Hansard, Wednesday, 8 May 2019

1 Ms Irene Quay Siew Ching asked the Minister for Education with regard to the post-secondary admission system to be implemented in 2028 (a) how does the new subject banding determine subsequent admission to post-secondary institutions of choice; and (b) how can it be ensured that a student chooses subject bands based on his ability and talent and not influenced primarily by entry criteria of his favoured post-secondary institutions.

Mr Speaker, as announced earlier during the Committee of Supply debate, the Ministry of Education will study how the post-secondary posting system should be adjusted to complement the rollout of Full Subject-Based Banding (SBB).

We have some time to work out the details and will announce them in good time. But the general thrust is to build upon ongoing efforts to recognise the strengths and talents of students.

For example, we have the Polytechnic Foundation Programme (PFP) today, where students who have done well in the Normal (Academic) course can apply straight to polytechnic. The core feature of PFP is to inject flexibility into the posting system, recognising the fact that students blossom at different times and have different strengths. In future, under "one secondary education, many subject bands", such considerations should not be just for special schemes like PFP, but an integral feature of the posting system.

In a similar vein, we will also study how we can further evolve the Early Admissions Exercise for polytechnics and the Institutes of Technical Education, and Direct School Admissions for junior colleges.

To help students make informed post-secondary choices, students go through education and career guidance (ECG) in secondary school to help them better understand their strengths and interests. Teachers and ECG counsellors guide students to explore different education pathways, different industries and job roles.

Full SBB and expanding aptitude-based admissions are part of the multiple pathways that we are creating to better cater to students with different interests and learning needs. We will keep evolving our education system to ensure that students are able to choose their subject bands and Post-Secondary Education Institutions based on what best fits their aptitudes and interests.

2 Mr Lim Biow Chuan asked the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance, currently, how many citizens live in private properties but do not have any declared income.

Sir, of 2.7 million adult Singaporean Citizens, about 6% or 164,000 live in private properties and do not declare income for the purposes of personal income tax in Singapore. They generally come under three groups: (a) they have no yearly income of any form; or (b) they do have income but that income is not taxable, including interest income or dividend income; or (c) they do have taxable income, but are not required to file tax returns as they are not subject to tax after taking into account their tax deductions and reliefs.

The 164,000 figure includes citizens who have access to other financial means. For example, those who have retired with private savings, and those who are receiving financial support from economically active family members.

We do not have further details of the financial situation of the 164,000 citizens, as we only collect information required for tax administration.

Mr Lim Biow Chuan.

May I ask the Second Minister whether we can take better care of this group of residents who stay in private property and whether we are able to assess whether this group of citizens who are without income, are they genuinely poor? I think we can do a little bit more for those who have no income rather than no taxable income. At the end of the day, at each Budget, we see benefits like the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Vouchers being given to those who stay in Housing and Development Board flats who have income. But for those who are in private property, they do not reap the benefits. They do not even get the benefit of things like digital television starter kits and they definitely do not qualify for service and conservancy charges rebates. I am just wondering whether the Government would want to review the policy to try to identify citizens who generally do not have income staying in private property and who would reap benefits of some of these Budget provisions for them.

I thank the Member for his question. Indeed, the Government's concern is the same as the Member's, which is, to make sure that all Singaporeans who are in need are taken care of. So, I think there are a few things. One, we have broad-based schemes and, for broad-based schemes, you need to have fairly rough and ready proxy indicators. There may be some who do not fall within the broad-based schemes, and then, we have to see how we can assist those, look at the way in which we try to identify them, because we do not have the detailed granular information. I would say about 80% are covered through our broad-based schemes like GST Vouchers, MediShield Life, Community Health Assist Scheme, Workfare Income Supplement, Silver Support and so on. I think the group that Mr Lim Biow Chuan is talking about is those who live in private properties who have not declared their income. That is 164,000 out of the 2.7 million adults that I mentioned. And out of those, some actually may have financial resources, either because of savings or they may have non-taxable income by way of dividends or interest, or their children may be looking after them.

The challenge then becomes, out of that 164,000, how do you identify the ones who really may have no income at all and may need some assistance.

The way it is designed is for those to do so by application. And we do have broad-based schemes like the Pioneer Generation Package that applies to all, even those in private properties, and the upcoming Merdeka Generation Package. So, the ones who do not benefit from the broad-based schemes, we would encourage them to apply if in genuine need because the system does allow for appeals and consideration of particular circumstances.

Mr Lim Biow Chuan.here1

Let me thank the Senior Minister of State. Oh, I beg your pardon! I thank the Minister. I do have residents who stay in private property. They have income from dividends or interest. But when they look at the Budget provisions and they see that they get nothing, whereas those who stay in 5-room flats, who earn more than them get the benefits of the Budget provisions. They really feel that this is inequitable. They, too, have done their part for the nation. They are disadvantaged purely because they live in a private property. So, they ask where is the equity of it all because, at the end of the day, they earn less than certain groups of people who earn more but living in 4- or 5-room flats. This group of people may be younger, earn more, and they get more from the Budget compared to them who are retired, living on interest income or dividend income.

I would not say that they are poor. But they feel that, "I, too, have done my part in building this country up". Can the Government not consider what they have contributed and give them more in terms of providing for them in the Budget? And I apologise once again, Minister.

Mr Speaker, I am not sure what I had done to the Member in my capacity as Senior Minister of State, but that identity seems to remain very firmly fixed in the Member's psyche! We shall try to see what we can do to dislodge that!

In the meantime, if I may address the specific question the Member has raised. I can understand how some of his residents may feel. It may be too much of a generalisation, though, to say that there is nothing for them at all in the Budget. Because, for example, education is broad-based and it applies to even those who are in private property. In particular, we also have healthcare. So, for polyclinics and other healthcare services, these are also available to them. And not forgetting things like last year's SG Bonus. That would have gone to everybody, irrespective of the property that they were living in.

It is important to look at the specific social scheme. For the GST Vouchers, for example, the idea was really to offset for those who are lower income and have less means. That is the reason why it is structured such that you look at their income and you look at the type of property that they stay in. It is also not fair to be subsidising those who do have some means.

I will come back to the basic point, which is that there are schemes which apply to all, and residents in private properties without income will benefit from those. But they may have specific difficulties. We will address those on a case-by-case basis. The assurance we can give is that those genuinely in need will not be left without assistance.

In terms of recognition, it should not be forgotten that things like the Pioneer Generation Package and the Merdeka Generation Package were specifically designed to give recognition. Precisely because we recognised that these different groups have contributed to the nation, that is why those are not means-tested and are given to all.

3 Mr Png Eng Huat asked the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Finance (a) whether there is a remuneration cap for key management staff of Fifth Schedule companies like GIC and Temasek Holdings; and (b) for the past five years, what is the range of total annual remuneration, including salary, annual and performance bonuses, paid to the top three higher paid executives in GIC and Temasek respectively.

Mr Speaker, the Government of Singapore Investment Corporation (GIC) and Temasek are commercially-run companies. The remunerations of their staff are, therefore, decided independently by their respective boards. The Government maintains an arms-length relationship with the companies and does not interfere in their operational decisions, such as remuneration. Instead, we hold the boards accountable for their respective performances.

Broadly speaking, both entities adopt remuneration frameworks that are based on performance and industry benchmarks. The salaries are benchmarked to the relevant markets and sectors where the entities compete for talent. This ensures that they can attract and retain capable people.

The remuneration frameworks also aim to support and reinforce a prudent risk-taking culture. A portion of the remuneration in both entities is tied to long-term performance. This ensures that staff, including senior management, are rewarded for long-term sustained performance, rather than a focus on short-term gains.

Ultimately, the Government evaluates the performance of the two entities based on their long-term returns, net of all expenses incurred. These figures are published in their annual reports, and they show that both GIC and Temasek have performed creditably under challenging market conditions.

Mr Png Eng Huat.

Mr Speaker, just a quick question. The reason I asked is because these two entities are managing our Reserves and the Government is the sole shareholder. Usually, the shareholders would know the remuneration packages for the company that they own. Does the Government or anyone in the Finance Ministry know the remuneration packages for the top brass in terms of the value of GIC and Temasek?

Mr Speaker, I think we should take a step back. As I have said, what we are trying to do is to design a system that best supports the mandate of GIC and Temasek, and that mandate is to secure good long-term returns on their overall portfolio. So, our focus should not be on one or two expense items, but on designing an overall system that enhances and maximises long-term performance, and that is what we have tried to do.

As I have explained in this House before, the way we go about this is through a very rigorous process. When we look at expected future long-term returns, there is a thorough assessment of the investment environment, done by professionals. The Ministry of Finance reviews that assessment of the investment environment. The expected long-term returns for both GIC and Temasek, that figure is proposed to the President and the President makes an independent assessment of that long-term expected return, together with the Council of Presidential Advisers.

So, that long-term expected return is the basis which both GIC and Temasek work to achieve over a period of time and their performances every year are published in their annual reports. That overall system is designed, as I have said, to maximise and secure our best chances of getting good long-term returns. That is the system we have today which achieves that result.

4 Mr Vikram Nair asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs whether he can provide an update on the state of bilateral relations with Malaysia following the 9th Malaysia-Singapore Leaders' Retreat.

Mr Speaker, Malaysia hosted the 9th Leaders’ Retreat on 9 April 2019. Prime Minister Lee and Prime Minister Mahathir had very candid discussions and they both reaffirmed our mutual commitment to maintaining a positive and constructive bilateral relationship. I will now provide an update on four key areas: the maritime boundaries, air, water, and land connectivity issues.

So, let us start with maritime boundaries. The Malaysian Foreign Minister Mr Saifuddin Abdullah and I agreed on a set of measures to de-escalate tensions on 14 March 2019. Malaysia and Singapore have, therefore, mutually suspended the implementation of the overlapping port limits, and we have applied the port limits that were in effect prior to 25 October 2018 and 6 December 2018 respectively. The Malaysian Government vessels are no longer anchored in the area.

The next step is for both countries to start negotiations on the maritime boundary, and we will do so through the committee that is co-chaired by the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Secretary General of the Malaysian Foreign Affairs Ministry. This Committee will be meeting soon.

On water, our position has remained clear, consistent and unchanged. At the Retreat, we reiterated that Malaysia has lost the right to review the price of water under the 1962 Water Agreement. Neither country can unilaterally change the terms of this Agreement. The 1962 Water Agreement is enshrined in the 1965 Separation Agreement. It is, therefore, a fundamental founding document for Singapore. Our Attorneys-General are having further discussions on the differing legal positions of both sides on the right to review the price of water under the 1962 Water Agreement.

Whilst Malaysia is apparently most concerned about the price of raw water, this issue cannot be viewed in isolation.

First, if there is any revision in the price of raw water, it is obvious that the price of treated water that Singapore sells to Johor will also have to be revised. This is obvious. Second, at the Retreat, Prime Minister Lee highlighted Singapore’s grave concerns about the multiple pollution incidents which have affected the Johor River and the long-term yield of the Johor River. Members of the House would be aware, and I think Minister Masagos Zulkifli reminded us of this over the last two days, of the recent case of ammonia pollution in the Johor River on 4 April 2019. This is the seventh pollution incident in the Johor River since 2017 which led to a shutdown of our Waterworks. Further, Johor has built at least two water treatment plants upstream of the Public Utilities Board's (PUB’s) Johor River Waterworks, and we also note that the future demands for water in Johor will increase. These two Malaysian plants, combined with our Johor River Waterworks, are currently drawing more water from the Johor River than it can yield on a sustainable basis.

