, on the first supplementary question, these programmes are already part of our CCE package and programme.

On the second supplementary question, there are, indeed, baseline policies, but when we say that we intervene, I would just like to reiterate what I have spelt out clearly in my response just now. Any intervention cannot be a one-size-fits-all. Any punishment or rehabilitation must take into account the circumstances and also the background of both the victim and perpetrator.

So, these are complex issues, as Mr Liang Eng Hwa says, and it is important for us not to oversimplify these issues. Very often, the rehabilitation for both the victim and perpetrators is not a short journey and we need to put in the necessary efforts with the parents and the community partners in order to do this well.

Mr Yip Hon Weng.

Mr Speaker, I thank the Minister for his reply. I have two supplementary questions. While the criteria for bullying classification seem clear, are there concerns about under-reporting of bullying cases? Secondly, will there be more channels for the reporting of bullying in schools for students, parents and teachers to report such cases?

Mr Speaker, Sir, we are similarly concerned about the reporting, not just of under-reporting. There can also be over-reporting of a different kind. Because, as mentioned, this issue is a complex one. What people constitute as "bullying" also varies in interpretation across different people. So, we should be careful.

There will be instances whereby some people may have encountered some bullying or unfortunate instances and where they think that they are able to manage it and they did not escalate the issue to the adults or teachers. There will also be cases where people have experienced uncomfortable situations which may not exactly constitute "bullying", but they will also raise this to the adults or parents and we will take actions as necessary.

So, it is not just about having more channels. The channels are there for us to use. But regardless of the channels, we want to give people and students the confidence that if you are in doubt, where you feel troubled, you should be able to use the existing channels to report it to the adults and then have the adults work with the students to see how they can mend the relationships and move the relationships forward.

Mr Louis Chua.

Mr Speaker, just two quick supplementary questions for the Minister. Indeed, as many other Members have shared, I am concerned that the number of reported cases, though steady over the past few years, may not be indicative of the underlying concerns that many parents have.

So, two points, if the Minister can help us to understand. These are not just about having more channels. But how has MOE enhanced the detection and reporting of bullying cases over the years? Secondly, in terms of the policy and approach, how has the approach by teachers and schools in addressing bullying changed over the years?

Mr Speaker, Sir, as I have mentioned, the issues have become more complex over time for various reasons. One, students today are exposed to much more diverse influences beyond schools, beyond the community and even beyond the families, and largely through the Internet. So, the sources of information and the kind of exposures that they are being exposed to have become much more complex.

Second, on the positive side, we have also stepped up efforts to sensitise our students to what constitutes bullying and that can also help us to have better detection. And students today are much more confident, willing and able to come forward and tell us what they have experienced.

On the other hand, we also have students who are becoming much more sensitive, not just sensitised, to some of these issues and what they perceive as bullying may or may not correspond to what other people may perceive as bullying. But regardless of the complexities, we encourage all students to report instances when they feel they have not been treated with respect or they have felt unsafe, to let the school leaders know. We will work with the parents and the community to try and rehabilitate the perpetrators and also to take care of the physical and emotional needs of our children.

So, how has this changed over the years? Well, besides those points that I mentioned, today, when such instances happen in schools, very often we have to not just manage the issues between the students; sometimes, we also have to manage the issues amongst the parents and their great expectations on all parties of what the other side should do.

Ms He Ting Ru.

Mr Speaker, I refer to parts (b) and (c) of my original PQ. I do not think I heard the Minister answering them. The first being for a breakdown between the offline and online bullying incidents that are reported to schools. And part (c), relating to whether there are any special guidelines, given our approaches taken for cases of bullying involving students with neurodiverse conditions or disabilities, and if there are such guidelines, what are they?

And it is important, especially for this last point, because different measured strategies need to be behind how these students are handled, because they need to be sensitive or also effective, and not all teachers or counsellors might feel that they are able to handle some of the more complex issues.

Mr Speaker, the numbers for the breakdown of the offline and online bullying incidents have been answered in my response. The number of reported online cases is generally much lower than the offline ones. But as Members have noted, this could also be because people are less sensitised to what constitutes online bullying. So, for example, if a child views that he or she has been excluded from a group repeatedly, persistently, does that constitute a form of psychological bullying? It has to be taken in context and then we have to look at the case carefully.

So, my own belief is that the online numbers will progressively rise because of the circumstances that our children are exposed to, but also because as people become more aware of what is happening, there will be more of such reported instances.

On the second point about neurodiversity, that is why we handle all cases sensitively. It is not a one-size-fits-all method to handle things. Some children with special needs may have, advertently or inadvertently, caused harm to others and they may not know and, when we counsel them, we have to handle them with care because of their different needs.

On the other hand, when students with special needs are bullied or made to feel uncomfortable, we will also have to make special efforts to counsel the perpetrators. The guidelines as to what constitutes bullying is the same. But the remediation measures will have to be taken in context, taking into account the conditions and circumstances of both the victims and the perpetrators.

Ms Hazel Poa.

The Minister mentioned just now that the trend of bullying in the past five years has remained steady. As trends for social behaviours may take some time, this five-year timeframe may not be sufficient. Does the Minister have figures over a longer timeframe like, for example, 20 years?

Secondly, have there been studies into why children or young people engage in bullying behaviour, with a view to identifying whether there are any ways of pre-empting such behaviour?

Mr Speaker, Sir, I do not have the last 20 years of data. I have already explained that in the last few years, the data has been relatively stable. The only thing that we have changed in the classification is that, previously, we did not account for instances that happened outside of school, but more recently, we have also put that into our data. That is about the only change that we have done recently.

On the second issue that Ms Hazel Poa mentioned, this is exactly the point, because it is not about focusing on just the bullying, but the potential causes of why people engage in such behaviours, whether is it children or adults or teenagers, and there are many reasons for this. I think the literature has various hypotheses on this. But for more recent events, one of the things that we watch closely is the impact of the COVID-19 safe distancing measures and the reduction in opportunities for our children to grow up interacting with people, as they would have done previously, and whether this would have an impact on the kind of social or anti-social behaviours that they have.

The second thing that we are watching very closely is what is happening on the Internet. Sometimes, even though the numbers are the same, the virality of some of these instances will then spawn copycats or attempts to "out-viral" the last known instance. That is why when we respond to such instances, we have to be very careful to not aggravate the situation.

Mr Sharael Taha.

Mr Speaker, as mentioned by the Minister just now about the virality of such videos, we have seen in the recent bullying case, the videos have made their rounds and continue to be made available. These videos may cause further embarrassment to the victims of the bullying.

In fact, in the past one week, another video of students engaging in public displays of affection has come up. So, is there any possibility that the Ministry can work together with the Ministry of Digital Development and Information (MDDI) to get social media platforms to remove such videos, so that we remove the embarrassment for these students?

Mr Speaker, Sir, indeed, that is what we are discussing with MDDI and some of the platform companies. We are particularly concerned when videos of such instances go around because, as I have mentioned, they can have consequences. One, it can lead to more copycat attempts. Second, it can lead to people trying to "out-viral" the last known video. But third, we have to have a care when we viral such things. Because we need to give the perpetrators a chance to rehabilitate. I have received many letters, emails from concerned parents.

Sometimes, the things that they suggest we do, we need to have a care. For example, trying to doxx the perpetrators. It will leave a digital footprint for a very long time. And I am not sure it will help us in our rehabilitation efforts. Imagine a young child doing something wrong and it is on record forever. That child could be our child. This is not to make an excuse for the people who have done wrong, the perpetrators. For the people who have done wrong, we try to rehabilitate them, just as we punish them for doing wrong. That is why, in the last sentence in my reply, "True justice must blend punishment with rehabilitation."

And the last thing I hope we do not get into is where adults jump in and complicate the situation. Sometimes, these are most unhelpful in helping us to manage the situation on hand when we rehabilitate the perpetrator and help the victim to heal. So, I would like to just make an appeal for all of us to be careful. Then there are also letters and suggestions that we throw the children out of school. Again, I am not very sure that helps the children in the long term.

I have also parents who have written to me to say, "Can you please do not suspend my child from going to school because when they are not in school, they are in a much more difficult environment where they do not have anybody to guide them even".

So, I think we need to help the victim to heal. We also need to rehabilitate the perpetrators to the extent that we can. But, of course, at the end of the day, nobody is above the law, and, in the extreme cases, the full force of the law will be applied to the perpetrators.

Assoc Prof Jamus Lim.

Sir, I wish to follow up on the position of MOE on parental involvement in mitigating bullying. To be clear, I understand that parents cannot be held completely liable for the actions of their children, which is a step that some jurisdictions like France or Germany actually have in place. That said, I am concerned when there is limited or no parental involvement at all. I have Sengkang parents who have explained that even after they have reached out to the school and to the discipline master, the actions have been somewhat inadequate in their view because of insufficient involvement on the family side of the perpetrator, to be clear.

I understand that in the UK, parents may face orders to attend counselling or even face fines. While MOE may not wish to go as far, I wonder if there are merits to having this sort of joint counselling sessions, keeping in mind as the Minister said, that we do want to be very sensitive to adult involvement, but here, I feel it is about building a relationship between the parent of the perpetrator and the child.

Mr Speaker, Sir, the Member Jamus Lim might have missed some parts of what I have mentioned. Indeed, we get the parents of the perpetrators involved because we believe that this is part of the rehabilitation process. The rehabilitation process cannot be done independent of the parents because the parents are part of the partnership for us to bring up the children.

We do not have a position, as the Member has mentioned, like in some other jurisdictions, where they take the parents to task through fines or other punitive measures. But we certainly involve the parents. And if you have cases where you think the parents of the perpetrator would like to get involved more, but is not adequately provided for, let us know and we will follow up on this. Most of the time, it is the other way around, where we would like to engage the perpetrators' parents to get their support and cooperation, but sometimes this may not be forthcoming.

On the other hand, the Member has touched on the other point about expectations. Sometimes, we have difficult cases when parents take things into their own hands and this is certainly most unhelpful because that will be a negative role modelling of what we want for our children.

Last supplementary question. Ms Yeo Wan Ling.

Mr Speaker, I have been told and shown by parents and students in my constituency's social media pages on popular platforms and closed group chats where students doxx younger students and sometimes even their parents from the same school. There appears to be a movement, as there are repeat instances of such pages. Usually, it is "xxx", the school name, confidential. What is MOE doing to equip schools on dealing with such pages and what measures can students and parents take with the school, MDDI and the Singapore Police Force to take down these chats and pages? Can the community work with MOE on rehabilitation, like what the Minister had spoken about?

Mr Speaker, Sir, I fully agree with the Member Ms Yeo Wan Ling's point about both the dangers and difficulties of doxxing others. It could be younger students; it could be older students. It does not matter; it is still doxxing. Because this will complicate the relationship. Doxxing, itself, in certain contexts, will constitute bullying as well. So, sometimes, when people exercise what I call "social vigilantism", it can backfire and complicate many of the efforts to help the victim and to rehabilitate the perpetrators.

We will continue to explore with the platform companies to see what can be done. I am not confident that this is top of mind for them, but we will certainly try to get their help, especially when the physical and psychological well-being of our children are at stake. And I hope the platform companies will work with us, MDDI and the Police to manage some of these issues.

I would like to thank all Members for your concern and I would like to reiterate that, in order for us to manage these issues, all of us have a part to play to guide our children, help the victim heal, but also to rehabilitate the perpetrators so that the actions are not repeated.

28 Mr Melvin Yong Yik Chye asked the Minister for Sustainability and the Environment (a) what is the median rent for hawker stalls tendered out in the last two years, excluding stalls that have had their rents adjusted after their three-year tenancy period; and (b) whether the National Environment Agency has any plans to review the duration of the initial tenancy period to discourage disproportionately high rental bids.

29 Mr Melvin Yong Yik Chye asked the Minister for Sustainability and the Environment (a) when did the National Environment Agency last review the way hawker stalls are tendered out; (b) whether a ballot model at a fixed rental rate targeted at cost-recovery have been considered; and (c) if so, what are the reasons for not moving to such a model.

Mr Speaker, with your permission, may I take Question Nos 28 and 29 together, please?

Please proceed.

Thank you, Sir. The National Environment Agency (NEA) lets out vacant hawker stalls through monthly tender exercises, which are transparent and fair. After the first tenancy term of three years, tendered stalls are adjusted towards an assessed market rent determined through independent professional valuation.

Since 2012, NEA has removed reserve rent and does not set a minimum bid price for hawker stall tenders. As such, tenderers can secure stalls at lower-than-market rent for the first tenancy term. This would not be attainable under a model where stalls are allocated at fixed rental rates.

About one in five cooked food stalls was awarded tender prices at or below $500 a month in 2023. The median successful tender price for cooked food stalls across hawker centres was about $2,000 in 2022 and $1,800 in 2023. While some stalls at popular locations have attracted higher bids, such tender prices are not the norm. NEA is reviewing relevant policies at hawker centres to ensure that the system remains effective while keeping hawker food prices affordable.

Hawkers face various cost pressures, such as raw material and manpower costs. To address manpower challenges, NEA has provided support through measures, such as the Productive Hawker Centres programme and the Hawkers' Productivity Grant to help stallholders improve productivity and reduce reliance on manpower.

We are also looking at other ways to further ease manpower challenges. Currently, only Singapore Citizens and Permanent Residents can be stallholders or work as stall assistants in hawker centres managed by NEA and NEA-appointed operators. These measures help to safeguard and preserve the local identity of our hawker centres. NEA exercises some flexibility by allowing stallholders to appoint their spouses who are Long-Term Visit Pass (LTVP) or LTVP+ holders with a Letter of Consent (LOC) or Pre-approved LOC as their stall assistants, given their familial ties to the hawkers.

To provide additional support to stallholders at hawker centres managed by NEA or NEA-appointed operators, we will further relax our policy to allow hawkers to hire LTVP or LTVP+ holders with LOCs or Pre-approved LOCs to work as their stall assistants. This policy will be effective from 1 January 2025.

This suggestion was also previously raised by Mr Edward Chia in an earlier Parliamentary Question. I hope he will be happy that NEA is now making this move. We are also studying other support measures for hawkers and will share the details when ready.

Sir, with your permission, may I say a few words in Mandarin?

(In Mandarin): [Please refer to Vernacular Speech.] Hawkers face various cost pressures such as raw material and manpower cost. Currently, only Singapore Citizens and Permanent Residents can be stallholders or work as stall assistants in hawker centres managed by NEA and NEA-appointed operators. These measures help to safeguard and preserve the local identity of our hawker culture. NEA also allows stallholders to appoint their spouses who are LTVP or LTVP+ holders with a LOC or Pre-approved LOC as their stall assistants.

To provide additional support to stallholders at hawker centres to manage manpower challenges, we will further relax our policy to allow hawkers to hire LTVP or LTVP+ holders with LOCs or Pre-approved LOCs to work as their stall assistants. This policy will be effective from 1 January 2025.

We are also studying other support measures for hawkers and will share the details when ready.

Mr Melvin Yong.

Sir, I thank the Senior Minister of State for his reply and I am glad for the new measures to better support our hawkers. I would like to focus my supplementary questions on the high rental bids.

Sir, I have spoken to veteran hawkers regarding this phenomenon of new entrants bidding high rental prices. They shared that it is common that these hawkers would, therefore, have to charge higher food prices to make up for the high costs. In some cases, other hawkers in the same hawker centre would then see this and take this as a signal that they can also increase their food prices, therefore, causing a price increase ripple within the same hawker centre.

My first question is: does the Ministry track if food prices have, indeed, increased in hawker centres where there had been an abnormally high rental bid?

My second question is: could the Ministry consider modelling its tender bid system after the Housing and Development Board's (HDB's) resale portal and alert prospective bidders if the rental bid that they have submitted exceeds the median rent in the same hawker centre, by say, about 10%? Doing so can possibly help prospective hawkers place more realistic bids, but more importantly, I hope that this can help moderate food price increases as a result of high rental bids.

Mr Speaker, I thank the Member for his two supplementary questions. On his first question of whether NEA tracks hawker food prices in correlation to the rental they bid for, I do not have the data at hand. But I would say that in a price competitive market, in a hawker centre where there are multiple stalls offering food of different prices and different choices for consumers, it would be something that the market will have to take into account. In other words, a person who bid for a high rental price at the stall, will have to take into account what consumers can bear as well, so that he can keep his business viable.

I think we have to allow the market to weed out those who are not competitive and unable to offer food at affordable prices where consumers will see this as good value for money, and allow some churn in the market so that at some point, the best operator with the best offering, in terms of taste and quality of the food with the price that consumers can bear, will be the one that eventually can succeed.

Having said that, I must emphasise that high stall rental bids that the Member may be talking about are actually the outliers and not the norm. As in my reply earlier, the median cost of rental across our hawker centres has remained quite stable over the last few years.

What we can do, in response to his second suggestion of putting some form of alert to help bidders to be more considered in their prices when it comes to bidding for a rental stall, is to put out a bit more granular information on the NEA website, so that a potential bidder would be more cognisant of the kind of price points that he is competing against, fellow stall owners in the same hawker centre. And to ensure his longer-term viability, he would then have to be a bit more moderate about what kind of price he wants to bid for a stall. I think this is something that NEA would take back and see how much more granular information we can put out.

Like I said, these are very rare circumstances where a small number or percentage of stallholders put in that kind of bid prices. I would say most hawkers do try to make sure that they bid at a price that is sustainable for their own businesses. And I think this is something that we will see how to enhance further.

Mr Liang Eng Hwa.

Sir, while I agree with the Senior Minister of State that these very high rental bids are the exceptions, they do have the effect of creating some upside on the rentals – something that we should take note of. These disproportionally high rental rates do go against the intent of why we set up hawker centres, which is to provide hawker food at affordable prices.

So, I would like to ask the Senior Minister of State whether NEA, besides looking at the rental bids, could also do some due diligence on the bidders on whether they have the ability and the financial capacity to sustain at this kind of high rentals for their business, and because to take up a stall when another stallholder might have been able to do it better — so, very much like how, in public tenders, we look at price and quality, whether these stallholders have the means and capability to be able to sustain at such a high rental rate.

Sir, I thank the Member for his supplementary question and the concern he has. Indeed, I think it is always good to help the stall owners make a more considered bid when it comes to bidding for a stall. But I would be cautious about putting in requirements that would make it much more difficult for a potential tenderer to put in a bid.

When we say "doing due diligence", I think it could mean that we are going to impose a lot more onerous demands on the stall bidder to show a lot more information before we select the bid. And that itself could disadvantage hawkers who may not be able to put in, say, a certain proposal or show their financial standing.

We do have to let the market, in some ways, select out those who can survive in a competitive marketplace. Bear in mind that in a typical hawker centre, it is not everyone who will be in the outlier pricing, and as I have said, these are a small number of stalls in the grand scheme of things. So, by and large, the kind of hawker offerings in a particular hawker centre will help to moderate prices of other stalls who may find that it is difficult for them to survive if they were to actually price themselves out the market.

When we talk about "due diligence", I think it is putting out more information, so that they can also be clear about what they are bidding for. One thing which I said earlier is about putting more information on the NEA website, so that when the bidder comes in, he is aware of what his fellow stallholders are actually paying as market rent.

We will take some of these considerations that the Member has raised and see how best we can, maybe, make adjustments even to the bidding process, so that these excessive high bids will be something that is lesser than what it is today. But, in fact, this is a very small number of bids that go into this kind of stratospheric range.

Mr Leong Mun Wai.

Mr Speaker, I have two questions for the Senior Minister of State. The first question is: when he said one in five hawker stalls have rental below $500, does that statistic include non-cooked food stalls?

Secondly, since the Government is liberalising the manpower policy with regards to the hawker stalls to include the LTVP holders, has the Government also considered liberalising it to allow Work Permit holders to work in hawker stalls? Because, currently, as far as we know, there is a scheme called the mini-restaurant licence scheme, whereby some hawkers at the coffee shops and food courts are allowed to employ Work Permit holders.

Sir, to the Member's first question, the answer is that the rates we quoted apply only to cooked food stalls.

And for the second question on whether we were going to liberalise it to, in general, Work Permit holders, the answer is, not at this moment. Because we still want to preserve the hawker culture, which is largely run by local Singaporeans, of course, with a small supplement from some LTVP+ LOC holders. The numbers today are very small to begin with. And while we want to help solve their manpower challenges in the immediate term, the more sustainable way forward is to continue to help them to adopt more resilient and more productive methods, which is why we enhanced the Productive Hawker Centre Grant to do things at a centralised level, to make the hawker centre more productive through things like centralised dishwashing, for example.

We will also continue to enhance the Hawkers Productivity Grant, where the hawkers themselves can take on more productive methods of preparing their food. For example, with the grant, they can purchase food preparation processing equipment to do the meat mincing, vegetable chopping and also reduce their reliance on manpower to do these repetitive tasks.

So, I think with these kinds of measures, we want hawkers to adopt a more productive approach to their business to be more sustainable, while for those who may still need some manpower, this is where the LTVP+ LOC liberalisation will help them to access some of these LTVP+ holders who are already here in Singapore on a permanent basis as part of a family nexus in Singapore, to be able to contribute economically as well.

30 Assoc Prof Razwana Begum Abdul Rahim asked the Minister for Social and Family Development what is the Ministry's response to the findings of a recent study by the Institute of Mental Health and KK Women's and Children's Hospital on the long-term economic and social costs of adverse childhood experiences.

Social and Family Development): Mr Speaker, the Institute of Mental Health and KK Women's and Children's Hospital conducted a study to establish a baseline of the economic and social cost of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) in Singapore. The study found that the impact of such events on individuals with ACEs was higher health and productivity costs, compared to individuals with no ACE exposure.

The Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) agrees that there is a cost to every ACE. Many ACEs and their detrimental effects, however, can be prevented or at least mitigated.

Families form the bedrock of our society and are the first line of support for many of us. This is why MSF has been strengthening our upstream interventions to foster strong and resilient family relationships and equip families to create a safe and nurturing environment for our children. A 2023 MSF survey on families found that 86% of Singaporeans reported that they have a close-knit family. The same survey found that 85.9% of families reported moderate to high family resilience scores, which means that these families would generally be able to recover from challenges together as a family unit.

For a small group of individuals who have been through more severe or multiple ACEs, the efforts of the family alone may not be enough. This is where the community and the Government would need to step in to support them. I note that the Member has also filed two other related questions, Question Nos 31 and 32 on today's Order Paper on the study, and the Ministry of Health and the Ministry of Education will be covering the interventions to support persons affected by ACE.

Ultimately, our efforts aim to promote strong and stable families so that as far as possible, we can prevent ACEs and to mitigate their effects when they occur.

Assoc Prof Razwana Begum.

I thank the Senior Parliamentary Secretary and the Ministry for its intervention in addressing ACEs. I would like to ask, based on the long-term economic impact of ACE, specifically on social services expenditure, how is the Ministry looking at this particular aspect to guide future policy intervention?

Additionally, how are social workers and families being informed and equipped to recognise and address ACE early and what efforts are being made to ensure they have access to necessary resources and support? For instance, would the Ministry consider developing public awareness campaigns and rolling out trauma-informed care across all social service agencies?

Mr Speaker, I thank Assoc Prof Razwana for her supplementary questions. I think the principle is that practice must be informed by research.

And in the study, there were some 11 forms of ACEs that were identified. Let me highlight some archetypes for which MSF is working with ground organisations to address some of these concerns. For children who have experienced abuse or neglect, MSF works with community partners and agencies to provide evidence-based trauma interventions to address the trauma as well as other behavioural and emotional needs to help them develop healthy coping mechanisms. In terms of children who have lived with family members who are or were incarcerated, MSF works with the Singapore Prison Services on processes where social service touch points, for instance, the family service centres will be notified to provide support to family members of inmates or ex-offenders.

For children whose parents are separating or divorcing, MSF has also partnered social service agencies to support these children and their parents, and this include the mandatory co-parenting programme, which helps parents make informed decisions that prioritise their child's well-being as well as to practise cooperative parenting. There are also other programmes to help children cope with their parents' divorce, such as the Children of Divorce Intervention Programme and the Children-in-Between Programme.

So, these are the some of the archetypes that I have mentioned for which the Ministry is working closely with partners on the ground and as and when we can, we will have research inform some of the interventions that we are making and to assess the intervention's effectiveness on the ground as well.

31 Assoc Prof Razwana Begum Abdul Rahim asked the Minister for Health what programmes or resources are available within the Government and the community healthcare system to help identify and support children and young persons affected by adverse childhood experiences.

I thank Assoc Prof Razwana for raising three separate Parliamentary Questions to the Ministry of Health (MOH), Ministry of Education (MOE) and Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) in relation to adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). MOH will be addressing the question from the community health and healthcare angle.

As stated in the MSF reply, actually the ACEs effect can be mitigated or prevented. Nevertheless, several programmes are in place to identify and offer support to those who have been exposed to ACEs. The Institute of Mental Health's (IMH's) programme on Forensic Rehabilitation, Intervention, Evaluation and Network Development Services, or FRIENDS for short, provides integrated multidisciplinary assessment and intervention for youth victims of abuse. IMH also conducts a Resilience Programme which enhances the well-being and resilience of children whose parents have mental illnesses, through family-based psycho-education workshops.

Additionally, children with signs of exposure to ACEs may be identified when they present at the KK Women's and Children's Hospital (KKH). KKH has two programmes to support children with ACEs. Firstly, the Anchor Start programme provides timely and comprehensive screening for young children up to six years old with suspected abuse and neglect as well as counselling and psychoeducation for the affected children and their families.

Secondly, KKH's Project RESTORE – REach the unreached, STrengthen Our community to support and REspond to families – trains community partners to provide psychological support and therapy to traumatised children and their caregivers.

Community mental health services, such as Youth Community Outreach Teams or CREST-Youth, and Youth Integrated Teams or YITs, also provide mental health support to youths with mental health needs arising from stressors, such as ACEs.

Assoc Prof Razwana Begum.

I thank the Minister of State Rahayu for her response in explaining the various interventions to support children with ACEs. I have one supplementary question. In terms of ensuring that healthcare professionals are adequately trained to recognise and address ACE; and in terms of partnership existing between schools and social services to provide comprehensive mental health support for the children, would the Ministry consider implementing screening for ACE in clinics to identify at-risk children early, prior to them coming into the programmes that are already available in the system?

There is already training for our healthcare providers and clinicians to look out for signs and symptoms of ACEs. When the clinicians see these signs and symptoms, like distress and parental neglect, they can ask more questions and identify some of the issues and would already make the appropriate referrals. So, there is already that approach that we take to try and catch them early.

But this takes a whole-of-Government, whole-of-society effort – and that is also why you have asked questions of all the different Ministries. We, indeed, work together because you see children at different touch points and you want to make sure that everyone who interacts with them will be able to identify and help and catch them early. So, that is the direction we are going.

We try and go as upstream as possible with MSF and MOE taking care of building stronger families. We train the professionals to understand and identify this and we want to proliferate this to as many touch points as possible so that they can be caught early.

We do acknowledge that there is a need to go upstream and we do need to have a broad-based approach involving many different partners in this effort.

32 Assoc Prof Razwana Begum Abdul Rahim asked the Minister for Education what programmes or resources are available within early childhood education and in schools to identify and support students affected by adverse childhood experiences.

I thank Assoc Prof Razwana for raising the Parliamentary Questions on adverse childhood experiences. Building on the measures by the Ministry of Social and Family Development and Ministry of Health, I will highlight the Ministry of Education's (MOE's) support available to such students in preschools and MOE schools.

Across our preschools and schools, educators are trained to look out for signs of physical, behavioural or emotional changes in our students and recognise signs of child abuse. They work with parents and social service agencies to support those who have gone through adverse childhood experiences. Students in distress are referred to school counsellors and our student welfare officers. Such cases are also reported to the authorities, such as the Early Childhood Development Agency and the Child Protective Service for investigation and intervention.

Our schools also work closely with community partners, such as the REACH, or the Response, Early Intervention and Assessment in Community Mental Health, teams so that affected students receive the necessary specialised assistance. We will continue to help these students develop safe and positive relationships in our schools so that the impact of their adverse experiences is reduced.

33 Ms Sylvia Lim asked the Prime Minister and Minister for Finance (a) what is his assessment of the public impact of the case involving the former Minister-in-charge of Trade Relations on building public confidence in a culture of zero tolerance for corruption among Government officials; and (b) whether Singapore’s anti-corruption laws should be reviewed for greater efficacy.