These issues, if not addressed, will compromise Singapore’s right to extract our full 250 million gallons per day (mgd) entitlement of water under the 1962 Water Agreement. They will also affect the water supply for Johor’s own growing needs, and action needs to be taken expeditiously to avoid a potentially more intractable issue in the future. This is a problem which is clear and present and we can see it looming. Both sides have noted Singapore and Malaysia’s mutual interest in identifying appropriate and timely measures, including additional schemes, to increase the yield of the Johor River, and to safeguard its environmental conditions, and to safeguard, in particular, the quality of the water. Officials from both countries will follow up on this. The two Foreign Ministers have also been tasked to follow up on the water issues that were raised at the Retreat.

Let me move now to airspace. On 6 April 2019, both sides agreed for Malaysia to indefinitely suspend its Restricted Area over Pasir Gudang, and for Singapore to withdraw the Instrument Landing System (ILS) procedures for Seletar Airport. The ILS procedures will be replaced with GPS-based instrument approach procedures. The technical agencies from both countries are currently engaged in discussions with a view to implementing the GPS-based instrument approach procedures soon for both the northern and southern approaches.

At the Retreat, Malaysia reiterated its intention to review the existing arrangements for air traffic services provision over southern Peninsular Malaysia pursuant to the 1974 Operational Letter of Agreement that was signed by Malaysia and Singapore. It is very important to note that this 1974 Operational Letter of Agreement, in fact, operationalises the decisions that were reached at the 1973 Asia-Pacific Regional Air Navigation Meeting held under the auspices of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO). This decision sets out the recommendations that were agreed to by both Singapore and Malaysia, as well as other regional states, and was subsequently approved by the ICAO Council. Thus, any review of the existing airspace arrangements should take into account both countries’ needs and interests, as well as the interests of other stakeholders, including the airlines and ICAO. Any proposal to change the current arrangements must also be in accordance with ICAO standards, processes and procedures, and the 1973 decision I mentioned earlier. Our utmost priority must be to achieve the highest standards of safety and efficiency in civil aviation operations, given that the airspace arrangements in our region are very complex and will only get more complex in the future as air traffic continues to grow. Discussions on the review of the 1974 Operational Letter of Agreement will involve consultations with many regional and global stakeholders. These will take time. It cannot be rushed. Singapore will discuss these matters with Malaysia in good faith and in the spirit of bilateral cooperation.

On land connectivity, Singapore will consider Malaysia’s proposal to suspend the Johor Bahru-Singapore Rapid Transit System (RTS) Link Project for six months from 1 April 2019 and we will do so in a manner that is similar to the arrangements that we made for the suspension of the Kuala Lumpur-Singapore High Speed Rail (HSR) Project. Both sides are currently working out the details of the Supplemental Agreement to effect this proposed suspension. As for the HSR Project, both sides had earlier agreed to suspend the Project up to 31 May 2020.

Both Prime Ministers also discussed the issue of congestion at the Causeway and Second Link. Both Prime Ministers agreed to explore initiatives, including the use of new technology, for enhanced security and checkpoint efficiency. Prime Minister Lee also shared Singapore’s plans to upgrade the Woodlands Checkpoint to meet growing traffic needs, and to ensure that immigration clearance remains secure.

Singapore believes that the RTS Link and the HSR Projects are mutually beneficial projects that will significantly ease congestion, facilitate business and tourism, and bring the people of Malaysia and Singapore closer together. Malaysia wants to review these projects, and we have agreed for this review to be done in the spirit of bilateral cooperation. The ball is now in their court, and we hope that Malaysia will find a way forward in the projects within the period of suspension that they have requested.

Mr Speaker, in conclusion, Singapore and Malaysia will always be close neighbours and issues will inevitably crop up from time to time. What is important is that we continue to keep the channels of communication open; we discuss these issues in a calm and constructive way, on the basis of equality and mutual respect; we honour our international agreements fully, and we find amicable win-win solutions in accordance with international law.

I believe both sides have demonstrated, at the Leaders’ Retreat, a commitment to manage some of the recent bilateral issues to ensure that we protect our broader, multifaceted relationship. We are now on a more stable footing. But there is still much work to be done, and there are also new areas of cooperation which we hope to explore together. Singapore is ready and willing to cooperate with Malaysia in the spirit of goodwill and neighbourliness.

Mr Vikram Nair.

I thank the Minister for the very comprehensive response covering a very wide range of issues and I think very good outcomes have been achieved from this Leaders' Retreat in very difficult situations. But this is more of a subjective question. Does the Minister feel that good relationships have also been built at all levels, including at the working level where all the implementation will take place? Because the Malaysian government is very large and many of the Ministers are new and I think at the working level, the government-to-government level, it will be good to have relationships as well. I am wondering if this is the first step to building relationships at a deeper level.

Relationships at multiple levels are important. And I think at the people-to-people level, given our history and the fact that most of us have relatives on both sides of the Causeway, I believe Singaporeans and Malaysians want good relations between our two states. Having said that, I think it is just as important for the Civil Service, the officials, the Members of Parliament from all parties, and Ministers and obviously the Prime Ministers, to also continue to engage one another, look for areas where we can cooperate constructively, understand each other's concerns and anxieties and then try to make progress. So, I want to encourage more interaction between the civil servants and Parliamentarians. And I would encourage all of you to do so when the opportunities arise.

Mr Pritam Singh.

I thank the Minister for Foreign Affairs for his reply. My question pertains to the comments made by the Minister with regard to water and, particularly, the right of Singapore under the 1962 Water Agreement to draw up to 250 mgd from Johor. The Minister said that, in future, it would appear that there would be a risk that we would not be able to draw that amount, given that Johor's own needs are likely to grow. The development sounds worrying for Singapore. Can I ask the Minister, prior to today, for example, have there been situations where we have not been able to draw the 250 mgd, apart from those incidents where the waterworks had to be shut down?

This is a very important point. Quite apart from Johor's own growing needs, and we expect that as we do more together with Johor, and as our bilateral projects take off and the economy improves, Johor will need more water. But actually, and here I would be very frank, the biggest threat to Johor's own water supply is actually the lack of environmental protection. The seven episodes of pollution since 2017, which resulted in the water treatment plants having to be shut down, are a clear and present amber warning light.

Singaporeans may not have noticed because whenever our plant shuts down, fortunately, because of very careful and astute management by PUB, Singaporeans' water supply is apparently not affected. But every time our plant in Johor shuts down, there is disruption and water rationing in Johor. So, this should focus their minds on protecting the environmental standards and the quality of the water in the rivers.

And again, as a former Minister in charge of water, I need to remind Members if you walk outside Parliament, you will realise that every drain, every longkang in the city, flows into Marina Bay. And we drink the water from Marina Bay, after appropriate treatment. The challenge in maintaining that quality of assured water supply is not just a technical challenge. It means having strict laws against littering, against pollution, strict and careful long-term planning on zoning, on what type of economic activities are allowed in the water catchment area. And in fact, this has been a key critical ingredient for Singapore's success in water management.

The fact is, actually, the same approach is needed in Johor. But I do not want to belabour this point because, to be fair, the authorities in Johor are aware of this, and within their own limits, they are trying to address it. I do want to add one more point that, actually, PUB has an excellent relationship with the water agencies in Johor. We have worked very well. There is no problem at the technical level.

Assoc Prof Walter Theseira.

Speaker, just to follow up on the Minister's last point. Would Singapore consider providing material or technical assistance to Malaysia on a bilateral basis to safeguard the Johor River watershed? Is it something we are prepared to do?

Actually, Singapore and Malaysia have been working on this for a very long time. A clear example of this is the construction of the dam over the Linggiu River, which has led to the development of the Linggiu Reservoir, which has been operating since the 1990s, and has been a significant buffer that has helped to ensure good yield from the Johor River. I would have to remind everyone, including the Malaysians, that Singapore paid for it. We paid for its construction, we paid compensation. In fact, our estimate is that, over the years, we have probably spent over $1 billion on such projects. So, there should be no question about our willingness to engage and assist on a technical level in order to further projects which ultimately have win-win consequences for both Johor and Singapore in the long term.

I should also add that these investments that we have made in Linggiu Reservoir, ultimately, they are owned by Malaysia. And just as in 2011 when we returned all the waterworks in full working order to Johor – these were the waterworks in Tebrau, Skudai and Gunung Pulai, which were pursuant to the 1961 Water Agreement – we intend to do the same thing pursuant to the current 1962 Water Agreement, which expires in 2061.

I say all this so that I hope the Malaysian people appreciate that Singapore has been a constructive, helpful, reliable and honest partner. And actually the more important fundamental point – if you cut across all the political polemic which you often hear – the fact is that the Water Agreements – the 1961 Agreement which has expired and the 1962 Agreement which is still in effect – actually have brought enormous benefit to the people of both Malaysia and Singapore.

5 Ms Irene Quay Siew Ching asked the Minister for Health (a) how rigorous is medication tested by the Health Sciences Authority before the drugs enter Singapore; (b) whether the testing is in line with international testing standards; (c) whether there are public concerns with generic use of medications in Singapore; and (d) what are the steps and considerations taken by the Ministry compared to other countries' handling of the same worldwide concern, particularly with the Losartan recall.

The Health Sciences Authority (HSA) sets stringent standards on the quality and safety of medicines sold in Singapore. Before being approved for sale, the medicines are evaluated to ensure that they meet the required international standards of quality, safety and efficacy. HSA conducts in-depth technical assessments of the scientific data from clinical studies, as well as the manufacturing and quality control processes. In addition, HSA checks that the manufacturers conform to international standards of Good Manufacturing Practice.

After approval, HSA conducts post-market surveillance which includes monitoring of global developments and risk-based product sampling and testing for compliance to quality and safety specifications. Products found to be deficient in quality will be withdrawn from the market. Manufacturers are also required to test all batches of medicines to be sold in Singapore, including the levels of specific impurities, to ensure that they comply with stipulated standards.

Generic medicines are subject to the same strict regime of regulatory controls to ensure their safety, efficacy and quality.

The standards, checks and processes adopted by HSA are similar to those adopted by regulatory counterparts in other jurisdictions, such as Australia, Canada, Europe, Japan and the United States (US). HSA’s Pharmaceutical Laboratory is also accredited to international standards, such as the International Organization for Standardization/International Electrotechnical Commission 17025 standard for testing laboratories. It is also a World Health Organization Collaborating Centre for Medicines Quality Assurance.

On 28 March 2019, HSA recalled three brands of medicines which belong to the angiotensin receptor blocker (ARB) class of blood pressure medication and contain the ingredient losartan. Following the recall of several losartan medicines in the US due to the presence of a nitrosamine impurity, N-nitroso-N-methyl-4-aminobutyric acid (NMBA), HSA tested the suspected losartan medicines and they were found to contain trace amounts of NMBA which are above the acceptable limit.

The routine tests required of the manufacturers are based on known impurities that may be generated during the manufacturing process, as it is not practical to exhaustively test for all types of impurities. In the case of the recalled losartan medicines, testing for nitrosamines like NMBA was not previously part of the testing parameters of ARB medicines as NMBA was not expected to be generated in the manufacturing process. This approach is similar to that adopted in other countries, including the US, Canada and the European Union.

As the short-term risk of taking the medicine was low, the advisory to affected patients was to continue taking their medicines until they are provided with suitable alternatives. Sudden stopping of their medication could pose greater and more immediate risk to patients’ health.

Meanwhile, HSA and our public healthcare family worked together to reach out to affected patients to facilitate a switch to alternative medicines. HSA tested all locally marketed ARB medicines to ensure that these alternatives do not contain NMBA. Public healthcare institutions then scheduled appointments for affected patients to switch to alternative medicines. The institutions also deployed additional staff to operate the hotlines for patient queries and set up service touchpoints to help patients switch their medicines. These actions went beyond what most other countries had done.

As of 28 April, we have helped more than half of the affected patients switch to alternative medicines. For all patients whose appointments are on or after 1 July, public healthcare institutions have already reached out to all of them to offer earlier appointments. We are on schedule to complete the exercise by end June this year. Since the recall, HSA has also been working with suppliers and international regulatory agencies to determine the cause of contamination, and to formulate measures to eliminate the nitrosamines in the medium to longer term. HSA will continue to monitor the quality and safety of these medicines to safeguard public health.