34 Ms Sylvia Lim asked the Prime Minister and Minister for Finance whether the definition of "public servant" under the Penal Code is fit for purpose for an offence under section 165 of the Penal Code.

Mr Speaker, Sir, on behalf of the Prime Minister. May I have your permission to take Question Nos 33 and 34 on today's Order Paper together?

Yes, you may.

In view of former Minister S Iswaran's court conviction, various Members in this House, including Ms Sylvia Lim, Mr Yip Hon Weng and Mr Zhulkarnain Abdul Rahim, have asked about the application of section 165 of the Penal Code and its impact on the wider Public Service.

My response today will also address the questions by Mr Yip Hon Weng1,2 and Mr Zhulkarnain Abdul Rahim3, which are scheduled for subsequent Sittings. I invite Members to seek clarifications, if need be. If the questions have been answered satisfactorily, it may not be necessary for Members to proceed with their Parliamentary Questions for future Sittings.

Mr Speaker, Sir, let me first set the context. We expect individuals in the Public Service to uphold high standards of conduct and this expectation extends to individuals carrying out functions on behalf of the Government, even if not directly employed by the Government. This is important to preserve the integrity of our Public Service, so as to maintain public confidence and trust.

Section 165 of the Penal Code is one of the legislative levers that are part of the wider system of checks and balances to combat corruption in the public sector. For an offence to be made out under section 165 of the Penal Code, the following conditions need to be met.

First, section 165 applies only to public servants. This generally includes public officers under the employment of the Public Service and various individuals executing public duties on behalf of the Government. Second, the public servant must have accepted or obtained a valuable thing for free or for inadequate payment. Third, the valuable thing must be accepted or obtained from a person whom the public servant personally knows to have been, or to be, or to be likely to be concerned in any business transaction connected to the public servant's official functions or where the business is transacted by the public servant in relation to his duties.

In this context, a business transaction would commonly take the form of legal contract that is being negotiated or actively performed, applications for permits, licences and exemptions and ongoing investigations or assessments by Government agencies.

With these as background, let me address some specific questions raised by Members of this House.

First, Ms Sylvia Lim asked if the definition of "public servant" under the Penal Code is fit for purpose for an offence under section 165 of the Penal Code. Public servants carry out a wide range of functions on behalf of the Government. The definition of "public servant" in the Penal Code is broad, so as to cover individuals who are entrusted with these public duties.

I should also point out to Members of this House that being deemed as "public servants" under the Penal Code also offers the individuals protection when they are carrying out their public duties because there are specific provisions under the Penal Code that make offences more serious when committed against a public servant. Section 332 of the Penal Code, voluntarily causing hurt to deter a public servant from his duty, is one example. Under this provision, the offender will face a higher penalty than if he had committed the offence of voluntarily causing hurt against an ordinary member of the public, with all other things being equal.

We expect high standards of conduct from all public servants. Accepting or obtaining gifts from a person whom the public servant knows to be concerned in business transacted by that public servant or having a connection with that public servant's official functions is not acceptable in Singapore's context. Otherwise, public confidence in the impartiality and integrity of the Government would be undermined. This is also the ethos Singaporeans would expect of leaders in all organisations, whether private or public.

Mr Zhulkarnain Abdul Rahim asked about the review of Chapter 9 of the Penal Code. We review our laws regularly. The Ministry of Home Affairs is still reviewing whether and, if so, how, to port over certain provisions of Chapter 9 of the Penal Code to the Prevention of Corruption Act (PCA).

Mr Yip Hon Weng and Mr Zhulkarnain Abdul Rahim have asked whether section 165 of the Penal Code may deter individuals and top talents from the private sector from joining or contributing to the Public Service. Individuals from the private sector who are serving as Chairpersons or Board Directors on our Statutory Boards play an important role in building resilient and effective public sector organisations. I do not think our rules would deter good people from joining our boards.

On the contrary, if we do not have an ethos or system that ensures clean, honest government, we would not be able to attract the right people from the private sector to join us. I would also like to assure our Chairpersons and Board Directors that if they act professionally and with integrity, they have nothing to fear.

Ms Sylvia Lim has asked about the impact of recent developments on public trust and whether our anti-corruption laws have to be reviewed. However stringently we act against corruption, from time to time, individuals might fall short. When this happens, we should not have a knee-jerk reaction and immediately tighten or add more rules. Instead, we ask ourselves whether it was an individual or systematic matter.

If the rules were clear, but were flouted or ignored, what we need to do is not to adjust the rules, but to take decisive action against the offender. If the rules were unclear, we should clarify or simplify the rules. If the rules were too lax or it was a new situation not envisaged or covered by the rules, we should update the rules.

As I explained to Members of this House in February 2024, maintaining the integrity of our system is a multi-pronged and continuous effort. At the individual level, we must have the right ethos and values, understand both the spirit and letter of the rules and uphold them. At the team or organisation-level, we must look out for one another to minimise the chances of us being compromised, subverted or succumbing to human frailties. At the system level, we must have regular internal audits, external audits and have institutions like the Auditor-General's Office and Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau (CPIB) to respond to issues not picked up by other layers of checks.

The recent developments show that we do not shy away from doing the right thing to uphold the trust that Singaporeans have in the Government and this is what we will continue to do.

Ms Sylvia Lim.

Thank you, Speaker. On my Question No 33 on the case itself, I have three questions for the Minister.

Broadly, these questions surround my observation that the handling of this case has actually raised more questions than it has answered. And I would like to ask three specific questions to see if Minister will agree with me on this.

The first question is, we all remember the damaging headlines in the middle of last year and how the former Minister was subsequently barred from Government buildings and charged under the PCA. But on the first day of the trial in September, the charges were suddenly reduced to non-corruption cases. So, would the public be justified to conclude that the corruption case against the former Minister was weak, hence, resulting in the reduction of charges, away from PCA?

The second question is, because of the former Minister pleading guilty, there was no trial. So, the evidence was not tested as such in the Court, but there was a plea bargain behind closed doors. Does the Minister agree that such a way of handling the case under a plea bargain has now given rise to a lot of speculation in the public sphere as to what precisely happened on the facts and also between the Attorney-General's Chambers (AGC) and the Defence? I am just asking a factual question.

Third, at the sentencing stage of the case, the Judge decided to impose a sentence of imprisonment that was double what the Prosecution had asked for. He, in fact, noted that what the Prosecution asked for was manifestly inadequate. I have had residents come to me on this point to express their doubts as to whether the Public Prosecutor had defended the public interest adequately in this case.

So, these are my three questions. On Question No 33, part (b), on the PCA review, I do agree with the Minister that we should not have knee-jerk reactions. That I agree. In fact, I was prompted to ask this question because it was the AGC's response when asked by the media on why the charges were reduced against the Minister, where they mentioned that there were litigation risks involved in proceeding against PCA. To quote them, what they said was, both the giver and the receiver of the gratification have a common interest to deny the corrupt element and, hence, it was risky to proceed.

But does the Minister agree that actually this has not prevented prosecutions under the PCA in such scenarios, where both parties actually deny corruption? Prosecutions in other cases have proceeded. And based on what the AGC has indicated, is this a reason for the Government to look again into PCA?

Mr Speaker, Sir, I will make two sets of responses in response to Ms Sylvia Lim's comments.

Ms Lim, as a lawyer, would know very well that it is not uncommon for charges to be amended on their way to the Courts because of developments or representations by the Prosecution and the defendant. So, it is not odd because such things do happen regularly in the Courts.

The second part of the first comment is on sentencing. We need to make a distinction between what the Prosecutor asked for and the Judge's discretion to mete out the sentence. So, these two are quite separate and we should not conflate the two.

My second set of comments on the PCA review, I think Minister Shanmugam has also said this before as to whether and if there is a need for us to align the section 165 with the PCA in a different formulation, that we can consider. As of now, suffice to say that CPIB and our enforcement agencies find the current framing is able to allow us to do the job that we need to do. But going forward, if there are new developments that necessitate us to do a review of this, we are open to that.

Mr Yip Hon Weng.

Mr Speaker, I thank the Minister for his reply. I have two supplementary questions.

First, how does the Ministry ensure that the public perception of incidents like the recent case does not inadvertently narrow the range of candidates willing to serve, particularly those who may have offered different perspectives due to a private sector background?

My second supplementary question pertains to this. Given that many private sector professionals are accustomed a different business culture, how does the Ministry plan to ensure that the existing measures for navigating potential conflicts of interests are aligned with these cultural norms while at the same time maintaining public confidence?

Mr Speaker, Sir, I will make two comments in response to the two supplementary questions.

First, I will be very careful to not overplay the difference in the business culture and the Public Service culture when it comes to corruption. We are all Singaporeans and the international community knows that, in Singapore, we have clear rules and I would not want to suggest that somehow the private sector has a different set of rules or culture that is so different from the public sector. So, that is my first point.

On the second point, does this affect the public perception on whether good people will want to join us? This is precisely the point that I mentioned in my reply. If our rules are not clear, if our execution of the rules are not clear and decisive, it will deter good people from wanting to join us. We can see this in the experiences of other countries. When rules are not clear or when rules are clear but enforcements are not done properly, it will actually deter good people from joining both the Public Service as employees and for serving the Public Service even if they are not employees, like, for example, being on our boards.

Ms Sylvia Lim.

Speaker, two further supplementary questions for the Minister. As he speaks on behalf of the Prime Minister, so these questions are actually directed at certain things the Prime Minister has said about the case.

When the former Minister was charged in January this year, Prime Minister Wong said, and I quote, "CPIB has done a thorough investigation. They have left no stone unturned. They have dug deep and wide and they have presented their full investigations to the AGC. The AGC has decided to press charges against Mr Iswaran." So, nine months on, with the subsequent developments, I would like to ask whether it is still the Prime Minister's position that the CPIB and AGC did a thorough job in this case.

The second question, again, after the sentencing of the former Minister, the Prime Minister was quoted as saying that we need to act against corruption. But noting that the former Minister was not actually convicted of corruption, is the Prime Minister actually saying that regardless of the charges that were preferred and, finally, the former Minister was convicted on, he thinks that the former Minister acted corruptly?

Mr Speaker, Sir, I will make two comments in response.

First, on the second point, section 165 is a corruption charge.

It is not a corruption charge.

It applies to the public officers, but it is a corruption charge.

Second comment, do we have reasons to believe that CPIB and AGC did their job? Yes, we have reasons to believe that they have done their job properly. But as I have mentioned and explained, along the way, it is not uncommon for the Prosecution and the Defence to see how the situation develops and, sometimes, charges may be amended in this situation or in any other cases.

Ms Lim.

Yes, Speaker. On the point of section 165, I believe it is the law that no corrupt element needs to be proved. That is why it is easier to get a conviction on section 165. Minister may want to clarify that.

Mr Speaker, Sir, let me clarify that. The difference between the PCA and section 165 is as follows: in section 165, you do not need to prove a quid pro quo on both sides. You just need to prove that the person has taken. It does not mean that it is not a corruption charge.

35 Mr Christopher de Souza asked the Minister for National Development whether BCA is actively encouraging construction and infrastructure companies to use drones for inspections of projects, especially for the facades of high-rise buildings.

36 Mr Christopher de Souza asked the Minister for National Development whether the Ministry is educating and equipping construction and infrastructure companies to utilise drone technology to increase efficiency and safety in the workplace.

37 Mr Liang Eng Hwa asked the Minister for National Development (a) how has the use of drones by the building industry helped to improve productivity and effectiveness in building inspections, repairs and maintenance; and (b) whether the process of seeking approvals for the use of drones can be streamlined and the turnaround time for granting approvals improved.

Sir, the Government has been exploring the use of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) to perform facade inspections and maintenance for high-rise buildings.

Senior Minister of State, if I could just interrupt, are you answering for the three questions?

Yes, Sir, if I could take Question Nos 35 to 37 together?

Okay. Please proceed.

The use of UAS in periodic facade inspections allows inspections to be conducted more quickly while reducing costs incurred by building owners. It also improves workplace safety for facade inspectors as they can now inspect building façades from ground level without the need to work at height.

To better equip the industry, the Building and Construction Authority (BCA) published two Technical References in 2020 that provide specifications for the industry in using UAS for building facade inspections. In addition, BCA and Enterprise Singapore jointly launched the UAS Accreditation Programme in 2023, which aims to standardise the competencies of service providers and ensure that inspections are carried out by competent drone service providers (DSPs). The Government has also been investing in research and development to advance facade inspection technologies.

Beyond facade inspections, the Government is currently exploring how UAS can be used in building maintenance. For example, agencies, such as Defence Science and Technology Agency (DSTA), Housing and Development Board (HDB) and JTC are exploring the potential of using UAS, in tandem with robotics, to undertake the cleaning of building facades. As the use of UAS in building maintenance and repairs is nascent and has not been widely adopted in the industry, BCA will continue to partner the industry and research institutes to explore new use cases for UAS in the sector.

On the approvals required to use drones, BCA's approval is required for facade inspections where Competent Persons (CPs) intend to use technology, including the use of UAS. Typically, BCA's approval will be issued within three working days.

DSPs will also need to obtain the necessary permits from the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS) prior to using UAS to carry out the inspections. CAAS will assess the safety of the UAS operations and coordinate the airspace for UAS activities.

In 2022, CAAS and the relevant Government agencies established a "green lane" approval process for locations with lower risk, where the UAS activity permits are processed within three working days. CAAS also leverages on information technology systems to better track and enhance the efficiency of processing approvals.

To keep pace with the application of UAS across more use cases, CAAS will continue to review its regulations and processes with Government agencies to streamline the approval process for UAS activities without compromising aviation and public safety, as well as security.

Mr Liang Eng Hwa.

Sir, indeed, like what the Senior Minister of State says, in the HDB towns, we are seeing more of these building contractors and repair contractors using drones to inspect HDB flats for any defects or seepages and so on.

The Senior Minister of State mentioned that under the "green lane", it will take three days to get the approval to use a drone. From my experiences with the contractors, some told me it took as long as two weeks to get approvals to be able to fly the drone. So, I would like to ask the Senior Minister of State whether in cases like for very localised use for HDB heartlands just to inspect the HDB blocks, can a kind of blanket approval be given for the whole works, for example, repair and redecoration (R&R) work? Can approval be just given for the whole stretch rather than you need to go for a case-by-case approval in the use of the drones?