Ms Irene Quay.

I thank the Senior Minister of State. I would like to congratulate the Ministry of Health for the excellent leadership and planning in this recall of losartan event, taking an open but calibrated approach to ensure that patients have sufficient, unaffected stocks and, at the same time, avoid panic on the ground such that patients stop taking their anti-hypertensives. I think this is something the world can learn from us. Just a question: when are we expecting the stock to be stabilised so that patients will not be inconvenienced by the current stock restriction policy?

We expect the stock of losartan as well as other ARBs to stabilise from 1 July onwards. This is based on the current concept of operation whereby affected patients will be restricted to only one-month supply, and gradually increasing to two or even three months of supply, which is the regular practice, from 1 July onwards. We would like to reassure all patients that we have sufficient stocks of alternatives, as well as losartan stocks that are not contaminated with the nitrosamines. Things should go back to normalcy from July onwards.

6 Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang asked the Minister for Health (a) what is the rationale behind barring women above 45 years old from receiving in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatments in Singapore; (b) what is the rationale behind limiting the number of IVF fresh cycles for women above 40 years old; and (c) whether the Ministry is planning to review these restrictions.

The success rates of Assisted Reproduction (AR) procedures decrease and the likelihood of medical complications and adverse pregnancy outcomes increases with maternal age. It is, therefore, important that patients are well informed of the risks and outcomes of such procedures.

To protect patients’ interests, the current age limit for AR procedures, including in-vitro fertilisation (IVF), is set at age 45. However, the Ministry of Health (MOH) considers appeals on a case-by-case basis.

In addition, the current IVF limit is set at 10 fresh cycles for women aged 40 and below, and five fresh cycles for women above 40. This is because there are increased clinical risks with multiple cycles of ovarian stimulation and oocyte retrieval. These risks include ovarian hyper-stimulation syndrome, bleeding and infection.

We recognise that recent advancements in AR technology have improved the safety of AR procedures in general. The Government reviews these limits regularly and will take into account such technological advancements and other medical and social considerations, including the risk of chronic diseases, pregnancy or delivery complications, and continued low success rates of pregnancy and live births for women of higher maternal age.

Mr Louis Ng.

I thank the Senior Minister of State for the reply. I understand the concerns and risks that she mentioned, but these are concerns and risks that parents should consider and decide whether they want to have a child, and not something that the Government should decide.

So, two clarifications. One, whether MOH will review this policy of restricting the number of IVF cycles after age 40 and restricting IVF completely after 45; and two, how long will such a review take?

Let me say that besides Singapore, some countries like Belgium and Israel also impose AR age limits due to medical and social concerns of pregnancy and childbearing at older ages.

In Singapore, the current AR age limit of 45 is set based on empirical evidence that shows that the chances of conception are very low at older ages. In fact, for AR success rates, it falls sharply at age 40, from 17.1% for women of ages between 35 and 39, to less than 7% for women from age 40 to 44. And then it falls further to about 4% for women aged 45 and above. In addition, there are also increased medical risks and complications as well as adverse pregnancy outcomes for women of older ages. As I have said in my reply, this is really set to protect the patients' interests. Nonetheless, MOH does consider appeals on a case-by-case basis.

For the treatment cycle limit of five fresh cycles for women above the age of 40, again, this is due to concerns of increased clinical risks with older ages, with multiple cycles of ovarian stimulation and oocyte retrieval. Notwithstanding this, as I have also said, we recognise that there have been recent advancements made in AR technology that have actually improved the safety of AR procedures in general, we regularly review these limits and will take into account such technological advancements as well as professional standards of care and other patient factors. It is an ongoing review. So, we will make the announcements if we decide to change these limits.

Mr Louis Ng.

I just want to make one point. I understand the policy intent. But what all this is driving is that these parents who want to have kids are just going to Johor to do the IVF cycles, and that places a lot of undue stress on them to travel to another country to do something that they want to do which our Government is prohibiting them to do.

My response will be that, as I have said, even as there are advancements made in AR technology and it is safer and lower risk now to women for the AR procedure, we need to continue to highlight to couples who want children that notwithstanding the advancement in AR technology, the chances of conception, of pregnancy, at older ages have not increased, remain low. The medical risk and adverse pregnancy outcomes also remain. That has to be highlighted, so that they do not have false high expectations of success for such AR procedures at older ages.

Just a quick clarification for the Senior Minister of State. I was wondering if the Senior Minister of State could share with the House for those appeals for IVF, what are some of the considerations that the Ministry takes into account when evaluating the appeals?

We received about 50 patients' appeal per year over the last five years. Some of the factors we take into account will be the medical conditions of the female patient, the maternal age, as well as the number of fresh cycles that she had previously undergone.

7 Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang asked the Minister for Manpower for each year in the past five years for non-Malaysian Work Permit holders with salary claims, what is the number of cases whereby (i) the employer does not pay the full sum ordered by the Labour Court or Employment Claims Tribunal, (ii) the security bond is invoked to repay the worker, (iii) the Migrant Workers' Assistance Fund (MWAF) is used to repay the worker and (iv) both the security bond and MWAF are invoked.

In the last five years, the Labour Court and the Employment Claims Tribunals issued an average of 130 money orders per year for salary claims involving non-Malaysian Work Permit holders. In most cases, affected workers received full payments from their employers or settlement payments through insurers. In about 10% of the cases, the Migrant Workers’ Centre stepped in to provide assistance to the workers via the Migrant Workers’ Assistance Fund (MWAF).

Employers are required to furnish a security bond (SB) for non-Malaysian Work Permit holders whom they wish to employ. In the last five years, the Government forfeited an average of 150 SBs annually for workers with salary claims due to reasons, such as non-payment of salary or failure to repatriate the workers. MWAF is funded through donations from the public, which is matched by Government funding, rather than through forfeiture of SBs, which can vary greatly from year to year.

All workers, local and foreign, should come forward when they face salary issues. The evidence clearly shows that early reporting greatly improves the chances of recovering the owed salaries fully from the employers.

Mr Louis Ng.

I thank the Minister of State for the reply. Can I just check, for the 10% where the employers did not pay the unpaid wages, was the SB used? Second, under what criteria is this SB used and under what criteria is MWAF used? And third, whether the Ministry of Manpower has a preference on using either of these two?

Generally, we will talk to the companies to get the insurance to cover. If the insurance does not cover, the SB gets forfeited, and the workers get assisted through MWAF. So, that gets deployed to supplement for the last 10%, for example, who do not get payments.

So, the majority of those receiving orders actually get full payments. But there will be some, if they approach the Migrant Workers Centre, we can provide some ex-gratia assistance, but on a case-by-case basis, to help them through.

Mr Louis Ng.

Can I just confirm that when they file a case, they do get judgment in the Court and, if the employer does not pay and the insurance is unable to pay, then the SB will be used in all cases?

That is the order of preference, yes.

8 Assoc Prof Walter Theseira asked the Minister for Manpower whether the Ministry will start monitoring the number of employers who have adopted measures in the Tripartite Advisory for Managing Workplace Harassment, with such monitoring to include whether the employer has a policy explicitly defining harassment, including sexual harassment, whether the policy details how harassment will be dealt with, and whether training is provided to employees on how to prevent and respond to harassment.

Mr Speaker, individuals who face harassment at the workplace should contact the Tripartite Alliance for Fair and Progressive Employment Practices (TAFEP) for advice and assistance. If the facts suggest that an offence under the Penal Code or the Protection from Harassment Act (POHA) is committed, TAFEP will refer them to the Police or the Courts.

At the Ministry of Manpower's (MOM's) Committee of Supply (COS) debate this year, in fact, just two months ago, we announced that TAFEP would set up a centre for workplace harassment, so as to further enhance the support provided to individuals who come forward to report workplace harassment.

In 2015, the tripartite partners also agreed on a Tripartite Advisory on Managing Workplace Harassment. The tripartite partners affirm that all employers are expected to provide a safe and healthy working environment for their employees. They are also in agreement that for cases that do not constitute a criminal offence, the proper way to deal with it is through effective grievance handling procedures within the companies. To help employers put in place processes to prevent and manage workplace harassment complaints, TAFEP provides online resources, such as a sample workplace harassment prevention policy and a list of training providers, to train the supervisors in dealing with workplace harassment and complaints.

Tripartite advisories are meant to provide further guidance for employers and employees. We do not track how many companies implement the measures suggested in the advisories. However, when evaluating whether an employer has taken adequate measures in response to a complaint of workplace harassment, MOM and TAFEP will assess whether the employer has implemented an effective grievance handling procedure as well as the measures that are outlined in the Tripartite Advisory on Managing Workplace Harassment. If the employer failed to address a workplace harassment case fairly, TAFEP would advise the employer to review the case again. TAFEP would also engage the employer to put in place the proper measures as outlined in the Tripartite Advisory to ensure better prevention and also management of workplace harassment. For egregious cases where the companies fail to provide a safe environment for their employees, MOM will take actions against the company, including curtailing the work passes.

Assoc Prof Walter Theseira.

I thank the Senior Parliamentary Secretary for the reply. I understand the Ministry is taking this issue very seriously. I appreciate those efforts very much.

The main concern here is that if we are not putting in some effort to try to track, for example, the number of employers who are adhering to these guidelines, we would find it difficult to say anything credibly about how well we are addressing these concerns. If there were, for example, an incident of severe workplace harassment, let us say, not taken care of properly in the workplace, as what happened to students at the National University of Singapore, then it would be difficult for the Government to say what is the actual state of affairs. That is my concern.

I want to thank Assoc Prof Walter Theseira for the supplementary questions. Maybe allow me to explain what the difference is between a tripartite advisory and a tripartite standard. But before that, allow me to again recap that two months ago, MOM announced that TAFEP will be made a resource centre of workplace harassment. One of the objectives is, like what Assoc Prof Walter Theseira has mentioned, to educate and also equip not just employers, but also employees, with the necessary information and resources when it comes to this topic of workplace harassment.

In the Tripartite Advisory, we have provided very clear, very comprehensive and a free sample copy of the Workplace Harassment Prevention Policy. Very detailed information, which will cover guiding principles, definition of workplace harassment and also how to take pre-emptive steps and so on. TAFEP has also, within the last two months, produced a video, so that we can share with, not just employers but also employees, what constitutes workplace harassment, the definition I talked about; and the video outlines what the employers' fundamental responsibilities and policies should be.

I want to assure the Member that TAFEP is certainly stepping up efforts to extend the outreach to more employers and employees and also to advise more employers to implement the measures that are outlined in the tripartite advisory. Other than the education efforts, we are working with partners like the Labour Movement. We are also working with the Singapore National Employers' Federation to organise workshops because we realised it is not just the boss in the company, we need to work with the supervisors. And the workshops are also targeted at the supervisors to help them understand how to smoothen the employer and employee relationship.

I have talked about the tripartite advisory. The objective of the advisory is to outline the comprehensive information and also a sample copy of the Workplace Harassment Prevention Policy. It is also a way for us to develop the pipeline for companies that will come on board the Tripartite Standards. TAFEP has carried ads about the Tripartite Standard on grievance handling so as to encourage employers to adopt proper and specific practices in these areas, which also include workplace harassment. Allow me to share some numbers. As at end January this year, more than 960 employers – which collectively employ more than 498,000 people – have signed on to the standard.

Mr Patrick Tay.

Just a point and a suggestion for the Senior Parliamentary Secretary. In light of the amendments that she has seen in the last two days on the Penal Code as well as POHA, can I request MOM to take the lead and work with our tripartite partners and review the Tripartite Advisory on Managing Workplace Harassment as well as the outreach efforts and materials?

I want to thank the Member Mr Patrick Tay for the suggestion and I also want to take the opportunity to thank him and the Labour Members in the National Trades Union Congress Labour Movement for their efforts since the introduction of POHA. They have been doing very regular legal primers on this topic of workplace harassment in partnership with the Law Society of Singapore; they have done this since POHA was passed as law. I know that they have done this to better educate the employees, in particular, the union members and the non-union members as well.

To answer the Member's question, this is a copy of the tripartite advisory. MOM and TAFEP will continue to work with our tripartite partners to keep this document current and relevant. I must also say that the current focus is to go all out, to expand our outreach to cover even more employers and employees. We remain committed to keep this current and relevant, so that we can advise and bring on board more employers to keep our workplaces harassment-free.

Ms Anthea Ong.

The Senior Parliamentary Secretary earlier mentioned that a centre will be set up for employees to report cases of sexual harassment at the workplace. That is not coming yet, that is actually in the pipeline. Could the Senior Parliamentary Secretary share more of that and what is the process for employees to come forward if they want to report cases at the centre?

I want to thank Ms Anthea Ong. As soon as it was announced in early March during the MOM COS, the Resource Centre at TAFEP began its operations. Allow me to share the functions of the Resource Centre. Employees can choose to file the report with TAFEP and they will be advised on the appropriate actions that they can take against the perpetrator and also the avenues of support. Depending on the case details, TAFEP can link them up with the Police, or the Courts if it is an egregious case of workplace harassment which constitutes an offence under the Penal Code or POHA. For affected employees who need counselling services, TAFEP will also help advise them on where to obtain such support services and put them in touch with the relevant agencies. So, we also provide them the necessary support.

9 Ms Anthea Ong asked the Minister for Manpower whether the Ministry can conduct an in-depth study on legal protection for casual workers in other jurisdictions with the view of developing a new framework on the rights and benefits of casual workers, given the rise in number of such workers in recent years.

Mr Speaker, casual work employees, whose working days or hours are not fixed, make up a small and declining share of the workforce. They constituted 3.4% of resident employees in 2018, down from 5.1% in 2009.

All employees, including casual work employees, are covered by Singapore’s various employment-related legislation, such as the Employment Act and Central Provident Fund (CPF) Act. Therefore, like regular employees, casual work employees are entitled to timely payment of salary, CPF and protection against wrongful dismissal. They are also entitled to paid annual and sick leave if they have been employed for at least three months.

Other jurisdictions might have seen an increase in the number of self-employed persons (SEPs) engaging in casual work. In Singapore, we cannot equate SEPs with casual workers. For example, taxi drivers are self-employed but work regular shifts. Nonetheless, the proportion of SEPs who did self-employed work as their main job has remained stable at 8% to 10% of our resident workforce over the past decade. In fact, there was a drop in the number of SEPs last year, due in part to the tighter job market. Our surveys show that many SEPs choose to be self-employed for greater flexibility and autonomy.

In 2017, the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) convened a Tripartite Workgroup on SEPs. The workgroup consulted extensively with SEPs and other stakeholders, such as SEP associations and service-buyers, and considered practices in other jurisdictions as well. Its recommendations are being systematically implemented.

First, the Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management (TADM) launched its voluntary mediation services last year to assist SEPs in resolving disputes. The tripartite partners are also encouraging adoption of the Tripartite Standard on Contracting with SEPs and the key terms of engagement form template to minimise disputes. Second, we made available prolonged medical leave insurance products for SEPs to enhance their protection. Third, we are working with the tripartite partners and SEP associations to ensure that SEPs have access to both technical and non-technical skills training. Lastly, we will be introducing a "Contribute-As-You-Earn" model to make it easier for SEPs to save for their healthcare needs. The Government, as a service-buyer, will take the lead to pilot this savings model next year.

For those seeking alternatives to casual work or self-employment, there is a wide range of support under the Government’s Adapt and Grow initiative. They can approach career centres run by Workforce Singapore and NTUC's Employment and Employability Institute for assistance.

Ms Anthea Ong.

I thank the Minister of State for the response. I understand that a labour task force actually found that there is a third category of workers called the dependent workers. This would be workers who the Ministry cannot correctly categorise as either employees or self-employed persons. Examples of such dependent workers are typically the ones who actually choose to sell their services only to one company, the likes of Grab drivers and Deliveroo deliveryman. How are we supporting this group of dependent workers?

We are aware of some jurisdictions that introduced a separate category of workers and some limited employment protection. But we assessed that doing so could lead employers to reclassify existing employees under this separate category, resulting in reduced protection. So, to a certain sense, one of the major issues that we have seen in countries, such as the United Kingdom and Italy, where they have created a separate category, is that you find employees being classified there or you find misclassification to try to game the system by providing them less benefits.

To some extent, there are two problems that we found. One, we found that in misclassification, employees received weaker protection; at the same time, businesses also got smarter, they then change the contracting models to fully or partially avoid obligations. So, in Singapore, for example, if you are classified as SEP, employers do not pay for CPF, for example, so you will have to fork out yourself. So, in a certain sense, the terms are very different and they are not covered against term. So, I think we will keep to the current model. But where we will do more are schemes in which, for example, for low-wage workers, we have got Workfare to support them and other forms of employability-type schemes, such as training and insurance, so that we can support them better.

Mr Patrick Tay.

I have personally come across casual workers who are sometimes wrongly classified as own account workers, self-employed, freelance, independent contractors, contract-for-service. These terms are used interchangeably. So, can we do more and can MOM have a more robust approach to errant employers as well as a better outreach to such casual workers?

I thank the Member for his observations. In fact, that was what I was mentioning just now. If we create new segments of workers, then all the more you will find employers or some industries trying to game the system.

In the last three years, MOM and CPF Board received a total of 308 cases of suspected misclassification. In 160 cases, workers were assessed to be misclassified as SEPs. Each case that MOM and CPF Board investigate could involve more than one worker. On average, about 100 workers a year were found to be misclassified. In all but two of these misclassification cases, employers made good their obligations when informed of the misclassification and paid back the affected employees what they were due, including overtime pay and CPF contribution. Those are the protection they get as employees.

Penalties, including warning and late payment interest charges, were meted out to the companies. Two companies which refused to make the necessary payments to the affected employees were prosecuted. One subsequently fully settled the arrears out of Court while the other is currently appealing against this conviction. So, rest assured that MOM and CPF Board will investigate the cases. If misclassification is established, we will ensure that employers make good their obligations and to pay back the affected employees what they were due, including overtime pay and CPF contributions.

10 Mr Louis Ng Kok Kwang asked the Minister for National Development (a) apart from relying on tip-offs and the risk assessment framework, what are the current efforts to deter and detect the international trade of pangolins in Singapore; (b) whether the Ministry can use the Multi-Mode Passive Detection System Generation 3 to detect wildlife products in shipments; and (c) whether the Ministry is exploring the use of other technologies to detect shipments of pangolins.

Singapore adopts a whole-of-Government and multi-pronged approach to combat illegal wildlife trade, including the trade of pangolins. First, the National Parks Board (NParks) works closely with Singapore Customs (SC) and the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) to identify cargo for further inspection via tip-offs and a risk assessment framework. Risk profiles and indicators are reviewed regularly to ensure that the framework remains robust. This approach has led to two successful seizures of nearly 26 tonnes of pangolin scales in April 2019.

Second, our enforcement agencies use technology to screen and check travellers and goods at our checkpoints. For example, ICA uses radiographic scanners and hand-held screening devices to ensure that goods that enter Singapore are lawful and legitimate. The Member mentioned the Multi-Mode Passive Detection System (MMPDS). The Ministry of Home Affairs and ICA are currently testing a prototype of the MMPDS. Depending on the outcome of this testing, ICA can work with NParks to use this technology to detect the smuggling of illegal wildlife products. We will continually review our enforcement measures to adopt more effective technology and methods where feasible.

Third, we cooperate closely with our regional and international counterparts to combat illegal wildlife trade. For instance, our agencies assess intelligence reports from our partners and work with them to act upon credible and actionable information. Our officers also attend international conferences and workshops to keep up with developments in the field as well as to share best practices.

Finally, while the Government will continue to enforce to reduce supply, tackling illegal wildlife trade requires the concerted efforts of all stakeholders, including buyers reducing demand for such products. NParks conducts public awareness campaigns to discourage people from buying illegal wildlife and wildlife products, including pangolins. Members of the public can do their part to reduce demand by rejecting these products and encouraging others to do the same.

Mr Louis Ng.

I thank the Senior Parliamentary Secretary for the reply. I think one of the problems may be that the chances of detecting this shipment may be too low. So, the first clarification is: how are we stepping up our detection capabilities at our checkpoints? Beyond the technologies that the Senior Parliamentary Secretary mentioned, are we looking into further technologies? Two, can the Ministry of National Development (MND) work with the local tech companies to develop this kind of new technologies that will help to increase our detection capabilities? Three, and the last clarification is whether we can increase manpower in the enforcement team at NParks that is tackling wildlife crime issues here in Singapore.

I thank the Member for his three supplementary questions. On the point he made about further use of technology, all cargo currently passing through our checkpoints are subject to risk assessment. In my earlier reply, I had responded as to how our enforcement agencies currently use radiographic scanners and handheld screening devices to ensure that the goods that enter are lawful and legitimate. And we are continually reviewing our enforcement measures and the types of technologies that are available in the market to further improve our efficiency and efficacy at it.

In his second question, the Member has asked about whether or not we can work with local tech companies. Indeed, we are open to doing so. So, if the Member is aware of the local tech companies and the products that they have, please feel free to let me know of these contacts and our agencies will follow up with them.

Lastly, about increasing manpower at NParks, that is something the NParks management will look at. Annually, they will make their revisions or updates as and when necessary.

Mr Louis Ng.

I thank the Senior Parliamentary Secretary for the reply again. I think one of the concerns is whether we are able to use this technology for all the cargo that is coming in at our port. It is a little bit easier at the airport and the land checkpoints but, at the port, there is difficulty using some of these scanners when the containers are on board the ship. So, is MND looking into this?

The point about the manpower is a very real one. I worked with the officers on Saturday or Sunday over the last weekend and they really are constrained in terms of manpower and responding to these cases in Singapore. So, I hope MND can consider increasing their manpower so that we are able to tackle this trade more effectively.

I thank the Member for his two points. On the first point, for our air and land checkpoints, all incoming cargo is scanned. Indeed, for our seaports, there is a large volume that we have. So, selected cargo that is identified during upstream risk assessment will be scanned. I would like to provide maybe more details on how that is done.

We have a risk assessment framework that I mentioned earlier. It allows us to target high-risk entities that may be involved in illegal wildlife trade. So, when the Singapore National Single Window for trade declaration, known as TradeNet, receives and processes information declared by traders prior to the arrival or departure of cargo, our risk profiles are applied to this information to identify shipments for further inspection. To ensure that our risk profiles remain current and effective, our enforcement agencies regularly review and update these risk profiles, with information from seizure cases, international reports on illegal wildlife tracking and inhouse seizure analysis.

But I take the point that the Member made that if there is better technology available that allows us to scan a greater volume of cargo more effectively and more efficiently, we will definitely do so. And that is why we are conducting the pilot on MMPDS that the Member had mentioned. But as it is a pilot, we will have to work with the vendor to see how we can improve the information set, the details and the data that we gather and see if it is effective. Then, we will look at using it in future.

11 Mr Lim Biow Chuan asked the Minister for National Development (a) in the past three years, how many summonses have been issued to offenders who feed pigeons; and (b) what other measures can the Ministry introduce to deter the feeding of pigeons.

Over the past three years, 682 enforcement notices were issued for pigeon feeding offences. The National Parks Board (NParks) takes measures to deter the feeding of pigeons, including installing cameras and conducting surveillance at identified feeding hotspots. NParks also works with Town Councils to put up notices to ask for information about feeding activities, so as to carry out enforcement operations in a more targeted manner.