[Deputy Speaker (Mr Christopher de Souza) in the Chair]

Sir, the majority of submissions are approved by BCA within three working days from when BCA receives a submission from the CP. For CPs who engage DSPs that BCA has not previously engaged, BCA may require these DSPs to present their track records and technical capabilities, and that may take more than three days.

So, it really depends on the DSPs that the CP assigns the work to. For HDB Town Councils, actually, the instruction for facade inspection is issued to the Town Council and the Town Council could then decide which CP and DSP to appoint. So far, we have not come across significant issues around permit approvals for most of the cases that we have seen.

In Mr Liang's case, if there are specific issues that he or his Town Council has encountered, we will be happy to take it up and look at it.

38 Ms Yeo Wan Ling asked the Minister for Social and Family Development (a) whether the Ministry has conducted studies to determine the cost of CCTV installations in preschools; and (b) whether the Ministry can consider subsidy support to assist preschools in the mandatory installation of CCTVs.

Mr Speaker, based on a survey conducted by the Early Childhood Development Agency (ECDA) in 2022, more than 60% of preschools had already installed closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras in their premises. These centres had done so voluntarily before ECDA announced last year in 2023 that CCTV would be mandatory by 1 July 2024. In other words, the majority of preschools had already factored in CCTV installation as part of their business cost.

For the remaining preschools that have yet to install CCTVs, operators should similarly build in this requirement into their business cost.

Ms Yeo Wan Ling.

Some childcare operators have given feedback that while there was, indeed, a lead time on the implementation of their CCTV systems, this continues to be an unplanned expenditure outside of their usual budgets. The implementation can be costly for some operators in the tens of thousands of dollars for a single centre. This budget would have been used for other expenses, such as bonuses, training or facility upgrading. As such, smaller operators, in particular, seek for assistance and support, given this unplanned expenditure, even though they have already complied with the requirements.

I would also like to ask the Ministry, while schools are allowed to have their own standard operating procedures for access to the CCTV for investigation, if guidelines and best practices have been communicated across to all preschools, are these guidelines adopted across the board for the protection of students, educators and the school and are parents also brought on as informed stakeholders accordingly?

Sir, ECDA, as noted by Ms Yeo, has informed all preschools of the mandate in a Town Hall in February last year. ECDA then issued a circular with details of the implementation in August last year, stating that all preschools must implement CCTVs from 1 July this year. This includes details of CCTV camera requirements, locations of where CCTV cameras must be installed, recording and storage of CCTV camera footage as well as usage and access of CCTV footage by parents and authorities. ECDA has provided lead time of over a year before the start of the mandate on 1 July this year.

Additionally, I would like to inform the House that ECDA will also adopt an advisory approach for the first six months of implementation from 1 July this year to 31 December this year and enforcement will take place from 1 January 2025 onwards. This advisory approach was communicated to preschools in August last year.

Order. End of Question Time. Ministerial Statement. Minister Edwin Tong.

[Pursuant to Standing Order No 22(3), provided that Members had not asked for questions standing in their names to be postponed to a later Sitting day or withdrawn, written answers to questions not reached by the end of Question Time are reproduced in the Appendix.]

Mr Deputy Speaker, on 17 July 2024, Allianz Europe BV, or Allianz, announced its Pre-Conditional Voluntary General Offer (VGO) to acquire the shares of Income Insurance Limited (Income). I will refer to this as the proposed transaction.

As part of the proposed transaction, NTUC Enterprise, or NE, had given a legal commitment to sell a proportion of its shares in Income to enable Allianz to acquire a majority stake in Income. The Government has assessed the proposed transaction and has decided that it would not be in the public interest for the transaction, in its current form, to proceed.

I am therefore making a Ministerial Statement today to explain the Government's position and to set out the steps which it proposes to take. I will start by setting out the circumstances in which Income, a former co-operative society or co-op, was corporatised in 2022, as that background has relevance to the proposed transaction. I will also explain the exemption from section 88 of the Co-operative Societies Act or CSA which Income had obtained in the course of its corporatisation. I will then set out our views on the proposed transaction and the next steps.

Sir, let me start with some background on Income. Income has a unique history and has played a special role in serving Singaporeans.

The concept of Labour Movement co-ops, also known as social enterprises, was first conceived at NTUC's Modernisation Seminar in 1969, where Mr Devan Nair articulated the need for the Labour Movement to turn into a social institution to serve Singaporean workers in various ways. Then, Dr Goh Keng Swee urged NTUC to set up social enterprises in areas such as life insurance and essential consumer goods to meet the needs of the working population.

Income was subsequently established in 1970 under the name NTUC Income Insurance Co-operative Limited. It was Singapore's first co-op under the aegis of the Labour Movement. Over the years, Income played an important role in providing affordable insurance for workers and Singaporeans at large.

NE was set up in 2012 as a holding entity for the various social enterprises under the Labour Movement. NE is also a co-op and currently holds about 72% of the shares in Income. Since 2012, NE has strongly supported the growth of Income, progressively contributing to the share capital of Income. NE injected a total of $630 million into Income between 2015 and 2020. This included $100 million of capital during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, which was critical for the continued viability of Income.

With NE's support, Income has grown through the years to serve Singaporeans' needs. As of 31 December 2023, Income Insurance covered close to 1.7 million customers, with an ambition to serve one in two Singaporeans by 2025.

Income has also made progress in its social mission to provide accessible and inclusive insurance. For instance, it launched the Complete Cancer Care to offer Singaporeans comprehensive support from cancer diagnosis to recovery. It has also launched a suite of products over the years to cater to the financial needs of specific underserved segments. These include SpecialCare Autism and Down syndrome, Care4MigrantWorkers, and products that provide coverage for mental health conditions.

In 2022, Income embarked on a corporatisation exercise. It wanted to change its legal form from a co-op to a company and to replicate the existing co-op shareholding profile in the shareholding profile of the new corporate entity to be set up.

Its reasons were as follows. Income needed to evolve to meet tightening regulations for financial institutions. This required a strong capital base. However, the co-op structure has limitations and is not conducive to stronger capital access and good value strategic partnerships. In the face of increasing global competition, Income wanted a corporate structure which would put it on par with its competitors. Income therefore proposed to convert itself into a corporate entity, with the members of the co-op receiving pari passu distribution in specie of shares in the new entity.

Income also sought an exemption from section 88 of the CSA – which applies when a Co-op is put in liquidation – because Income was not, in substance, being liquidated. It was only changing its legal form and would continue to be engaged in the same business. The exemption was therefore needed to facilitate the corporatisation exercise, so that Income's accumulated surplus, beyond par value, could be carried over to the new corporate entity to allow it to continue the business. I will come back to this point later in my speech.

At that time, Income explained to its members, the public and to the Ministry of Culture, Community and Youth (MCCY) that corporatisation would also empower Income to drive greater social and economic value in a sustainable manner. MCCY wanted to understand Income's position in greater detail and met with Income on several occasions to discuss the matter.

In the course of our meetings, Income emphasised a few salient points to MCCY. First, the insurance landscape had fundamentally changed since 1970 and corporatisation was critical to allow Income to effectively compete with other insurers. Income pointed out that the local insurance market had matured by 2022, unlike in earlier years, when a significant working class segment was still underserved. At the same time, Income was facing increasing competition from large insurance players as well as new technology players in the market. Its existing structure as a co-op lacked the flexibility of a corporate structure and did not give it access to distribution channels or the ability to scale, either locally or globally.

Second, there was growing pressure to inject capital into Income to build up its financial strength, in response to regulatory requirements and market competition. Income explained that corporatisation was critical for it to achieve operational flexibility. It also wanted to have better access to capital to pursue strategic growth options, compete effectively in the market and do well in its business in the long run.

The third key point made by Income was that its social mission focus would not change. Income made clear to its members and to MCCY that the corporatisation exercise would only change its legal form from a co-op to a non-listed corporate entity. The new corporate entity would remain an NTUC social enterprise.

In our discussions, Income assured MCCY, and I quote, that "post-corporatisation, Income will be able to grow more significantly in scale and deliver its social mandate as a significant player in the insurance industry".

Income wanted more flexibility to establish partnerships that could build up its capital base so that it could sustain its social mission. In its letter to MCCY dated 27 June 2022, Income stated, and I quote: "We believe that, pursuant to the corporatisation, Co-Op", which is Income, in this case, "will be regarded to offer a more attractive proposition to investors and strategic partners. This would, in turn, allow Co-Op to raise capital more easily and thereby grow and unlock value for existing and new shareholders and policy-holders, and further its social mission through a sustainability agenda", unquote.

The Registry for Co-operative Societies told Income that it had to address the public perception that NTUC social enterprises would be seen as moving away from co-op values. In response, the CEO of Income confirmed that even after corporatisation, Income would not change its purpose and values. Income repeated this point publicly. At its extraordinary general meeting (EGM) in 2022, Income reiterated that the new company would continue operating as a social enterprise of NE and sustain its social mission.

The Government accepted Income's rationale for corporatisation. We agree that social enterprises need to do well in order to do good. This includes having good financial and market discipline, in order for Income to be able to pursue its social mission more effectively. At the EGM on 18 February 2022, Income's members voted overwhelmingly in support of corporatisation.

I said earlier that as part of the corporatisation exercise, Income had applied for a Ministerial exemption from section 88 of the CSA. Let me now elaborate on this.

Co-ops are regulated under the CSA. Under section 88 of the CSA, when a co-op decides to cease being a co-op and is wound up, its members can only be paid their original share capital plus any unpaid dividends up to a cap, after settling the costs of liquidation and the co-op's liabilities. Any surplus in the co-op beyond that will be transferred to the Co-operative Societies Liquidation Account, or the CSLA, to be applied for the benefit of the co-op sector generally. This is the framework under the CSA, when a co-op is wound up.

Technically, Income would be required to comply with section 88, as Income, the co-op, would be wound up after corporatisation. However, as I explained, Income was not in fact ceasing its business. It was proposing to convert from a co-op into a corporate entity for the reasons outlined above. The corporatisation was to strengthen Income's capital base and financial adequacy in order for it to carry out its business better.

For these reasons, carrying over Income's surplus to the new corporate entity to support the business would be an integral part of the exercise. Income thus sought an exemption from section 88 of the CSA as part of the corporatisation, which I granted. Following this exemption, Income carried over approximately S$2 billion in surplus to the new corporate entity. The corporatisation exercise was completed on 6 April 2023.

Sir, let me now come to the proposed Income-Allianz transaction, which was announced on 17 July 2024. In announcing the proposed transaction, NE and Income had said that it was needed to strengthen Income so that it could continue with its social mission. They explained that insurance is a long-tail business. Income's capital buffers have repeatedly come under pressure over the years. NE has supported Income with capital injections but cannot continue to do so on its own.

That is why Income has proposed this transaction with Allianz, to find a strong partner that can complement NE in strengthening Income, so that it can sustain its social mission. Income, with Allianz and NE, had also committed to continue pursuing Income's social mission even after the transaction. For example, Income will maintain two low-cost insurance schemes as well as contribute $100 million over 10 years from 2021 for social and environmental causes.

In its announcement, Allianz had also said that it intended for Income to continue participating in national insurance programmes. It assured the public of a seamless transition for policy-holders and said that it would continue to honour the contractual terms and conditions of the existing polices underwritten by Income.

MCCY had no prior knowledge of the proposed transaction prior to the public announcements. When we first saw the announcements, we accepted the intent of the transaction, which is to strengthen Income. We saw that Income would be engaged in a strategic partnership with a major reputable player in the industry. This would strengthen Income's capital base and allow it to have more access to capital. This is consistent with the representations that Income had made to MCCY at the point of corporatisation.

As we have said before, for Income to do good, it must first do well. In a Facebook post on 4 August, I pointed out that co-ops, as social enterprises, must be financially sustainable in order to better serve their members in a fast-changing economic environment.

My colleague, Minister of State Alvin Tan, also spoke in Parliament in the August session. He explained that MCCY appreciated the competitive landscape that Income was operating in and understood how the transaction with Allianz would help Income achieve longer term financial sustainability.

Subsequent to the August session of Parliament, MCCY continued to do due diligence and enquire further into the proposed transaction, including on the various public queries which had been raised. In the course of this review, the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) provided MCCY with further details on the proposed transaction. This included information which Allianz, Income and NE had submitted to MAS in respect of initiatives to optimise the capital of Income post-transaction. MCCY had not seen this information earlier. From our review of this additional information, we gathered the following.

The parties intended to implement a number of initiatives to optimise Income's insurance business after completion of the acquisition. The plan was for Income to run its insurance business more efficiently, without the need to hold as much capital as it presently does. As such, post-transaction, Allianz contemplates that Income could reduce its existing share capital and return this capital to shareholders. Allianz projects that Income would return some S$1.85 billion in cash to its shareholders, within the first three years after completion of the transaction.

NE and Income focused on bringing in a strong shareholder and believed that, even with these initiatives, the proposed transaction with Allianz would allow it to continue with its social mission for years to come.

These projections were submitted to MAS at around the time that the proposed transaction was announced, in mid-July 2024. At that time, MAS had reviewed the information based on prudential grounds, focusing on whether Allianz was a fit and proper institution, and Allianz's financial strength and track record, so that the interests of Income's policy-holders would be safeguarded with a strong substantial shareholder.

MAS considered the planned capital optimisation from a prudential point of view, in accordance with its regulatory mandate. Based on the plans submitted, MAS did not have reason for concern as Income was projected to continue to meet regulatory capital requirements with a healthy margin even with the capital reduction. However, after the 6 August Parliamentary Sitting, MAS saw that Income's planned capital optimisation could be relevant to MCCY's views on the proposed transaction. MAS then shared the information with MCCY, including the terms of the proposed transaction.

It was at this point, after MCCY reviewed the information on the proposed transaction, that we became concerned. We decided that there was sufficient basis for the Government to intervene in the proposed transaction to protect the public interest, notwithstanding that the financial prudential requirements had been satisfied.