Public education is also an important strategy. NParks, the National Environment Agency (NEA) and the Town Councils work together to educate residents about the environmental health and hygiene issues caused by pigeon feeding. This is done through advisories, posters and outreach events. Agencies are also working with the Municipal Services Office (MSO) to develop targeted public education messages and materials. The community and grassroots leaders can also help to spread the message.

To reduce the availability of food sources for pigeons, NEA ensures good food waste management in food centres and coffee shops in Housing and Development Board (HDB) estates and enforces against littering. Residents can and should also play their part by helping to maintain the overall cleanliness of their estates.

Mr Lim Biow Chuan.

I have had many complaints about pigeons at hawker centres, on window ledges, at everywhere. And the bird droppings, I understand, are considered to be infectious. So, I am asking the Senior Parliamentary Secretary: can NParks do more to step up enforcement? Following what the hon Member Mr Louis Ng said, can there be more manpower given to NParks to enforce more, step up more patrols, do more advisories, because when the Town Council talks to the residents, many a time, they are ignored? So, there should be greater enforcement to send the signal that feeding of pigeons is not something that is legal. Would the Senior Parliamentary Secretary also consider increasing the penalties for pigeon feeding? The message has not gotten to many of these pigeon feeders that whatever they are doing is causing health risks to many other people.

I thank the Member for his two points. Firstly, I would encourage perhaps the Member to share with us where the hotspots are because that would be very helpful in allowing us to concentrate our manpower or the use of cameras and targeted patrols. Because if we know when the pigeon feeder normally comes out, it is easier for us to catch the pigeon feeder in action. So, information such as this from residents, grassroots leaders and the community will be very helpful in allowing us to be more effective in the way we conduct our enforcement.

On the second point about increasing penalties, currently, pigeon feeders can be fined up to $500 per offence. So, I think we can put more of this information out. I would also like to share with the Member that there was this high-rise littering/pigeon feeding pilot in Yio Chu Kang that was actually spearheaded by one of my colleagues. On the enforcement front, not only do they deploy cameras to basically enforce and find out who the pigeon feeders are, they also put up captured images of the offenders. So, it is helpful in creating community awareness. They also work with the local Agency for Integrated Care (AIC) to engage vulnerable and/or recalcitrant offenders. Because while we have our fines, and we enforce when we catch – as I mentioned, they can be fined up to $500 per offence – we also find that, sometimes, some of these offenders may have some other issues that they are dealing with. If we are able to work with the community, we can also reach out to the families and friends of these offenders and see how we can deter such behaviour from them.

Ms Foo Mee Har.

Similarly, in my constituency, we have a lot of pigeon issues. So, I listened with great interest in the pilot that the Senior Parliamentary Secretary spoke about. All the things that the Senior Parliamentary Secretary spoke about, we have attempted. And I would say, over the last eight or nine years, I do not see much result. We have done everything that she has suggested. The pilot that she just mentioned, I listened with great interest, and I would like to ask the Senior Parliamentary Secretary when this can be rolled out to the other parts of Singapore.

I thank the Member for the point she raised. The pilot consists of three parts. I had mentioned enforcement earlier. It also includes community solutioning, which includes putting up educational materials which I am sure the Member has attempted. But also, I guess it is really about house-to-house visits for affected blocks. But I would say that the initial results from this high-rise littering/pigeon feeding pilot in Yio Chu Kang have been quite promising. We would look into it further and see how we can roll it out to different locations. As we understand it, pigeon feeding issues are quite local-based. It depends on the local infrastructure, the demographics of the residents who live in a certain area, certain habits and the interaction between food centres in the local community.

So, while we currently seem to have a pilot that has seemed to have worked quite well in Yio Chu Kang, we will probably have to distill it further and work closely with the local Members of Parliament and grassroots advisors to see how we can adapt it for use in the local community.

I just want to go back to the point of whether MND can increase the manpower for the surveillance team because I think that is the crunch at this point, the bottleneck where we do not have enough officers to do the surveillance to tackle the feeding.

My second point is: a lot of us have focused on culling, and culling is actually not the solution. That is the problem: the more you cull, the more pigeons you have. So, I am really hopeful that this pilot that the Senior Parliamentary Secretary has mentioned, we can roll out nationwide so that we can now effectively tackle this problem.

I thank the Member for his repeated mentions about manpower and also earlier, Member Mr Lim Biow Chuan's point. I will take that back to my Ministry and I will also talk to NParks about it. We will see, where possible, how we can work towards achieving the outcome that we want, whether or not it is increasing more manpower or better use of the existing manpower that we have. I think we take the Member's points and we will see how we can work more effectively and efficiently on that.

On the point that the Member mentioned about culling, currently, population control measures are undertaken at the Town Council level. I believe that the Town Councils' first option is probably not to cull. I think they have worked very actively with NEA and NParks to enforce, like I mentioned, on pigeon feeders. Any strategy towards managing such local issues would include a variety of different initiatives. And culling is just but one part of it. People normally would much rather not do if they do not have to.

NParks is also looking at a variety of other initiatives. The Member has talked about the use of contraceptives before. We are looking into that. So, there are various other measures that we are looking into, things that we are trying out. Indeed, where effective, we will try to roll it out to different communities and see how we can develop a holistic solution towards this issue that we face.

12 Dr Intan Azura Mokhtar asked the Minister for Social and Family Development (a) what are the plans in providing grants for kindergarten education beyond the MOE kindergartens; and (b) whether he can provide an update on the provision of more educational support and resources for children with special needs in the preschool sector.

Mr Speaker, the Government's foremost objective is to ensure that parents have access to quality and affordable preschools for their children. This will provide a good start for every child and better support families with young children. To this end, the Government supports Anchor Operators, Partner Operators and Ministry of Education (MOE) Kindergartens with recurrent funding to uplift preschool quality while providing affordable options.

We will also continue to provide broad-based support for the sector as a whole to benefit all operators and early childhood educators. These include funding schemes, such as the Professional Development Programmes, which all kindergarten and childcare centres can apply for in order to support educators' professional development, as well as grants to improve productivity using technology solutions, and to foster more innovative teaching practices.

Overall, the market remains open to give parents a choice in selecting a suitable preschool for their children. I encourage all operators to make use of the schemes available to invest in uplifting the quality of their centres and teachers, in tandem with the overall improvements in the preschool sector.

Children under the age of seven with mild developmental needs can get support from the Development Support and Learning Support Programmes in some 550 preschools. Learning Support Educators and therapists collaborate with preschool class teachers to equip these children with skills within a classroom setting.

Through the new Development Support Plus programme, which will be progressively rolled out from July 2019, children with mild to moderate developmental needs who have made sufficient progress at Early Intervention Programme for Infants and Children (EIPIC) centres will be able to receive intervention support directly at the preschools they are enrolled in. For children with moderate to severe developmental needs, they are supported through EIPIC, provided at early intervention centres.

With effect from 1 April 2019, we have made such early intervention services more affordable for Singaporean children by enhancing the subsidies and broadening the income criteria for means-tested subsidies so that more families qualify.

I will be co-chairing a cross-sectoral workgroup with the National Institute of Education Associate Dean of Education Research, Assoc Prof Kenneth Poon. The workgroup, comprising people, private and public sector partners, will study the experiences of centres which serve children with moderate to severe developmental needs, to develop approaches that may be extended to more preschools.

Finally, to enhance coordination of early childhood development and support services for families and children, the Ministry of Social and Family Development will integrate the oversight of early intervention services for preschool-age children under the Early Childhood Development Agency (ECDA), progressively from July 2019. All early intervention services will come under ECDA by end-2020.

The Government will continue to improve the access to quality and affordable preschools for every child to have a good start in life.

Order. End of Question Time. The Clerk will now proceed to read the Order of the Day.

[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.]

[(proc text) Resumption of Debate on Question [7 May 2019], "That the Bill be now read a Second time." – [Minister for Law]. (proc text)]

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

Are there any clarifications from yesterday evening that anyone would like to pose? Okay. Ms Rahayu Mahzam.

Last year, I had the privilege to sit on the Select Committee (SC) on Deliberate Online Falsehoods together with several other Members of this House, including Mr Pritam Singh and Ms Chia Yong Yong. It was a rigorous process. The Committee was appointed in January 2018 and subsequently called for members of the public to submit their thoughts on the causes and consequences of deliberate online falsehoods and suggest countermeasures against the threat. We received 170 submissions from people from all walks of life, including academics, community leaders, think tanks, students and other individuals. We went through all the submissions and invited 79 of those who made submissions to elaborate on their submission at a public hearing. Over the course of eight days, we heard oral representations from 65 individuals and representatives of organisations. The Committee deliberated on the matter over a period of almost six months and eventually produced a 176-page report, not inclusive of the annexes, with 22 recommendations.

One of the key thrusts of the recommendations was to disrupt online falsehoods through new legislation which would empower the Government to take the necessary action. The Committee had observed that falsehoods can appear in a broad spectrum of circumstances, from deliberately fabricated content to satire and parodies. They can also have varying degrees of impact, causing minor confusion to threatening national security and dividing societies. The Committee emphasised that Government intervention should be calibrated in a manner that takes these factors into consideration.

I am heartened that the Bill today has taken into account one of the SC's recommendations on the creation of new legislation. In my view, the Bill has captured the essence of the Committee's recommendations and has done well in calibrating the responses to deliberate online falsehoods. I note that some may not share my view. In the wake of the First Reading of the Bill, I received feedback, heard and read about concerns of some people of the impact the new legislation may have on our ideals of freedom of speech and how some felt that this Bill may have been rushed through without proper consultation.

I disagree with these views but appreciate that my perspective was very much shaped by my experience and what I had learnt whilst I was on the SC. It would be impossible to set out my whole experience in this speech, but I would like to touch on several learning points that left a deep impact on me.

Firstly, Singapore is highly vulnerable to online falsehoods. Falsehoods have a great potential to deepen fault lines and polarise society. Singapore is one of the most diverse countries in the world. We are small, multiracial, multi-religious, with great digital connectedness. Racial and religious tensions may be inflamed quickly. A Nielsen survey indicated that more Singaporeans access their news over the Internet and social media, compared to hardcopy newspapers. A Business Times report stated that 70% of Singaporeans are active social media users on mobile devices, double the global average of 34%. The same report found that over three-quarters of Singaporeans used social media.

In addition, several security experts who presented at the SC pointed out that foreign disinformation can be expected to occur in Singapore. In fact, in private hearings, the Committee received evidence that State-sponsored disinformation operations have been carried out against Singapore. Targeting friction points in Singapore society, and weakening Singapore’s will to defend itself, are a more attractive strategy than conventional military warfare. Further, the tools for disinformation campaigns are readily available in our region.

Secondly, there are real risks of "slow drip" falsehoods causing long-term damage to society and are difficult to displace if not dealt with quickly. Several experts gave evidence on this issue, including Dr Ben Nimmo of the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab and Dr Elmie Nekmat, Asst Prof of Communications and New Media from the National University of Singapore. Falsehoods may play on existing "slow burn" issues, such as simmering communal tensions, to create more serious crises in the long run. In particular, Dr Mathew Mathews from the Institute of Policy Studies warned of “low-level” misinformation about particular ethnic, religious or immigrant groups on various matters, such as their loyalty to Singapore, potential to commit anti-social acts and others. And these could lead to friction within the community. Singapore society has seen such falsehoods. One notorious example is an article by The Real Singapore, which falsely reported that a complaint by a Filipino family resulted in commotion between Hindu participants and the Police during a Thaipusam procession in 2015.

Viral, drip-feed falsehoods may play on slow-burn issues. Such lies may not trigger immediate violence, but they can poison debate and irreversibly damage the fabric of our society like race relations and confidence in public institutions. All these can culminate in violence in the long run. They should not be considered "less dangerous", and Singapore cannot afford to be complacent about them. The breakdown of society due to a spread of what may seem like innocuous falsehoods can and will happen if we do not take action to correct and curb them.