Let me explain this. We accept that from a narrow commercial or even prudential perspective, capital optimisation measures that free up capital to be returned to shareholders, are not uncommon practices. However, MCCY is not confident that the proposed transaction would not affect the ability of the co-op movement as a whole, or of Income itself, to carry out its social mission. First, we find it difficult to reconcile the proposed substantial capital reduction, soon after the transaction is completed, with Income's representations to MCCY during the corporatisation exercise that it was aiming to build up capital resources and enhance its financial strength. As I had explained, as part of that exercise, Income had sought and obtained an exemption to allow it to carry over a surplus of S$2 billion to the new corporate entity. The proposed capital reduction runs counter to the premise on which the exemption was given. If not for the Ministerial exemption in 2023, Income co-op's accumulated surplus of some S$2 billion would have gone to the CSLA after being wound up, to benefit the co-op movement in Singapore as a whole.

MCCY has not seen any arrangement within the present transaction to account for the estimated S$2 billion surplus that was carried over to the new corporate entity, due to the exemption. There is no clarity on how this sum will be directed towards advancing Income's social mission.

Second, MCCY is not satisfied that Income will be able to continue fulfilling its social mission after the proposed transaction. There are no clear binding provisions or structural protections in the deal to ensure that Income's social mission will be discharged. It is also not clear what Income might do after the capital extraction, for example, to adjust or trim its insurance portfolio, and what impact this could have on policy-holders. NE has stated that it intends to maintain Income's social mission. MCCY accepts that NE is making this commitment in good faith. But MCCY is not confident that NE's intentions, or the assurances Income gave earlier to MCCY, can be upheld.

We had known earlier that the proposed transaction would leave NE as the minority shareholder in the new entity, with a minority of board positions and no ability to nominate the Chairman of the new Income entity. On their own, these factors would not have caused MCCY to object to the transaction. However, taken together with the proposed capital extraction and the lack of structural protections in the deal to ensure the continuation of Income's social mission, cumulatively, they pose a risk that MCCY judges not to be acceptable.

As such, it is the Government's view that it is not in the public interest for the transaction, in its current form, to proceed. I should, however, make clear that the Government understands and accepts the strategic purpose behind Income's corporatisation exercise and its subsequent decision to form a partnership with Allianz. It was to strengthen Income and make it more financially sustainable in the longer term. The Government also does not have concerns over Allianz's standing or suitability to acquire a majority stake in Income. As I noted earlier, MCCY supports Income's efforts to find a strong partner so as to strengthen its capital base and market position.

Allianz is a major global insurance company and asset manager that can bring financial strength and expertise to Income.

Our concern is only over the terms and structure of this specific transaction, particularly in the context of the preceding corporatisation exercise. Income was a co-op, and subject to the objectives and obligations of being a co-op. Therefore, we also have to take into account the circumstances in which Income was corporatised and obtained an exemption from section 88 of the CSA. Hence, our assessment of the viability of this transaction must go beyond prudential considerations alone.

Whilst we will not allow the proposed transaction to proceed, we are nonetheless open to any new arrangement which Income may wish to pursue, whether with Allianz or any other partners, so long as the concerns highlighted are fully addressed.

Sir, let me now set out the steps which the Government will take.

As Income is now a corporate entity, it is no longer subject to the jurisdiction of the Registrar of Co-ops. The approval or otherwise of the proposed transaction now rests with MAS under the Insurance Act. Sections 26 and 27 of the Insurance Act require a person to seek the prior written approval of MAS to obtain effective control or become a substantial shareholder of a licensed insurer incorporated in Singapore. The proposed transaction therefore requires MAS' approval to proceed.

When MAS assesses an application under these sections, it considers a range of criteria on prudential grounds such as the financial strength and track record of the applicant, and whether it is fit and proper. There is currently no provision in the Insurance Act for MAS to consider the views of MCCY, in the case of an application relating to an insurer that is either a co-op or linked to a co-op. We therefore intend to amend the Insurance Act to provide a clear statutory basis for MCCY's views to be considered in any approval involving such applications.

The amendments will be scoped specifically to only apply to a licensed insurer that is the subject of an application under sections 26 and 27 of the Insurance Act and, where the licensed insurer is a co-operative, has acquired the business of a co-operative, or has a substantial shareholder or effective controller which is a co-operative. This is based on the Government's recognition that insurance co-ops are a special category of insurers with a social mission for which the views of the Minister overseeing co-ops need to be considered.

The Bill will therefore provide for the Minister-in-charge of MAS to consider the views of the Minister responsible for the administration of the CSA. And for the Minister-in-charge of MAS to withhold approval to such applications if he considers that it is in the public interest to do so. Following this Ministerial Statement, Minister Chee Hong Tat will table the First Reading of an amendment Bill to the Insurance Act on an urgent basis. Given the time sensitivity of this matter, the Second and Third Readings are proposed to be taken on Wednesday, 16 October 2024.

I should add that MCCY may also consider future amendments to the CSA to give the Government stronger levers over co-ops that may wish to be corporatised.

Sir, before I conclude, I would also like to address an outstanding issue raised by the Leader of the Opposition at the 6 August Parliament Sitting. At that time, I had replied that we were still looking into the issue. Mr Singh had asked whether NE had given its undertaking to hold on to its shares in Income, and I quote, "for an indefinite period", unquote, referring to views that Mr Tan Suee Chieh, a former CEO of Income and Group CEO of NE, had published.

Our fact finding shows that Mr Tan did indeed state, when he was Group CEO of NE, at a meeting of the Income Board on 21 November 2014, that he, referring to Mr Tan, was, I quote, "confident that the NE Board would agree to a request to extend this undertaking not to redeem to an indefinite period, as NE was prepared to convert its shares to the new class of irredeemable shares once the legislation was passed", unquote.

However, the letter that was eventually sent by NE to Income on 11 February 2015 stated, and I quote, "Our shareholding in NTUC Income is thus committed over the long term, and there is no intention of withdrawing the share capital to be subscribed". In short, the answer is, there was no specific commitment that the shares would not be redeemed indefinitely; neither was there a commitment that the shares would not be transferred to someone else.

More importantly, Sir, the commitment given by NE to Income in 2015 is no longer relevant in today's context. Back in 2015, Income was a co-op whose members had the right to withdraw their share capital at any time. This was a problem because Income needed a stable capital base to support its insurance business, but its members' share capital, being redeemable at any time, could not be counted towards MAS' capital adequacy requirements for insurers. NE's commitment not to redeem its shares was meant to assure Income of the stability of its capital base, pending legislative amendments to provide for a more permanent class of share capital for co-ops.

The CSA was subsequently amended in 2018 to allow institutional members of co-ops, like NE, to hold permanent shares so that the capital could not be withdrawn. NE then converted all its shares in Income to permanent shares, which could count towards MAS' capital adequacy requirements. This rendered NE's 2015 undertaking no longer relevant, because NE's shares were now legally locked in and Income's capital base had stabilised.

When Income subsequently corporatised, NE's shares in Income, the co-op, were converted into shares in the new company, which are also not withdrawable. Therefore, there is no longer a need for any undertaking by NE not to redeem its shares because all the shares are now permanent.

I hope this makes the position clear.

Mr Deputy Speaker, co-ops remain an important pillar of our society. Co-ops have been helping the community, providing affordable services, especially to the underserved for close to a century. They reinforce our nation's social fabric, complementing the efforts of the public and private sectors, helping to create a caring and cohesive community in Singapore. We appreciate that co-ops have to balance the constant tension between doing good and doing well. On its part, the Government agrees that co-ops must do well before they can do good.

MCCY has been and will continue supporting the co-op movement through various capability building efforts and enhancements to legislation. At the same time, MCCY is responsible to ensure that the co-ops continue to uphold their social missions to benefit Singaporeans and our wider society, as they seek to do well. This is why we have seen it fit to intervene, in the proposed transaction.

Sir, I would be happy to address Members' clarifications on the Ministerial Statement today. As I said, the amendment Bill to the Insurance Act will be tabled after this. Members can take time to study the Bill and take part in the debate on 16 October and raise clarifications on the Bill and related matters during that debate.

Clarifications may be asked arising from the Ministerial Statement.

Thank you, Deputy Speaker, Sir. I thank you the Minister for the clarification.

Some of our Choa Chu Kang residents are Income policy-holders and they have expressed concern, and are grateful to the Government that they have looked into this and deemed that the transaction in its current form is not in the public interest. I have two questions.

The Minister mentioned just now that the Government intervened in this transaction but has not closed the doors to any potential other restructuring of the particular deal. So, my question is whether or not Income can find new partners or is it open to Allianz to restructure it and come back with future proposals? The concern is because Allianz is a foreign company and it is not the basis that just because it is an offer from a foreign company that we are intervening.

My second question is on the Government's commitment to support co-operatives as social enterprises. I cannot agree more that they need to do well in order to do good. Quite apart from Income, are there any other co-ops in Singapore and how are their objectives supported?

And the Minister mentioned the Co-operative Societies Liquidation Account, the CSLA. May I know what that account is for?

I thank Mr Zhulkanain for the two clarifications that he seeks. The first is on Allianz and whether or not we have foreclosed the possibility of a future transaction, whether with Allianz or any other partner. As I have said in my speech, the answer is no.

By all accounts, Allianz has put forward a credible, sound proposal and from a financial perspective it makes sense for Income to look at an entity that has global presence, strong networks and it is able to enter into it with a view towards a long-term strategic partnership.

On financial and prudential reasons alone, let me make clear, there is no reason not to accept this arrangement. The grounds that I have set up relate to the representations that were made at the corporatisation exercise, the exemption that was granted and the circumstances in which now it is proposed for capital to be extracted. Those were the reasons.

So, do not read into this as suggesting that we are not open to a foreign entity partnering with Income or indeed, whether it is Allianz or indeed, any other entity. So, I hope that answers the first of the Member's questions.

In relation to co-ops, they come under my Ministry. There are a variety of different co-ops and there are NTUC co-ops which helps look after the underserved workers. There are also campus co-ops where, Members might remember, the National University of Singapore, Nanyang Technological University and Ngee Ann, they all run co-ops for the benefit of students. There are also co-ops which help the sectors of society which need special attention. For example, Running Hour is a co-op that helps inclusivity in sports. There is also a co-op that looks after the employment of persons with disabilities. So, these are the different types of co-ops that come under the framework.

We support the co-ops in a number of ways, through enhancing the work that they do, supporting them through changes in the CSA that helps them in their business, that allows them to evolve and keep up with the times, and also has a fund that I mentioned, the CSLA, which MCCY and the Registrar manages and administers.

This fund, from time to time, helps co-ops with training of personnel and showing that they are the best people running each of the co-ops, and on occasion also sets up a fund like we have done recently, just earlier this year, on the Empowering Communities Fund, which helps to look after a specific segment of society, that is funded from the CSLA. So, this is one reason we maintain the CSLA, to look at how we can benefit co-ops as a whole in Singapore.

Ms Joan Pereira.

My clarifications are for MAS. MAS knew about the capital extraction plan by around mid-July. I would like to seek a few clarifications with MAS. First, what was MAS' assessment of this plan? Second, was MCCY aware? Third, why did MAS not share more information about the capital extraction with MCCY earlier?

Minister Chee Hong Tat, do you want to respond?

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker, because Ms Pereira posed the question to MAS, so on behalf of MAS, I would like to respond to her – with your permission, Sir.

Yes, please proceed.

Thank you. Mr Deputy Speaker, Allianz submitted the capital reduction plan to MAS in mid-July this year. At that time, MAS had reviewed the high-level submitted information based on prudential grounds, focusing on whether Allianz was fit and proper, looking at its financial strength and track record, and looking at the interests of Income's policy-holders and ensuring that this will be safeguarded with a new, strong, substantial shareholder. So, those were the elements of what MAS was looking at when they received this plan and they received the proposal from Allianz.

The information received by MAS to perform its regulatory functions is generally not shared with other Government agencies and at that time, MAS was not aware of MCCY's considerations when MCCY issued the section 88 exemption and hence, it did not link the proposal from Allianz with the exemption that MCCY had provided earlier.

As the MAS team were still doing their technical assessments at that time, they did not surface the details, including the capital reduction plan, to the MAS Board before the 6 August Parliament Sitting. It was only after the 6 August Parliament Sitting that the MAS team that was assessing this matter saw that this plan to optimise the capital could be relevant to MCCY's views on the proposed transaction. That is when MAS then decided that there were grounds to share the information with MCCY and that it was appropriate for MAS to do so – and that was what happened. So, I hope that clarifies the questions that Ms Pereira asked.

Minister Edwin Tong, would you like to add to that? No? Mr Liang Eng Hwa.

Sir, in a way I am glad that the Government has done its due diligence to pick up these very serious implications of the deal, which is the S$1.85 billion capital extraction. My question to the MCCY Minister is, Income is now no longer a co-op, it is a corporate now. Hence, my query is how would MCCY still be able to exercise its oversight, whether it is for these transactions on the grounds of public interest or to hold Income to fulfilling its social mission that it has committed to, going forward?

I thank Mr Liang for the question. Income today is no longer a co-op and I have explained in my speech why it had taken steps to become a corporate entity. And because it is now a corporate entity, we must allow Income to operate like a company with autonomy in how it pursues business decisions, how it makes its plans and its financial arrangements and so on, as a corporate vehicle.

But a corporate vehicle can also be a social enterprise within this framework. For example, if you ask how this could be done, for example, ring-fencing some of the products which I mentioned earlier, which serves a segment of society, ring-fencing this to ensure that whatever business you conduct, you will always be in a particular segment of looking after this underserved segment of society at a lower cost.

For instance, Mr Liang would recall that I spent some time explaining the background to the corporatisation and the exemption. So, going back to this specific case, when the exemption was granted, the surplus funds of about S$2 billion, instead of going to the CSLA which would have applied for the benefit of all co-ops in Singapore, was transferred into Income, the entity.

If this arrangement was not being proposed, Income was free to use this surplus as it has been doing, to carry out the social mission, it would embark on business obviously and it must meet the usual capital adequacy requirements and so on, but it would be able to exercise some discretion over this surplus. That is how we saw it and that is why the exemption was given.

But in the context of those representations – building up its surplus, share capital base and so on – to come forward now and to ask for it to be extracted so soon and at this amount, after the exercise was completed, in our view, runs counter to the premises on which the exemption was granted. That is why in this case we have stepped in.

But moving forward, which I think is the thrust of your broad point, there are a number of ways in which a corporate can still remain a social enterprise in the way in which it conducts its business.

Mr Louis Chua.

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. Just one clarification for the Minister. Was the Government and MCCY already aware in July that despite assurances given by NTUC and Allianz that there are no existing safeguards which precluded Allianz from optimising the capital base of NTUC Income, which, as I understand correctly from Minister's Statement just now, is one of the key reasons that it now steps in.

From what I can see from the announcements back in July, a key rationale that Allianz put forth was that it will undertake a strategic and operational review of the company to operate it in a more capital efficient manner, considering possible business model transformation opportunities and also to target a double digit return from investment.

I had explained earlier that MCCY was not aware of the terms of the transaction or indeed of the planned cash remittance which includes the capital extraction until after the 6 August Parliamentary Sitting. It was at that juncture, and I think Minister Chee shared the circumstances in which MAS shared the information with MCCY, which I also covered in my Statement, and thereafter we decided to intervene, based on what we found out from the terms of the transaction as disclosed at the point in time.

Mr Derrick Goh.

Mr Deputy Speaker, I welcome Minister's Statement on blocking the proposed deal and the Government's emphasis that at the heart of this decision is about NTUC Income being able to serve its social mission.

As such, can I ask Minister to clarify upon reflection if NTUC Income should have been allowed to be a corporate and be given an exemption from compliance with section 88 of the Co-operative Societies Act? And if so, will MCCY consider further mechanisms to be built in since subsequent corporate exercises could alter or weaken this social objective?

Sir, I have explained in some detail the background to the corporatisation exercise as well as the exemption that was granted in 2022 and 2023. Let me just reiterate that we felt that it was suitable at that point in time, because Income is involved in the insurance business. It essentially is competing with large players around the world and in Singapore and it also has to maintain a substantial capital base. That is the requirement under the Insurance Act and by MAS.

And the current co-operative, or at that time, current co-operative structure, was not conducive to it. For example, it made investments or strategic partnerships with a co-op less attractive. There were some restrictions on how much dividend could be declared, out of which year's profits and there was also a limit to it and so on. These limitations do not apply to a corporate entity.

And so, these amongst others, were the reasons why we supported Income when they approached us and discussed their plans with us.

In terms of the exemption, as I had explained, if Income was going to be wound up and no longer continuing with its business, obviously, section 88 would apply. It applies in all other cases – the fund with the surplus after you pay off liabilities would be put into the CSLA. But as I had explained, this was not a scenario where Income was going to be liquidated, wound up and cease its business. In fact, it was carrying on the same business, with the assurance that it would see to its social mission, in a sense, in a new skin, in a corporate vehicle set-up, but continuing with the same business, fundamentally.

And so, in that respect, taken as a whole, the exemptions were considered to be suitable and granted, so that Income can carry on and will be able to take advantage of the capital surpluses in its new vehicle.

In terms of future steps that Mr Goh mentioned, I mentioned in my Statement that we would look at the possibility of amendments to the CSA to look at such scenarios where a co-operative converts into a corporate vehicle and what are some of the measures that can be taken. We will explore all of this when we look at the CSA in detail.

Ms Hazel Poa.

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. Given that the need for more capital was the basis to justify the corporatisation of Income and then again, subsequently, to justify the sale of Income to Allianz which is in direct contradiction with the plan to reduce capital, will any action be taken against those responsible for misleading the public and the Government?

I am not sure Ms Poa heard my Statement or understood it. Let me explain the key points.

There is no question of misleading. The deal, on its own, was priced appropriately; the terms were put up. And as I had mentioned, even after the capital extraction, the financial viability, the capital adequacy requirements and ratios will be satisfied. That was the framework in which this was proceeded with. And NE and Income, as I also explained, believed in good faith that this strategic partnership would strengthen Income as an entity to allow it to compete in the insurance business with the benefit of a partner like Allianz. We have a different view of that for reasons which are not associated with the financial viability or sustainability of the proposal.

So, there is no misleading as far as this is concerned. But we believe that if you were to look at the representations that were given in the context of the corporatisation and the exemption exercise, we think that this goes counter to that arrangement and we have a different opinion from NE and Income as to its ability to still continue to carry out its social mission.

And as I said, cumulatively with other factors which we have also seen, such as the lack of structures in the agreement to protect the social mission or to advance it, and also coupled with the fact that it would no longer have majority control at the shareholding and also at the board level. So, it is taken in the round.

But there is no question that there has been any misleading. All of these facts were as disclosed. We have just taken a view of them differently from NE and Income as to its ability to carry out its social mission thereafter.

Mr Desmond Choo.

This is a question for Minister Chee Hong Tat. The strategic intent for this deal is to help policy-makers in the longer run. So, in MAS' review of this deal and that now that this deal will be halted, what does it mean for policy-holders in the short to the long run? Will the terms of their policy to their board be safeguarded and should policy-holders be concerned?

Mr Deputy Speaker, I would like to respond to Mr Choo by saying that the existing policy-holders of Income need not be concerned as MAS will continue to regulate Income as a licensee.

Income has sufficient resources to meet the necessary capital adequacy ratio, which means it has enough capital to meet its liabilities and also to pay out to policy-holders. I also want to add, Mr Deputy Speaker, that MAS has not yet approved this proposal.

I mentioned this in the August Sitting in response to Ms He Ting Ru that the deal is still subject to MAS regulatory approval. So, this is not something that MAS has approved. We are still going through the details. Minister Edwin Tong has explained why the Government has decided to make amendments to the Insurance Act to give the Minister-in-charge of MAS the powers to consider the views and concerns of the Minister for MCCY on public interest grounds.

The best way to protect policy-holders in addition to ensuring that the licensees have sufficient capital to meet the necessary capital adequacy ratios is also to ensure that we have a competitive insurance industry. Because then, that will give choice and options to policy-holders to be able to choose what is the best product, the most competitive product, that can meet their needs.

Assoc Prof Jamus Lim.

Sir, I appreciate Minister Chee's answer about how MAS has not given its approval at the time of the announcement. But nevertheless, as a globally oriented player, Allianz would presumably have done some of its regulatory risk assessment and homework prior to the actual announcement on 17 June. And based on Minister Tong's statement, it seems that it was MCCY that was ultimately caught unaware.

And I understand that the proposed urgent Bill scheduled for Wednesday is meant to, in part, remediate this lapse in intra-government communication.

Nevertheless, I wonder what this means for the reputation of MAS as a reliable channel for Government sentiment for potential future deals that would require regulatory approval. What of other deals where different agencies or Ministries other than MCCY may have relevant input?

Mr Deputy Speaker, MAS takes its international reputation very seriously and this is the reason why we want to handle this matter in an open and transparent manner, coming to Parliament to pass the amendments to the Insurance Act and to do so with urgency because the deal is under consideration by shareholders, as explained by Minister Tong earlier.

The current provisions in the Insurance Act do not provide explicitly a provision for the Minister-in-charge of MAS, or for MAS to assess an application like this, based on non-prudential related considerations. So, this is why we need to make this amendment through the proposed Bill to give the Minister-in-charge of MAS these powers, to be able to factor in non-prudential related considerations. In this case, relating to co-ops and with views from the Minister for MCCY.

I appreciate why Assoc Prof Lim asked this question because it is also something that is important to us. We want to make sure that when we regulate, we do so in an even-handed manner, in an open manner. And as Minister Tong mentioned earlier, and I would like to reiterate that, the reason why we have concerns about this particular deal is not because there is a foreign entity, Allianz in this case, and it is also not because we have concerns about Allianz being fit and proper and being a suitable partner for Income. I hope that clarifies.

Mr Leong.

Thank you, Deputy Speaker Sir. First of all, I really, from my heart, welcome the Government's decision to block this transaction, which I have questioned very much at the 6 August Sitting, with the help of information from many well-informed Singaporeans, like Mr Tan Suee Chieh. It is a big relief to NTUC policy-holders, of which I am one.

The Minister today, in announcing the turnaround of the Government's position, because what we heard on 6 August is actually very different. However, from what the Minister has said, it seems that all the processes are proper.

So, it begs the question, my first question is, who in the Government, in such big financial transaction, will be the final goalkeeper? Who is the one who will finally look at the outcome of the deal or any policy decisions, and not just the processes?

It seems that NE has gone through the right process, MAS has also done the first round of assessment and the case was presented to Parliament on 6 August. We were debating, we were asking questions in a different direction. We are trying to say at that Sitting that this transaction needs to be reconsidered. But of course, the Minister and the Minister of State at that time had given us very different impressions.

So, my first question is, in the future, when we have big financial transactions like this, can we get the assurance from the Government that there will be someone – in this case, we are happy that MCCY acted as a goalkeeper to look at the outcome of this transaction. So, in the future, can I get assurance who is going to do this goalkeeper role?

The second question I have is, what Minister Chee had mentioned just now, is that part of MAS' responsibility is to assess the deal in the interest of policy-holders. If the deal involves the acquirer extracting capital from the entity, can this fit into the criterion that it will be in the interest of the policy-holders? If it does not, then, is it that MAS had not done its job? I would like to have an answer to that.

So, I think there are two questions. If I am not mistaken, one is directed at Minister Tong and the other directed at Minister Chee. Who would like to go first? Minister Chee.

Mr Deputy Speaker, I think the way Mr Leong has described what MAS colleagues have done is not accurate and I think it is not fair. I have explained earlier in my reply to Ms Pereira that MAS will look at the proposal from a prudential point of view. That is MAS' role as the prudential regulator for the insurance industry.

So, when the MAS team looks at that, they at that point in time, were not privy to the details of the exemption, of MCCY's exemption from section 88. I had explained that earlier in my reply to Ms Pereira.

So, from the MAS team's point of view, this is a proposal, they were assessing it from a prudential point of view and they looked at after the proposed capital reduction, would Income still be able to meet its necessary capital adequacy ratio? And if so, then from a prudential point of view, there is no reason for the regulator to object.

And this goes back to the point that Assoc Prof Jamus Lim raised earlier. If we want to be a regulator of good standing internationally, we have got to operate in a rules-based system, looking at what our requirements are as regulator and apply them consistently and in an even-handed manner. So, regardless of who the entity is, we would have to apply those rules based on our considerations as a prudential regulator. So, this is what happened.

I also explained earlier in my response to Ms Pereira that after the 6 August Parliament Sitting, the team from MAS that was looking at this proposal then recognised that there is a larger consideration beyond just prudential considerations alone. They then passed this information to MCCY, the information about the proposed capital reduction. MAS was the one who provided this information to MCCY and said, "I think this is something you need to take a look at and whether this will fit with the terms of the earlier exemption that MCCY provided". And then, by working together, MAS, MCCY, in a whole-of-Government manner, and this is how we will work as a Government, we will work across different Ministries, across different departments for the benefit of Singapore and Singaporeans.

Yes, initially, there was an information gap, as I explained. But once we shared the information, we work closely together, we work in a coordinated manner, and this is why we are bringing this Bill to Parliament for consideration.

Minister Tong.

Mr Leong made a reference to the Sitting in August and also some public views on the transaction. I was not here in August, but I have since read the transcripts and understand what the Member had said. There were a number of views that were put out like, this transaction should not go on because the shares were supposed to be not redeemable or that it cannot be sold. None of these apply in this case. And I think the Member heard me explain earlier the background to why and how I answered the Leader of Opposition's query.

And the point really is that it is in the interest of Income in 2022 to have corporatised, I explained that, and for it to use this corporate vehicle to look at possibilities for partnerships, which it has now done and they found Allianz in this case. As I said, the objection is not to Allianz as an entity or to the financial suitability of its plans per se, but rather the questions that we have decided which followed after we reviewed the information, as the Member heard Minister Chee say earlier.

So, I would add to that by saying that is exactly how, when the Member mentioned the goalkeeper, this works. MAS would not share all and sundry information. The Member cannot expect that every time information about a potential application, an acquisition or a deal is proposed, is made, and information given to MAS that it is shared with all and sundry. That is not how MAS works. But, in this case, after they realised that there are various issues which MCCY might be concerned about, they then shared the relevant information with us. Collectively, we looked at it and came to a view, as a Government, on what would serve the public interest. And, in this case, we decided that it would not serve the public interest to allow this to proceed. That is how we would work, to answer your point about having a goalkeeper.

Mr Gerald Giam.

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. Sir, I am very surprised to hear this announcement by the Government today when it had defended the sale of Income Insurance to Allianz so strongly during the 6 August Sitting of Parliament.

I think I heard Minister Tong say earlier that MCCY was concerned that there were no structural protections in the deal to ensure that Income could continue its social mission. But the fact that Allianz would have a majority stake in Income Insurance under the proposed deal was known at least since 17 July 2024, when Income first made its public announcement. Was this not a concern to MCCY in August?

Be that as it may, what structural protections does MCCY expect to be put in place in order for any sale of a co-op or social enterprise to proceed? For example, will it be the case that co-ops or social enterprises will not be allowed to sell a majority stake in their shares to an entity that does not have an explicit social mission?

Sir, I spent quite a bit of my Statement explaining the sequence of events and explaining what we knew as of 6 August and what we knew after 6 August. I hope the Member has taken that into consideration and into account. And what we knew after 6 August allowed us to look at it cumulatively. On its own, as I mentioned my speech, losing board majority, losing shareholder majority were not itself factors which allowed us to reach a view that it was not in the public's interest.

And the Member would appreciate that it is a balancing consideration. On the one hand, there is a strategic interest in wanting the partnership to strengthen Income, to ensure that it will remain competitive. Yes, you lose board majority and you lose shareholding majority, but you take that in the round and on balance.

But what we discovered after 6 August, with a substantial capital extraction, shortly after the exemption was granted in 2023, of such a substantial amount, were factors which then tipped the balance. And then we said, as I mentioned in my speech, cumulatively, these factors caused us to have pause and we decided to review it in greater detail, and we realised that this was not something that we should see through as a matter of public interest.

So, I hope that explains the sequence of events and that Mr Giam does not see the shadows which do not exist in this case. It is about what we knew on 6 August and what we said, and even if the Member looked at the Hansard transcripts, what we said on 6 August was in relation to overarching purpose as strategic intent of Income looking for a partner, not so much that we knew the terms of this and we were talking about the terms of this on 6 August. I hope that makes that clear for Mr Giam.

As to what would work, I had ventured that in my answer to Mr Liang earlier. For example, you might ringfence products using proceeds or surplus from the co-operative, as one example. Or you might have terms contractually even without majority shareholding, which oblige the parties to operate in a particular way to fulfil social missions. So, these are some examples of what they might be.

But as to what exactly such a deal should look like, I think that would be speculative and I would not go into that. If the parties decide, at some juncture, that they want to reconsider this proposal and resubmit a proposal, we will consider it afresh at that point in time.