Thirdly, falsehoods are very, very difficult to combat. Therefore, there is a need to act swiftly and decisively in certain situations. The evidence before the SC pointed to three difficulties: (a) human cognitive tendencies, (b) weakness of truth compared with falsehoods, and (c) the further and faster reach of falsehoods than the truth. Basically, in short, we believe what we want to believe, the truth is not as salacious as falsehood, so it is harder to believe the truth, and falsehoods can go viral much faster that the correction.

A significant number of representors, both experts and laypersons, called for measures to swiftly stem the spread of online falsehoods. They were of the view that such measures are vital because of the speed at which online falsehoods can cause irreparable damage. Some of them explained why longer-term or indirect measures, such as fact-checking and public education, were not enough to deal with online falsehoods. The SC agreed.

In light of the things that I have learnt, I am, therefore, pleased with the calibrated approach taken in the Bill. The Government needs to be empowered to quickly react to falsehoods if there is an adverse impact to the public. In certain circumstances, there cannot be any delay, and the truth has to be brought to light immediately. Mr Speaker, in Malay, please.

(In Malay): [Please refer to Vernacular Speech.] Singapore is highly vulnerable to the threat of online falsehoods that can potentially destroy inter-racial and inter-religious relations. The adverse impact of falsehoods which have become widespread is hard to repair. Therefore, under certain circumstances, the Government has to be given the power to curb the spread of such falsehoods.

Many have voiced their concerns about how this legislation can affect people's freedom of speech. Let us take a step back and think about what we want for our society. We want a society that knows how to think and is able to conduct healthy discussions. This can only take place when there is a space that is free from slander and falsehoods because otherwise any debate will not be beneficial.

Some also questioned the power granted to the Government in this Bill which is seen as too broad. This is actually untrue. The Government must ensure that the information is false and affects public interest. Any view and opinion that are based on true facts will not be categorised as falsehoods. The Government can issue a direction for a correction alongside the falsehood or, in more extreme situations, for the falsehood to be taken down. However, if a person disagrees with the direction, he can go to Court to obtain a determination. The Government does not have the final say in determining whether the matter is true or false. In my opinion, there is a calibration in this Bill's approach and I think this is a good approach.

(In English): I am happy to note that corrections will be the primary response and there is no punishment for the majority of cases if there is no malicious conduct. I am satisfied that there are sufficient safeguards in the form of a recourse to the Court, in the event there is an objection to the allegation of falsehood. On this note though, I appreciate the lay persons’ concerns about the cost and complexities involved in seeking recourse from the High Court. I have intended to seek clarification on this, but I note that, in his opening speech, the Minister for Law had explained the simplified processes. I believe this should address the peoples' concerns.

At the end of the day, it is clear from the various explanations that the Ministry has given through news articles and videos, that the Bill does not affect ordinary Singaporeans. Only those who act deliberately will face criminal consequences. Such persons must not only know that the statement they are sending is wrong; they must also know that such statement will undermine public interest. So, it is not a criminal offence to forward or share messages without checking for accuracy first – although I think you should. I feel that ordinary Singaporeans should be happy to be warned about falsehoods and to receive corrections. This will help to build a community of more discerning Internet users. It may be useful to continue to guide and educate the public about this new legislation. Perhaps the Minister can consider efforts to educate Singaporeans on what type of falsehoods will be covered under the Bill so that they can better identify and avoid spreading these falsehoods.

On this note, I would highlight that the SC has recommended a multi-pronged approach to help deal with the issues of deliberate online falsehoods. It is very important to educate the public to help equip them with skills to tell false from fact and to build healthy online habits. Over the longer term, I believe that the new legislation, along with the suite of non-legislative measures put in place by the Government, will have the effect of cultivating an informed, discerning population. Mr Speaker, I support this Bill.

Prof Lim Sun Sun.

Hon Members of the House, if "fake news" was the word of the year for 2017, "POFMA" could go down in Singapore’s history as the word of the year for 2019. Indeed, this acronym for the "Protection from Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act", nifty by accident or design, has entered into our colourful Singlish lexicon. People have since been heard saying such things as "you better watch out, they POFMA you then you know!" or "wait you kena POFMA!" Indeed, so versatile is POFMA that it can serve as both a verb and a noun.

Jokes aside, the sheer liveliness with which this new Bill has been discussed, both online and off, has brought to light several issues. Singaporeans acknowledge the scourge of online falsehoods and recognise the need to do something about it. But Singaporeans also care deeply about our online space, and our freedom to discuss and debate within it.

Hence, there have been several aspects of the Bill that have stoked the greatest debate. These have been given considerable airing over both online and mainstream media and addressed by the Minister yesterday. I would like to focus on the need for a collaborative framework within the Bill which, as currently drafted, is lacking.

Mr Speaker, the problem of online falsehoods is both multifaceted and unwieldy, necessitating a more creative and collaborative solution. Indeed, borrowing from the experience of our Labour Movement with its tripartite model comprising the Government, employers and workers, we can foster an innovative tripartite model for tackling online falsehoods, one that comprises the Government, media and technology companies as well as media literate consumers.

As currently proposed, POFMA requires Internet intermediary companies to reactively respond to the directives of the state rather than proactively develop other strategies to douse the spread of falsehoods. This may not be the best use of their resources.

Instead, we should consider a more cooperative relationship that can facilitate mutual cooperation, education and engagement, where the state can be apprised of the latest technological trends and solutions, and technology companies can be schooled and reminded in the societal values that they must uphold.

Since being tabled, POFMA has drawn criticism for vesting individual Ministers with the power to determine falsehoods and take action. Such views reflect the visceral resistance that people have to granting exclusive authority to a small number of individuals in our pluralistic media landscape.

Furthermore, the proposed key measures of targeted and general corrections are based on evidence that when consumers are presented with both the original falsehood and the correction, they can consider the information in its totality and form their own conclusions. Although POFMA is meant to be platform-agnostic, the evidence we currently have on the effects of corrections is platform-, context- and even demographic group-specific. This raises several intriguing questions.

Will targeted and general corrections counter-productively amplify the original falsehood to a wider audience, without a guarantee of the original or new audience reading the accompanying correction? Will we perversely and inadvertently create a cognitive shortcut where people seeing an official correction presume that the original falsehood must be true precisely because it is being vehemently debunked? Will falsehoods that do not come with corrections be summarily assumed to be true? Such unintended outcomes of a correction strategy cannot be ruled out, despite our best efforts and intentions.

With the relentless proliferation of new communication platforms, many of which increasingly offer encryption to safeguard privacy, consumer habits, skills and even biases will evolve constantly. The execution of targeted or general corrections will differ from platform to platform, translating into varying degrees of consumer exposure to the corrections, and with varying levels of effectiveness.

I would thus like to propose that if the Minister must retain the authority to issue directions expeditiously, he or she should be advised by a panel of experts representing the technology industry and media consumers, somewhat like the Film Consultative Panel. In other words, the Minister should have, at his disposal, the wisdom of an advisory panel that can determine whether a particular course of action is realistic or practical, or whether it could be counterproductive. For instance, a correction or takedown order in some situations might be either inefficacious or serve to further entrench the falsehood in question. Further, the type of targeted action could differ, depending on the type of media platform – what works for Facebook may not be as effective for Telegram or YouTube. The role of the technology companies in this panel is thus not to promote vested interests, but to identify industry best practices on what is most efficacious and practicable in the circumstances.

The workings of such a panel need not slow down the process. Members can be pre-appointed and deployed at short notice to advise the Minister. There is no issue of accountability because the Minister retains the final authority to take action. But with this panel, the Minister can act with the benefit of a wider range of views extending beyond those of civil servants.

Going beyond POFMA for the longer term, in order to better align with the democratised nature of our media environment, we should further concretise this tripartite approach to tackling online falsehoods. We should establish what I call an Information Integrity Institute, or ICube for short, to supplement POFMA's correction regime. It should be funded by contributions from all media and technology companies. These can be pegged to a graduated scale commensurate with, for example, their annual returns from advertising.

ICube will play a critical fact-checking role and develop the expertise to do so swiftly and effectively. It can host an online repository of verifications of falsehoods. Over time, it should develop a reputation as a reliable third-party fact checker that is the first port of call for consumers in need of authentication. It should also play a capacity-building role to professionalise newsmakers in the production of quality information and raise ethical standards within the media and technology industries. It can also set the research agenda by offering grants to investigate the effects of online falsehoods and potential solutions to the problem.

Consumers, too, can also be involved in helping to flag suspect news. With robust fact-checking accessible to all consumers, we can nurture greater individual discernment and reduce our reliance on state-issued corrections. Due to its shared funding, ICube will be less liable to attract allegations of partisanship, and, therefore, more likely to engender trust in its determinations of truth and falsity, and the verifications and refutations which it issues.

Communication platforms are evolving rapidly and, along with them, the media usage patterns of consumers. In light of these shifting complexities, the possible unintended effects of legislative approaches to addressing falsehoods must be closely monitored and amended if necessary.

Mr Faisal Manap.

In Malay, Sir.

(In Malay): [Please refer to Vernacular Speech.] Sir, the Government stated that POFMA is a regulatory effort through legislation to deal with the problem of falsehoods that is becoming increasingly prevalent online, especially through social media. It is also stated that this piece of legislation is necessary to protect social cohesion.

Sir, the Workers’ Party (WP) agrees that there should be legislation to deal with the problem or phenomenon of online falsehoods even though the WP has made the decision not to support and to reject POFMA.

The WP disagrees with the basic principle of POFMA which provides powers to the Ministers, that is, the Executive, as the first arbiter in deciding whether a remark or statement can be considered as a falsehood or otherwise.

The WP suggests that the Judiciary, and not the Executive, become the first arbiter. We are of the view and we are confident that this suggestion is more appropriate in achieving the primary purpose of protecting and preserving social cohesion.

We disagree with the basic principles of POFMA because it contains elements that can lead to abuse of power and, if this happens, it will undermine social cohesion, something that runs counter to the primary objective of having a law to prevent and control online falsehoods.

We must acknowledge that in this context, social cohesion can also happen if the decisions and actions that are taken by the Minister contain elements of power abuse.

The concern over abuse of power has been mentioned by many groups – the public, politicians, journalists, civil society organisations, academics and so on ‒ ever since the First Reading of POFMA took place on 1 April 2019.

Sir, this concern is not without justification.

In my speech, I will first speak on two provisions contained in POFMA that have raised concerns about potential abuse of power on the part of the Government and, secondly, I will also touch on several arguments by the Government in its response to the negative aspects of POFMA.

Sir, the two provisions I referred to earlier can be found under clauses 2 and 4(f).

Clause 2 provides the definition that a false statement is a statement that is indeed false, or one that is not false but can be misleading. The word “misleading” in this definition raises concerns about the possibility of abuse of power taking place.

The Minister is a political member of the ruling party. Many have said that, if there are situations where criticisms are directed towards Government policies, or if there are negative opinions on the ruling party, can the Ministers make fair assessment and decision? This is because in this situation, the Ministers become a conflicted party. This can happen when, in order to defend Government policies as well as to defend the dignity of the ruling party, the word “misleading” under clause 2 can be exploited by the Ministers.

Sir, the late Mr Lee Kuan Yew once said that the Government is the People's Action Party (PAP) and that the PAP is the Government, and I quote, "I make no apologies that the PAP is the Government and the Government is the PAP." His words can be interpreted as the Civil Service and statutory bodies are the PAP and vice versa. Based on this interpretation, it is not wrong if there are concerns about the possibility of abuse of power in order to defend the interest of a political party.