Okay, I see the last three hands. That is Mr Leong, Ms He and Mr Liang Eng Hwa. Are there any more hands besides these Members? No? Okay, then Ms He Ting Ru, then Mr Leong and then Mr Liang.

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I would like to ask the Minister, as part of its discussions with NE, did MCCY ask NE why they agreed to the deal knowing that there will be a capital extraction post-acquisition? I believe some of the concerns raised in Parliament in August were about financial sustainability and capital structure of the business going forward. So, I struggle to understand how withdrawing capital in the future can strengthen any entity's capital structure.

Given that there is public interest and social mission involved here, I think it is important that these reasons are articulated properly to help the public understand why there was this structure put in place, and I think it is also relevant because NE is still after all going to be a shareholder, albeit a minority one going forward, under the original proposed structure.

I thank Ms He for the question. The short point is this: that a withdrawal must be seen in the context of several other factors and there was a plan. And the plan is to optimise capital and not so much just to withdraw per se. So, when you optimise capital, you can do it in a number of ways. In the context of an insurance company, maybe redeploy reinsurance, for example, to remove some of the risks and therefore you need to maintain less capital to deal with buffers. These are some examples. I am not saying that this is what happened in this case, but these are some reasons why you might have a capital optimisation which provides for withdrawal but still not compromise the longer-term financial sustainability of the entity.

And I think the Member heard me mention earlier that on MAS' assessment, even after the withdrawal, over a three-year period, the capital adequacy requirements of the new entity will still have to pass muster. So, these are factors that they take into account in looking at this. I take the point that these are discussions that obviously ought to be had with NE, moving forward, as to which types of proposals that maintain and allow us to fulfil the social mission can be countenanced. These are discussions for the future.

Minister Chee Hong Tat, would you like to add to the response?

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I just wanted to add to what Minister Tong has said in response to Ms He Ting Ru that MAS has not approved the proposed capital reduction plan. That was what they put forth to MAS since the middle of July, but MAS has not approved the proposed capital reduction plan.

In fact, Ms He may recall, when I responded to her on 6 August during the Sitting, I used the Chinese phrase to describe the situation that the deal still required MAS' regulatory approval. I said, "八字都还没一撇". So, this deal is not approved yet and it is something that is still subject to MAS' regulatory approval, including the capital reduction plan.

Mr Leong Mun Wai.

Deputy Speaker, I have two questions, maybe for Minister Chee Hong Tat. One is, can the Minister confirm that in assessing the prudential requirements of the deal, MAS had taken into consideration the capital extraction, although the Minister said just now that MAS had not approved the capacity extraction? Have they considered, even with the capital extraction, the prudential requirements are still satisfied?

The second question is maybe both Ministers can decide who to answer this question. This is about information given to Singaporeans. For the last few months, we are of the impression that the information given is all that we have. So, now we know about capital extraction. This is a very important condition of any financial deal. I am surprised, I am shocked and I am very unhappy today that this important condition is not being disclosed to the Singaporeans, when we were all discussing about this deal. So, whose responsibility is it for not disclosing this information? Can the Government give a commitment that it will pursue responsibility with regard to this? Maybe the company and all that, because this is a very important condition for the financial deal.

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. Sir, I had actually addressed the first question that Mr Leong raised, in my response to various Members. But in case Mr Leong may have missed it earlier, let me say that again. So, first, I think we have to understand that the proposed capital reduction is a proposal from Allianz. It is not something that MAS has approved because, as I mentioned repeatedly, the deal is still subject to MAS' regulatory approval. So, would MAS consider this proposed capital reduction in its overall assessment? The answer must be yes, because this is part of the proposal.

Mr Leong always remind us that he has more than 30 years of experience in the financial sector. So, I am sure Mr Leong would agree with me that as a regulator, it is only right that we assess the full proposal, including this element within the proposal. Whether we agree with it or not, we have not yet come to a decision because this deal is still not yet approved by MAS.

Earlier, when we were discussing this matter of capital adequacy ratio, I think Minister Tong and I were explaining that because of the way the capital was being optimised in the proposal, the capital adequacy ratios, even after the extraction, could still be met. But that is what the proposal put forth. MAS will of course have to assess this independently as regulator to see if we agree with that view. I hope that clarifies the first question that Mr Leong raised.

The second question – and I think my colleague Minister Tong may add on later – let me just say in response to Mr Leong that that is why we are coming to Parliament. In Minister Tong's speech, he has explained clearly and in an open manner our key considerations, what are our concerns, including the proposal to reduce the capital in Income and why that is a concern to MCCY, bearing in mind the section 88 exemption that was earlier given and the undertaking and commitments that were given to MCCY.

So, I hope Mr Leong understands that this is not about withholding information. This is about coming to Parliament after we have put together the full picture, working across the whole-of-Government, between MAS, MCCY and also other agencies, to see what is the overall assessment of how we want to move forward on this important issue and then coming back to Parliament to present the information in an open manner and to propose that we amend the Insurance Act to give the Minister-in-charge of MAS the powers to consider the concerns and the views of the Minister for MCCY on public interest grounds.

It is important for us to recognise that this deal is not yet approved and this deal is something that is ongoing, under consideration by shareholders, and that is why we have some urgency. That is why we are coming to Parliament to seek approval urgently.

Minister Edwin Tong, would you like to add to that?

Sir, Mr Leong should not mischaracterise what happened. I explained it in some detail in my speech and I hope that the Member will not mischaracterise it by suggesting that information has been withheld. On 6 August, we were here. We explained why we believed that it is important for Income to have the ability to find and make arrangements for a partnership.

But as the Member knows, the transaction had not been approved. It is being considered.

We then got information from MAS, we shared the information and, as you heard me say earlier, this is how the Government works. We studied the information carefully, went through, understood the transaction and its impact, understood it from a financial perspective, understood it from a social mission perspective. Then, after coming to a view that it would not be in the public interest for this to proceed, we had to decide what is the best way to deal with this, to handle this, having regard to the fact that the Insurance Act gives MAS the ability to look at transactions from a financial or prudential perspective, but not from this angle, which is the views of the MCCY Minister overseeing co-operatives.

So, we had to reach a view as to not just that it is not in the public interest to proceed, but what we would do about it, which I am sure Mr Leong appreciates, is equally important. This is, after all, a live transaction, it is going on and there is market-sensitive information as well.

So, the first available opportunity, we have come to Parliament, explained it in a Ministerial Statement, the background as well as the steps moving forward and then tabling a Bill, which we will put in in a few moments, for a debate on Wednesday, as much time as possible in the context given to Members, given that this is a live transaction and we cannot leave this state of uncertainty pending.

So, I hope Mr Leong appreciates that that is the scenario that we are in and that there is no question of any information being withheld, either from Parliament or from Singaporeans.

I will allow one last clarification from Mr Leong. Please make it short. You will have the opportunity to debate the merit and principles of the Bill at the Second Reading and Third Reading on Wednesday. So, could you make it a short clarification, please?

Yes, Sir. I would just like to say that I appreciate all the clarifications that both Ministers have done today. Thank you very much. When I talk about responsibility, I am actually talking more about when Income made the announcement, were they withholding information? Because we Singaporeans are all debating this deal. If this capital extraction is included right from the beginning in the deal, this information should have been made available to all Singaporeans.

Do either of the Ministers want to respond or we can leave it for the debate? Minister Chee Hong Tat.

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. We will have a further discussion on Wednesday when we do the Second Reading and the Third Reading.

The considerations for why the Government has concerns for this deal, Minister Tong has already explained. I just wanted to reiterate one point, an important point, that Minister Tong said earlier, which is that from NE and NTUC's point of view, their objective, their intent of entering into this deal with Allianz is to strengthen Income, so that Income is in a better position to do well and to be able to meet its social obligations. So, that was the intent.

The Government has a different view because of the concerns that we had, as Minister Tong explained, and that is why we are coming to Parliament. But I want to say this – because I think it is important that we do not leave with the wrong impression – that for NTUC and NE, their objective of wanting to go into this deal was, indeed, to do what is right; and it is, indeed, to allow Income to be strong and to be able to do well so that it can continue to do good.

Minister Edwin Tong, would you like to add to that?

Thank you, Sir. I would just like to say that Mr Leong has been working for longer than I have been, in the financial sector. You know that this is an arrangement, this is a deal, and the parties submit proposals or plans to MAS, socialise them with MAS. The Member cannot expect this to be then made public to everyone. Income has obligations to its shareholders as well, and this is a step that happens after the transaction is completed. They have not even applied to approve the transaction.

So, Mr Leong, be circumspect about making allegations that parties, whether the Government or Income, could be more open or are withholding information, because there is a due process as to how this is done. You do not go out there and produce information about a proposal when the transaction has not even been approved. So, I hope Mr Leong sees it in that perspective.

There being no other final clarifications, Mr Liang Eng Hwa.

Mr Deputy Speaker, my question relates to the Second Reading of the Bill on Wednesday. While I can understand the urgency of the intervention by the Government, can I ask is there not any provision within our existing legislation that allows the Minister-in-charge to reject corporate transactions on grounds of public interest, rather than to amend the Insurance Act on the basis of a Certificate of Urgency?

Minister Chee Hong Tat.

Mr Deputy Speaker, I understand where Mr Liang is coming from. I have explained earlier why there is urgency in tabling this Bill – because the deal is under consideration by the shareholders. Currently, there is no explicit provision in the Insurance Act for MAS to consider non-prudential-related factors in assessing such applications. This is why we need to come to Parliament with the proposed Bill to give the Minister-in-charge of MAS the powers to be able to consider the views and the concerns of the Minister for MCCY on public interest grounds.

Order. End of Ministerial Statement. Introduction of Government Bills. The Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Trade and Industry, for the Insurance (Amendment) Bill.

[(proc text) First Reading. (proc text)]

Mr Deputy Speaker, I have a Certificate of Urgency signed by the President in respect of the Insurance (Amendment) Bill, to be laid upon the Table.

[(proc text) Certificate of Urgency signed by the President in respect of the Bill, laid upon the Table by the Minister. (proc text)]

The Certificate is in order. Minister, please proceed.

Mr Deputy Speaker, I beg to introduce a Bill intituled "An Act to amend the Insurance Act 1966".

[(proc text) Bill read the First time. (proc text)]

Minister.

Mr Deputy Speaker, copies of the Bill have been provided to the Clerk. With your permission, may the Bill be distributed to Members now.

Yes, I give my permission. Please proceed. [Copies of handout distributed to hon Members.]

Minister, Second Reading what day?

At the next available Sitting on Wednesday, 16 October 2024, Sir.

So be it.

[(proc text) "to amend the MediShield Life Scheme Act 2015", (proc text)]

[(proc text) presented by the Minister of State for Health (Ms Rahayu Mahzam) on behalf of the Minister for Health; read the First time; to be read a Second time on the next available Sitting of Parliament, and to be printed. (proc text)]

[(proc text) "to amend the Energy Conservation Act 2012", (proc text)]

[(proc text) presented by the Senior Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Sustainability and the Environment (Mr Baey Yam Keng) on behalf of the Minister for Sustainability and the Environment; read the First time; to be read a Second time on the next available Sitting of Parliament, and to be printed. (proc text)]

[(proc text) "to amend the Sewerage and Drainage Act 1999 and to make consequential and related amendments to the Public Utilities Act 2001 and the State Lands Protection Act 2022", (proc text)]

[(proc text) presented by the Senior Minister of State for Sustainability and the Environment (Dr Amy Khor Lean Suan) on behalf of the Minister for Sustainability and the Environment; read the First time; to be read a Second time on the next available Sitting of Parliament, and to be printed. (proc text)]

[(proc text) "to amend the Extradition Act 1968, the Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Act 2000 and the Trustees Act 1967 to give effect to certain recommendations of the Financial Action Task Force and to enhance the legal framework for international assistance in criminal matters and extradition, and to make consequential amendments to certain other Acts", (proc text)]

[(proc text) presented by the Minister of State for Law (Mr Murali Pillai) on behalf of the Minister for Law; read the First time; to be read a Second time on the next available Sitting of Parliament, and to be printed. (proc text)]

[(proc text) "to establish the International Committee of the Singapore International Commercial Court and to make related amendments to the Legal Profession Act 1966", (proc text)]

[(proc text) presented by the Minister of State for Law (Mr Murali Pillai) on behalf of the Minister for Law; read the First time; to be read a Second time on the next available Sitting of Parliament, and to be printed. (proc text)]

[(proc text) "to amend the Administration of Justice (Protection) Act 2016 to provide for certain circumstances that amount to contempt of court", (proc text)]

[(proc text) presented by the Minister of State for Law (Mr Murali Pillai) on behalf of the Minister for Law; read the First time; to be read a Second time on the next available Sitting of Parliament, and to be printed. (proc text)]

[(proc text) Order for Second Reading read. (proc text)]

Mr Deputy Speaker, on behalf of the Minister for Manpower, I beg to move, that the Bill be now read a Second time.

Mr Deputy Speaker, the Constitution of the Republic of Singapore (Amendment) Bill 2024 is linked to the Platform Workers Bill 2024 which was passed in Parliament last month. To recap, Parliament passed the Platform Workers Bill to strengthen protections for platform workers providing platform services, such as ride hail and delivery services, in the areas of housing and retirement adequacy, financial protection in the case of work injury and representation.

[Mr Speaker in the Chair]

For representation, there will be a legal framework setting out the rights and obligations of both platform work associations and platform operators in dealing with each other. As the framework for employers and employees has worked well in preserving industrial harmony, it was a reference for the framework for platform operators and platform workers. Hence, platform work associations will be analogous to trade unions.

Today, a member of any trade union or of any body or association affiliated to a trade union cannot be a member of the Public Service Commission, Public Service personnel boards, Judicial Service Commission and Legal Service Commission. This is to preserve impartiality and high standards in the Civil Service, the Judicial Service and the Legal Service. As platform work associations function like trade unions, the same consideration should apply, for parity.

Therefore, we are proposing consequential amendments to the Constitution, through the Constitution of the Republic of Singapore (Amendment) Bill, to prohibit members of any platform work association or of any body or association affiliated to platform work associations from being a member of the Public Service Commission, Public Service personnel boards, Judicial Service Commission and Legal Service Commission. Sir, I beg to move.