Sir, we have also seen the dilemma faced by Prime Minister Lee when he had to decide not to proceed with legal action against his siblings, Mr Lee Hsien Yang and Dr Lee Wei Ling, on the Oxley Road issue which was discussed in Parliament. Mr Lee was in the position of a conflicted party. In this matter, allegations that impacted the integrity of the Prime Minister and the Government were brought forward. This was acknowledged by the Prime Minister himself, and I quote several statements from his speech.

The first quote.

(In English): "I am making this statement today because my siblings Dr Lee Wei Ling and Mr Lee Hsien Yang have made serious allegation of abuse of power against me and my Government."

(In Malay): Second quote.

(In English): "These allegations are entirely baseless but they have already damaged Singapore's reputation. Unrebutted, they can affect Singaporeans' confidence in the Government."

(In Malay): Third quote.

(In English) "In normal circumstances, in fact, in any other imaginable circumstance than this, I would have sued immediately, because the accusation of the abuse of power is a very grave one, however baseless it may be. And it is, in fact, an attack not just on me, but on the integrity of the whole Government. But suing my own brother and sister in Court would further besmirch our parents' names. At the end of the day, we are brothers and sister, and we are all our parents' children."

(In Malay): Prime Minister Lee's statements show that it is not easy to make decisions in a situation where he is a conflicted party. Many have questioned whether the decision taken by Prime Minister Lee regarding this matter is correct or not.

Sir, we cannot deny that POFMA will create a situation where the Ministers will be facing a dilemma just like what PM Lee faced.

Sir, I now turn to clause 4(f). This clause further reinforces the view on the possibility of abuse of power by the Ministers. This clause provides powers to the Ministers to take appropriate action if there are false or misleading statements intended to negatively impact public confidence in the Government. In such a situation, the Ministers, once again, become the conflicted party, if we take into account the interpretation of the late Mr Lee Kuan Yew’s statement that the PAP is the Government and the Government is the PAP.

Sir, I would now like to touch on several arguments by the Government in response to public queries about POFMA.

First, when the Government was asked why Ministers were chosen instead of the Judiciary as first arbiter, the answer given was that the judicial process would take time and this is not acceptable because immediate action is needed to curb the spread of falsehoods and limit the potential damage on social cohesion.

Sir, this can be overcomed by having provisions so that the process to obtain a decision can be done as soon as possible. This point was already mentioned and elaborated on by my colleague Mr Pritam Singh.

The second argument is about the reply on the possibility of an irresponsible future government exploiting POFMA. Minister Shanmugam said that he could not give any assurances. I am of the view that the Minister's reply is problematic and baffling. Sir, the PAP Government has all along said that they are a government that is concerned about Singapore's future and the Government always formulates policies to be forward-looking and that assures a better future for Singapore. One example is the Government's policy of creating a second key for the national Reserves where this function is given to the Elected President. The objective of having a second key is to prevent an irresponsible government from using the Reserves as they please for political benefit.

It is rather surprising as to why there is a difference and inconsistency in the Government's approach and values when dealing with the possibility of abuse of power between the POFMA issue and the national Reserves.

Sir, on a final note, through the arguments that I put forth, I believe the Members and the people can agree that the suggestion to make the Judiciary the sole arbiter is a better and appropriate action compared to the basic principles of POFMA which give the role of first arbiter to the Ministers. This is because if the Courts become the sole arbiter, there will be no concerns about abuse of power. As I have said earlier in my speech, if there is abuse of power, it will undermine social cohesion and this runs counter to the primary objective of having a law to deal with online falsehoods and manipulation.

Ms Anthea Ong.

Mr Speaker, may I have your permission to address the amendments standing in my name indicated in the Order Paper Supplement with this Second Reading debate, please?

Yes.

Thank you. First, please let me thank Minister Shanmugam for his comprehensive reminder of the legislative intent of this Bill. I wish to state plainly that I support the legislative intent of the Bill because I agree that online falsehoods can distort and demean public debate in our secular democracy by inciting polarisation and populism for all the reasons that the Minister has outlined yesterday. I also agree and appreciate that the Government has a responsibility to protect harmony, social cohesion and the integrity of public institutions and political processes against online falsehoods.

Singapore joins robust democracies like Australia, France, Germany, New Zealand and the United Kingdom (UK) seeking to use legislative measures to curb online falsehoods. This Bill has added first-in-the-world features, such has Correction Directions.

However, the Bill currently grants far-reaching powers to the Government on online communications which raises significant concerns across different segments of our society that these tools may be used, intentionally or otherwise, to suppress or chill debate for political purposes. Assoc Prof Walter Theseira, Ms Irene Quay and I submitted a Motion of amendment to this Bill as indicated in the Order Paper Supplement. The proposed amendments seek to mitigate these concerns by ensuring there is discipline in the way the Act would be utilised while ensuring that the Government has the ability to deal with the full range of threats posed by deliberate online falsehoods. The proposed amendments were, as part of our robust Parliamentary process, vetted by the Attorney-General's Chambers.

Mr Speaker, I will now address specific issues of concerns and corresponding proposed amendments. For any avoidance of doubt, I want to state plainly that my debate here is once again not about "why" we have this Bill – I reiterate that I agree online falsehoods should be legislated – but about how the Bill can realise its full function with these amendments.

A major area of contention that the House has heard is the definition of "fact" and "falsehood" under the Bill. A statement of fact is defined as "a statement which a reasonable person seeing, hearing or otherwise perceiving it would consider to be a representation of fact" while a statement is false "if it is false and misleading, whether wholly or in part, and whether on its own or in the context in which it appears".

I understand that the use of the phrase "a reasonable person" is common in legalese and is used as shorthand for a hypothetical individual who exercises average care, skill and judgement in conduct, and who serves as a comparative standard for determining liability. In the eyes of the Court, this "reasonable person test" is one that is objective. However, it appears broad, imprecise and highly subjective to the ordinary citizen who would rightly be concerned with the chilling fear that giving an opinion could be wrongly construed as a false statement of fact.

Many non-governmental organisations (NGOs) are also understandably concerned with such an unclear definition because it is common for NGOs to rely on firsthand accounts of the individuals they represent. They often craft reports, public awareness campaigns and make recommendations on issues with these accounts as the primary source material. However, these accounts may conflict with official interpretations of data by policymakers or are challenged as inaccurate, especially with the information asymmetry.

For instance, the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) has issued a total of 21 newsroom releases of a corrective nature that it refers to as "Fact Checks" since September 2017. Eighteen of those 21 "fact-checking" press releases, addressed NGO-published content about MOM's priorities, processes and practice. Many of these may technically be considered as opinions to most rather than facts, yet MOM presents these instances as a "fact check", and formats these refutations with author's "claim" which is then countered by MOM's "fact".

Let me share another illustration that is not entirely hypothetical. A sexual assault victim might feel uncomfortable sharing the full details of his/her assault experience with the Police but might later disclose important details to case workers, counsellors and researchers. If the NGO grounds its recommendations to legislation on evidence from such accounts, would the Government reject the basis for such recommendations because the accounts do not align with their official records of those cases? Would the findings of the NGO be invalidated if they conflict with what the Government has on record as the “facts” of the case?

Besides the ordinary citizen and civil society, Mr Speaker, the concern with the definition of "fact" and "false" as drafted is also shared by the arts and media practitioners, academics and researchers. To mitigate this definitional concern and without meddling with matters of jurisprudence, we propose that a new section called the Principles of the Act be included in the body of the Bill. One of the proposed clauses in this section states explicitly that the Bill targets materially false statements and does not apply to "opinions, comments, critiques, satire, parody, generalisations or statements of experiences".

I thank the Minister for agreeing with our intent for this amendment. Mr Speaker, what we are proposing here is certainly not new. We have similar legislative precedents for guiding principles on implementation and administration in the Mental Capacity and Vulnerable Adults Act. Assoc Prof Walter Theseira will elaborate further on this proposed amendment in his speech.

The Government has explicitly assured the public that this Bill is not intended to stifle or chill free speech, debate and criticism, and, in fact, aims to ensure such debate can occur without the corrosive presence of online falsehoods. However, the Bill, as written, when tabled, does not contain such assurances that limit how the Bill's powers can be used.

Mr Speaker, the Ministers are granted powers to issue Part 3 and 4 Directions based on: one, if the statement is false; and two, it affects public interest. Section 4 of the Bill defines, I quote, "public interest" and the circumstances under which it is justified to take action. However, clause 4(f) is again broadly worded and states: "action is justified under the Bill if the falsehood would prevent a diminution of public confidence in the Government, an Organ of State, a Statutory Board, or a part of the Government, an Organ of State or a Statutory Board".

This definition is reminiscent of but broader than existing laws, such as section 11(4) of the Computer Misuse Act, where words like "serious harm" and "disruption" prefaces and qualifies the basis of a diminution of public confidence.

The concern is, with such an overreaching scope coupled with the broad and subjective definition of "fact" and "false", that any criticism of the Government could be considered a statement that would diminish public confidence, as stated in the Bill. When does a statement cross the threshold from inconsequential personal expression to a threat to public confidence? Would someone opining that the Government is incompetent on Facebook be subject to a Correction Direction if their post gains enough shares or likes to be considered capable of influencing public confidence? In the case of the death of Full-time National Serviceman Dominique Lee, Facebook's recent posts by his mother critical of the Government received viral status and revived attention to the three-year-old case in 2016. Would her posts be targeted because they contributed to a wave of diminished public confidence in the Government?

Mr Speaker, we seek to amend clauses 13 and 25 of the Bill which set out the provisions for the two Directions, by adding the requirement that each Direction must be publicly justified by the Minister. This means that for each Direction that has been issued, the Government should publicly explain or demonstrate three things: (a) evidence that demonstrates the falsehood, or the evidence setting forth the true facts; (b) the public interest objectives of this Direction, and (c) why this Direction is suitable to achieve those public interest objectives.

I am heartened that the Minister agrees with the need for Ministers to provide more specific reasons on falsity and on public interest since this is currently not in the Bill when it was tabled. He assured us yesterday in his speech. He assured this House that this will now be set out in subsidiary legislation. Subsidiary legislation, however, can be amended without coming before Parliament. So, our intent with the amendments clauses 13 and 25 remains unchanged – that this amendment will ensure that any future Minister and/or Government would have to first change the primary legislation – that is, tabling it in Parliament, therefore, a higher barrier to clear.

The appeals process in clauses 17, 29 and 35 could potentially limit the ability of appellants to seek judicial oversight because all appeals must be made first to the respective domain Minister. Currently, no timeframe is provided in the Bill for a decision on the appeal to be made when the Bill was tabled. We seek to amend the clauses to state that the Minister shall do everything reasonable to ensure the appeals process is expeditious and low-cost.

Again, I am grateful that Minister Shanmugam has agreed that this provision that we have proposed is needed and clarified in his speech that this shall be addressed in subsidiary legislation with details. Again, Mr Speaker, our intent with clauses 17, 29 and 35 remains unchanged – that this amendment will ensure that any future Minister and/or Government that attempts to use subsidiary legislation or internal practice to unnecessarily delay the appeals process would have to first change the primary legislation.

Mr Speaker, the SC’s report contained an extensive list of recommendations derived from 170 written representations and their own deliberations. They highlighted, and I quote, that "there is no one silver bullet to combat this complex problem, and a multi-pronged approach is necessary". Indeed, we must refrain from viewing legislation alone as a "silver bullet" that will sufficiently address this complex issue of online falsehoods. The SC's report listed five areas of proposed countermeasures: (a) nurture an informed public; (b) reinforce social trust and cohesion; (c) promote fact-checking, (d) disrupt online falsehoods; and (e) deal with threats to national security and sovereignty.