The question is, "That the Bill be now read a Second time." Pursuant to Article 5(2) of the Constitution, a vote is taken to ascertain that the Second Reading of the Bill is supported by the votes of not less than two-thirds of the total number of Elected and Non-Constituency Members of Parliament, which is 60 Members. Clerk, ring the division bells.

[(proc text) After two minutes – (proc text)]

Serjeant‐at‐Arms, lock the doors.

Before I proceed to start the electronic voting, may I remind Members that they are to be seated at their designated seats and should only start to vote when the voting buttons on their arm rest start to blink.

[(proc text) Question put, "That the Bill be now read a Second time." (proc text)]

Take a vote. You may now begin to vote. May I remind Members to depress their vote buttons firmly in order to register your votes in the system.

Members are advised to check that their names are registered according to their vote indication when the voting results are shown on the display screens.

Before I proceed to declare the results of the vote, are there any Members who wish to claim that his or her vote has not been displayed or has been displayed incorrectly on the screens? I do not see any.

I will proceed to declare the voting results now. There are 82 "Ayes"; no "Noes"; no "Abstentions". The Second Reading of the Bill has been carried by the votes of not less than two-thirds of the total number of Elected and Non-Constituency Members of Parliament.

[(proc text) Question put, and agreed to. (proc text)]

[(proc text) Bill accordingly read a Second time and committed to a Committee of the whole House. (proc text)]

[(proc text) The House immediately resolved itself into a Committee on the Bill. – [Dr Koh Poh Koon]. (proc text)]

[(proc text) Bill considered in Committee; reported without amendment; read a Third time and passed. (proc text)]

Third Reading

Third Reading, what day?

Now, Sir, I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Third time."

The Question is, "That the Bill be now read a Third time."

Pursuant to Article 5(2) of the Constitution, a vote is taken to ascertain that the Third Reading of the Bill is supported by the votes of not less than two-thirds of the total number of Elected and Non-Constituency Members of Parliament, which is 60 Members. Clerk, ring the division bells.

[(proc text) After one minute – (proc text)]

Serjeant-at-Arms, lock the doors.

[(proc text) Question put, "That the Bill be now read a Third Time." (proc text)]

You may now begin to vote. May I remind Members to depress their vote button firmly in order to register their vote in the system.

Members are advised to check that their names are registered according to their vote indication when the voting results are shown on the display screens.

Before I proceed to declare the results of the vote, are there any Members who wish to claim that his or her vote has not been displayed or displayed incorrectly on the screens?

I will proceed to declare the voting results now. There are 82 "Ayes"; no "Noes"; no "Abstentions". The Third Reading of the Bill has been carried by the votes of not less than two-thirds of the total number of Elected and Non-Constituency Members of Parliament.

[(proc text) Bill accordingly read a Third time and passed. (proc text)]

[(proc text) Order for Second Reading read. (proc text)]

Mr Speaker, on behalf of the Minister for Law, I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time".

Sir, this Bill makes miscellaneous amendments across 12 Acts. These amendments broadly fall within the following three buckets. First, making legislative provisions clearer; second, updating legislative provisions in light of revised terminology and definitions; and third, streamlining and improving operational effectiveness and delivery of our policies.

Let me now take hon Members through the amendments in this Bill.

First, clause 2 of the Bill amends section 92(4)(b) of the Building Maintenance and Strata Management Act 2024 to update the term "interrogatories" to "discovery of facts". The amendment updates the terminology, in line with the Rules of Court 2021. It does not change the underlying substance of the provision.

Next, clause 3 makes minor and technical amendments to the Copyright Act 2021, or CA.

First, it makes typographical corrections to sections 61(1)(c) and 313 of the CA. Second, it splits the offence on causing protected performances to be seen or heard in public, under the current section 450(2) of the CA, into two separate offences: one, in relation to live performances and another in relation to recordings of performances. The split is necessary to restore the original intention with respect to the offence relating to recordings, which carries a different condition from the offence relating to live performances. These offences were inadvertently conflated when the CA was revised in 2021 in plain English.

I now come to the amendments to the Criminal Procedure Code 2010, or CPC, under clause 4 of the Bill.

First, clause 4(a) and (b) update the definition of a "juvenile" in section 2(1) of the CPC to refer to a person who is 10 years of age or older, but below 18 years of age. This is to align with other related legislation, namely: section 25 of the Criminal Law Reform Act 2019, which raised the minimum age of criminal responsibility in the Penal Code 1871 from seven years of age, to 10 years of age; and section 2 of the Children and Young Persons (Amendment) Act 2019, which increased the maximum age of a "juvenile" under the Children and Young Persons Act 1993 from 16 years of age, to below 18 years of age.

Second, there are clarificatory and technical amendments to sections 319 and 360 of the CPC, which relate to fines and compensation. These amendments provide that a person, who is serving imprisonment imposed in default of payment of a fine or compensation sum, must be released "as soon as reasonably practicable" after the unpaid fine or compensation sum is paid. This is already the practice today and the proposed amendments make this clear in statute.

In addition, the proposed amendments make clear that fines must be paid using a designated mode of payment and within the time designated in a payment advice issued by the court to the offender, in line with existing practice.

Next, clause 5 of the Bill makes technical amendments to the Insolvency, Restructuring and Dissolution Act 2018, or IRDA.

First, it amends the definition of a "relevant company" in section 250(7) of the IRDA to delete a reference to a Registered Fund Management Company. This follows MAS' recent repeal of the regulatory regime for these companies on 1 August 2024.

The second amendment is to section 327(4)(a) of the IRDA, to extend the period within which a secured creditor has to notify the Official Assignee of the secured creditor's intention to claim interest on the secured debt, from 30 days after a bankruptcy order is made against the debtor to 60 days. This would give secured creditors more time to consider whether to and make a claim.

Finally, the proposed amendment to section 368(4) of the IRDA will make clear that the 14-day time limit mentioned in section 368(3) only applies to serving the Sheriff with notice of a bankruptcy application made against or by the debtor and not to the making of a bankruptcy order.

Turning to the next amendment, clause 6 of the Bill amends section 2(1) of the Interpretation Act 1965: to insert a definition for "His Majesty", "Her Majesty", "King", "Queen", "Sovereign", "His Britannic Majesty" and "Her Britannic Majesty", in relation to the United Kingdom, so that they can refer to the Sovereign of the United Kingdom, regardless of whether that Sovereign is a King or a Queen.

Next, I will address the various amendments to the Legal Aid and Advice Act 1995, or LAAA.

First, clause 7(b) introduces a new section 4A to provide protection from personal liability to individuals carrying out certain functions and duties under the LAAA. This is similar to the position in section 7 of the Public Defenders Act 2022.

Second, a new section 6A ensures that when a volunteer steps forward to help a mentally incapacitated person who qualifies for legal aid and does not have suitable family members to be appointed as that person's deputy, the volunteer will not be means-tested. The volunteer would not be paid for his work as a deputy for the mentally incapacitated person.

The volunteer here refers to a person who is registered as a professional deputy under the Mental Capacity Act 2008 or a person who meets certain criteria to be prescribed in the subsidiary legislation. These criteria would be similar to those required for registration as a professional deputy under the Mental Capacity Act 2008. For example, the volunteer must be a citizen or permanent resident of Singapore, must not be a bankrupt and must be 21 years of age or older.

This section applies when a volunteer applies for legal aid for a proceeding to be appointed as deputy in relation to a person who lacks capacity, or to vary an order made in relation to such a person under the Mental Capacity Act 2008.

In such a situation, the means test would be applied on the person who lacks mental capacity, rather than the volunteer who is the applicant. With this amendment, the volunteer, who is stepping forward to help a mentally incapacitated person, would not need to incur costs to hire a private lawyer, if the mentally incapacitated person meets the means test criteria.

Third, the proposed amendment to section 16 of the LAAA will provide that costs owed by an aided person to the Director of Legal Aid, in connection with that aided person's application for legal aid, may be waived either partially or completely. This aims to provide a more equitable outcome for aided persons, in cases where the costs owed by them are equal to or greater than the settlement or judgment sums they may receive at the completion of their legally aided matters.

Finally, clause 8 effects an administrative move for the Legal Aid Bureau's financial requirements to be met directly through MinLaw's regular budget provision going forward. Hence, the clause provides for the transition from the current Legal Aid Fund, which will no longer be needed. The Government's commitment to the provision of civil legal aid through the Legal Aid Bureau remains unchanged.

Next, I will move on to clause 9, which amends the Moneylenders Act 2008, or MLA.

First, it clarifies that all pawnbrokers regulated under the Pawnbrokers Act 2015, or PBA, are "excluded moneylenders" for the purposes of the MLA. As such pawnbrokers are already regulated under the PBA, this will ensure that these pawnbrokers are subject to only one regulatory framework.

In addition, it amends section 66(1) of the MLA such that a licensed moneylender must obtain from a body corporate loan applicant the same information as other loan applicants that are business entities. This will ensure consistency in the information collected by licensed moneylenders from all non-personal loan applicants.

Finally, proposed amendments to section 66A(2)(a) will require a licensed moneylender to inform each surety of the loan applicant in writing, when the surety's information is submitted to a designated credit bureau for the purpose of producing a credit report in relation to the surety. This amendment achieves parity in treatment between loan applicants and sureties, by notifying them when their information is submitted to a designated credit bureau.

I now come to clause 10, which makes technical amendments to the PBA.

First, it deals with whether fees are refundable. It introduces a new section 9A that deals specifically with fees for the grant or renewal of a pawnbroking licence. This provision prescribes when such fees are not refundable, as well as the Registrar of Pawnbrokers' discretion to deviate from this position. Clause 10 also clarifies that other types of fees for making various applications are not refundable. These amendments align the positions under the PBA with those under the MLA.

The second amendment is to section 2(1) of the PBA, to allow the use of an individual's foreign identification number, or "FIN", as an alternative to their foreign passport number, for identification purposes. As the FIN does not change over time, permitting pawnbrokers to collect the FIN as an alternative identification information will better meet their operational needs.

Third, proposed amendments to sections 10 and 13 of PBA will provide that the Registrar of Pawnbrokers may refuse to grant or renew a licence, or approve substantial shareholding, on the ground that a substantial shareholder of the applicant or licensee is not of good character or is not a fit and proper person. This is in line with our intent to prevent individuals with a wider range of criminal antecedents from being involved in the business of pawnbroking.

Fourth, proposed amendments to sections 38 and 39 of PBA will streamline the process for licensees to make representations and appeals, before the Registrar of Pawnbrokers takes action to vary their licence conditions, suspend or revoke their licence or impose a financial penalty. These amendments will provide clarity to pawnbrokers who wish to make representations or appeals before the above administrative sanctions are imposed.

Finally, there are proposed amendments to paragraph 4 of the Second Schedule to clarify that pawnbrokers may charge fees lower than $2 for the issuance of a pawn ticket. It also clarifies that pawnbrokers may charge the fee only if they offer any mode of payment as specified. These amendments make clear that pawnbrokers have the discretion to offer customers more competitive fees for the issuance of pawn tickets.

Next, I come to amendments to the Public Defenders Act 2022. Clause 11 makes clarificatory amendments to the Public Defenders Act 2022, or PDA.

Currently, section 12 of PDA requires the merits of applications involving offences that carry a maximum prescribed sentence of more than seven years' imprisonment to be assessed by a board. This board consists of the Chief Public Defender and at least two solicitors appointed to the Public Defender's Office's panel of solicitors established under section 4 of PDA.

The proposed amendment to section 12(1) will clarify that such applications are determined by a majority of the board's members and this is consistent with our policy intent. Second, the Schedule under PBA on excluded offences and excluded classes of offences is reformatted for clarity and to improve readability. Clause 11 and clause 14 of this Bill contain proposed updates to include Regulatory offences under the Pawnbrokers Act 2015, the Bankruptcy Act (Chapter 20, 2009 Revised Edition) before its repeal, the Sale of Drugs Act 1914 as in force before its repeal, the Town Councils Act 1988; and to retain the existing reference to regulatory offences under the Medicines (Advertisement and Sale) Act 1955. This is consistent with the policy intent to exclude regulatory offences from criminal defence aid coverage.

I now turn to clause 12, which amends the Revised Edition of the Laws Act 1983, or RELA.

The last universal revision of Acts under RELA was completed on 31 December 2021 when the 2020 Revised Edition of Acts came into force. The Law Revision Commissioners (LRCs) will be revising subsidiary legislation to ensure coherence and consistency between subsidiary legislation and the revised Acts. For instance, when revising the Acts, certain provisions were renumbered and the language was modernised.

As at 26 June 2024, there are about 4,900 pieces of subsidiary legislation under around 349 Acts to be revised. This comes to almost 50,000 pages of subsidiary legislation. Given the sheer volume, the amendment in clause 12(e) is needed to allow subsidiary legislation to be revised in batches, rather than on a single date. This will allow batches of updated subsidiary legislation that are ready to be published earlier, compared to holding back until all the subsidiary legislation is ready at a later date.

The amendments by clauses 12(e) and 12(i) also give the LRCs discretion not to revise certain types of subsidiary legislation, for instance, subsidiary legislation that applies to certain time periods. Clause 12(l) also allows subsidiary legislation to be revised on an ad hoc basis, not necessarily every year.

Clause 12(h) allows a consolidated subsidiary legislation to be amended. Sometimes, when revising subsidiary legislation, the LRCs consolidate two or more pieces of subsidiary legislation. An example is the Infrastructure Protection (Protected Areas) Orders. When combined, a single subsidiary legislation will list the protected areas that were previously in separate subsidiary legislation. The amendment by clause 12(h) allows this consolidated subsidiary legislation to be amended to accommodate changes to the contents of the subsidiary legislation in the future. As a whole, the amendments in clause 12 help the LRCs' work in keeping our Statute Book coherent and comprehensible, furthering the rule of law.

Finally, Sir, I come to the amendment relating to the Women's Charter 1961.

Clause 13 amends the Women's Charter to make a minor drafting adjustment to the new section 126B, which was inserted by section 35 of the Women's Charter (Amendment) Act 2022 and is yet to be commenced. The amendment clarifies that the new measures to enhance the enforcement of child access orders apply to all access orders made under section 126 of the Women's Charter.

In conclusion, Sir, this Bill makes miscellaneous and minor amendments in the manner that I have just described. Sir, I beg to move.

[(proc text) Question proposed. (proc text)]