We propose that an independent council be set up to give effect to these SC recommendations to be called the Independent Council on Online Falsehoods. I will refer to this henceforth as "The Council". The Council's primary objective is to assure the public that the Government is accountable for the routine exercise of powers under the Act. It ensures that regardless of whether Parliament takes an active interest in the exercise of powers under this Act, there will still be routine independent oversight. The Council is empowered to evaluate the actions of the Government under the Act, evaluate other measures taken by the Government to address online falsehoods, and make recommendations to the Government on the exercise of powers under the Act. The Council is accountable to Singaporeans. In our amendment in clause B(5)(i), the Council will publish annual reports of its activities, findings and recommendations. I do hope I have clarified for Mr Christopher de Souza on his misunderstanding yesterday of the Council as taking over the Ministerial function. We had shared this in the Explanatory Notes which were sent out with the Notice of Amendment on 30 April 2019.

I am glad that the Minister also shared in his speech yesterday that he agrees with the intent of the Independent Council. I believe that councils for such a purpose do not lead to unnecessary bureaucracy because we have numerous precedents to cite in support of this, such as the National Council on Problem Gambling set up in 2005 in conjunction with the Casino Control Act to address the social issue of problem gambling. Casinos were introduced to Singapore for the first time then, and we may have been able to clearly justify the economic benefits of the new legislation then at that time, yet we could not have known with certainty the collateral issues and damage, social or otherwise, that may result. The impetus to set up the Independent Council on Online Falsehoods is the same as that of the National Council on Problem Gambling: a recognition that a dedicated independent council is best suited to undertake the national responsibility of assessing the impact of a new legislation and significant development for the country and providing specific expertise to advise the Government on the effectiveness of current measures.

However, Mr Speaker, I would like to highlight that unlike councils stipulated in other legislation, we are proposing that members of the Council are to be appointed by a Select Committee of Parliament, not by a Minister. We believe that this ensures that the Council stands as a separate and independent body from the Government. So, yes, we agree with the Minister that the Executive is accountable to Parliament and all Singaporeans. But the Council serves more than the role of oversight.

If there is one thing this House agrees unanimously on through this debate so far, it would be the importance of public education in our war on online falsehoods. Minister Iswaran has announced that a national framework to build information and media literacy will be launched by June 2019, jointly developed by the Ministry of Communications and Information (MCI), the National Library Board (NLB), the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) and the Cyber Security Agency of Singapore. The Ministry of Education (MOE) will also be rolling out a New Media Literacy toolkit to all primary and secondary schools, as well as junior colleges. The expertise and knowledge provided by the Council will help enrich these cross-agency and whole-of-nation efforts.

Mr Speaker, I understand that we are the first country to enact such a complex legislative intervention against online falsehoods which could only mean that this will be a steep learning curve for us. If I may, Mr Speaker, I would like to request that all Singaporeans be given a review of all exercise of powers under the Bill by way of a Ministerial Statement in Parliament a year from the implementation of the Act after the Bill is passed, with the findings and recommendations from the Independent Council on Online Falsehoods.

The best antidote against the potential harms brought about by fake news is an educated and discerning citizenry. An informed citizenry can only be created and sustained if the Government remains open to debate and criticism in an increasingly complex world. Mistrust in public institutions also facilitates the uptake of falsehoods.

Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat recently stated that the biggest "unknown" challenge that Singapore will face is the "nature of politics". I understand that to be a question of whether Singapore – that is, the people and its Government – will be able to collectively wield sufficient political consensus for the best interests of the country in the long run. I agree with Deputy Prime Minister Heng and believe that, for that to happen, we need the basis of trust between the Government and the people to be grounded in a climate of psychological security, one which allows all citizens to participate actively in the future of Singapore from a place of safety and responsibility, not fear of punitive consequences.

I acknowledge that it is in the interest of the Government to maintain and further public trust. This would mean using executive powers to protect society and limiting the use of these same powers when they may discourage or chill robust criticism. As the Minister has shared, this Bill seeks to scope down and calibrate the Government’s powers compared to existing laws, including the Broadcasting Act, Telecoms Act and so on. I would, therefore, sincerely urge the Government to consider reviewing these existing harsher laws to honour the intent with this Bill of scoping down executive powers.

Mr Speaker, the Minister is right that we are no lawyers and so, yes, this last month has been a rich yet steep learning curve for me, especially without the benefit of an institutional apparatus but thankfully with the support of a community of lawyers and concerned stakeholders. I would like to humbly remind Members that Parliament has the final authority to approve any laws proposed by the Government. Parliament must meaningfully exercise that authority to further public confidence in our robust Parliamentary processes. Minister Shanmugam has said that Ministers exercising their powers under this Bill will be accountable to Parliament and the public, and I believe that process starts with the consideration of these proposed amendments that we have put forth to the Bill, for an inclusive and thriving society that we will and can be.

Finally, I also want to second Ms Irene Quay’s call yesterday for the Whip to be lifted. I urge Members of this House to review the amendments set out in the Order Paper Supplement. Your vote for the specific amendments does not mean you are standing against the legislative intent of the Bill to curb online harms from falsehoods. It means you believe in this Parliamentary process to register your, and your constituents’, concerns with the Bill and to ensure that this and future governments are bound to the intent of the Bill.

Mr Vikram Nair.

Mr Speaker, I rise in support of this Bill. The threat of online falsehoods is a real and insidious threat that subverts the idealistic notions of free speech. As a teenager, I grew up believing in the concept of the marketplace of ideas where if everyone is free to speak, eventually, lies would be exposed and the truth would prevail.

On this basis, there is very little need for the Government to legislate in relation to free speech. Subsequently though, the experiences of life and certainly the study of law have made it clear to me that this idealistic notion is not supported by real-world problems.

Speech is restricted for many different reasons. The laws of almost all countries prevent inciting violence or inducing people to commit crimes. Defamation also results in liability in many countries. Hate speech is also getting more attention. In Singapore, there have always been laws that prevent people inciting hatred against others. Generally, the law steps in when freedom of speech is abused to cause harm.

The latest abuse of free speech is the threat of fake news. Minister Shanmugam has set out in vivid colour the nature of this threat in his speech. Falsehoods are deliberately created, for example, by foreign state actors to interfere with and subvert governments and electoral processes in other countries. The fact that the US Presidential Election and the Brexit vote involved significant amounts of fake news being circulated and relied on by voters shows that even the most advanced democracies are vulnerable to this threat.

In parallel, there are many who profit from fake news and these include those who originate as well as those who help circulate it, such as social media platforms which make money from advertising revenues.

Fake news is often sensational, interesting and plausible, so it goes viral. The cost to produce it is not so high as no real research work is needed and it is easy to circulate. In contrast, serious news providers are suffering because the cost of producing real news is high. You have to pay journalists, opinion writers, the cost of publication and even airtime.

Ironically, after incurring all these costs to produce real news or considered opinions, which are often not sensational because they are presented fairly, they are increasingly losing market share to those that peddle fake news. News providers all over the world are suffering from falling revenues and profitability. Indeed, this is the complete inverse of the marketplace of ideas – the fake news prevails over the truth.

Essentially, the truth gets drowned out by falsehoods because it is more expensive to produce, less interesting and, ultimately, there are fewer people producing it as news providers go out of business. This, in turn, also subverts the democratic process which works best when people are well-informed and able to make decisions based on the facts.

It is clear that everyone in this House agrees fake news is a threat. The differences in relation to this Bill are, in fact, relatively minor, and it has to do with how to address this threat.

My friends from the WP are with us on the nature of the threat. Their main difference of opinion is that they believe the Judiciary should make the decision first and issue directions, rather than the Executive.

What the Bill envisions is a competent authority because fake news is a relatively prevalent problem. Fake news is easy to generate, it is going to be voluminous, and you will need people who will be able to deal with this as and when it comes up. So, you need people who can make a large number of decisions relatively quickly. In this sense, it makes perfect sense to leave it to the Executive or a competent authority. If someone disagrees with the competent authority's decision, they can take it up to the Minister. The allegations that Ministers will abuse power and insinuations that because they are all from the party, it will be used for political purposes; if a Minister were to do that, it can be taken up to the Judiciary. The judicial process is a transparent one. The Judge will decide one way or the other, the Government does not always win, so it is a fair process, and it will be open to public scrutiny. So, if there is any abuse of power, there will be public scrutiny on this as well.

In my view, it is a fairly sensible mechanism because it allows things to function efficiently while creating avenues for checks and balances. And in government, you need efficiency. Fake news moves fast and moves quickly, and you need an authority to deal with it in a quick way.

I was also interested in the variety of tools. A lot of attention has been given to the Directions, which include statements of correction. Of course, this is likely to be the most commonly used tool. But there are also interesting powers included in the Bill which includes powers against false amplifiers and fake news websites. Can the Minister elaborate on how these powers would be used?

There is also an interesting question about what happens to fake news that is already there, already in the public domain, that means news that is not generated in future. Will these laws apply and give the authority powers to deal with that as well? My own view is that it should, because the fake news is out there.

The WP made a lot of allegations about how the Judiciary would be impartial and, therefore, should make the decision and the Judiciary can make the decision quickly. As a practising lawyer, I have to say the Judiciary has a very huge caseload. If the Executive has to go before a Judge for every single decision, which we would have to wait several days, depending, because fake news is so easy to generate. In a volatile period, you may have hundreds of fake news articles circulating in a day. Are you supposed to have hundreds of applications in Court, with the Executive going up against the defendant each time, and the Judges to decide under the gun? That would be a complete abuse of the judicial process, a waste of resources and ineffective against the threat. So, I think it is completely unworkable.

But the system of having judicial scrutiny at the end, I think, is actually very effective and very logical, because, in a sense, the authority decides first, the Minister has a chance to review, and if the Minister makes an improper decision, that would be under scrutiny by the Judiciary and by the public in that process. So, the Minister is, in fact, taking more political risk by doing that, as opposed to leaving it to the judges, in which case, the political risk can be abdicated. So, in this sense, it puts the responsibility in the right place for an efficient operation of the mechanism.

There is also an amendment filed by some of our friends, the Nominated Members of Parliament, which include a large number of additional checks. I am grateful they put so much thought into the process and some of the points are well made, in particular, the one about the Minister having to make the decision quickly. I think this is going to be captured in the subsidiary legislation.

But with the greatest of respect to my friends, I do not think a lot of the other mechanisms are probably necessary, including the setting up of a council. Because what you want is a process that operates well and efficiently. It seems to me the work of the council really is to scrutinise how the authorities are exercising their powers and to publish reports on that. I think that can equally well be done by academics or people who have access to the information, and questions in Parliament can be filed about decisions made by the Minister, how many have been made, and so on.

So, I do not think we need to set up another body by statute to achieve this objective. I think many of the objectives for scrutiny and all that can be done through much simpler mechanisms. With that, Mr Speaker, I stand in support of the Bill. It is a much needed piece of legislation to deal with the present threat.

Mr Pritam Singh.

Mr Speaker, I would like to thank hon Member Mr Vikram Nair for his comments. Just to follow up on his point that the volume of applications may upset the process, and efficiency could be at risk. When we passed the Protection from Harassment (Amendment) (POHA) Bill yesterday, this House envisaged the setting up of the Protection from Harassment Courts (PHCs). The remedies that are provided for under POFMA are also available to ordinary Singaporeans, companies in Singapore, thousands of companies under POHA. I would have imagined that the Court actually would be prepared for this volume of applications that could be made to it. Even more so, as we found out yesterday the application process is quite simple. My point is, would it not be foreseeable that actually the Courts could take on that additional task of looking through applications whether it comes from an individual, a company or the Government?

Mr Vikram Nair.

My view is that it is unnecessary for the Court to do so and, especially if you are in a "hot" situation, say, largely, elections, as has happened in the US and in Europe. You have hundreds of articles a day; how are the judges going to come in and make a decision? Is the Executive supposed to come in and take out a hundred applications and then get the respondent for each one? It is far better if they can just make the decision and get it done. And then, if there is a challenge later, that can come up through the judicial process, which is I think a more prudent use of judicial resources.

I believe that the threat of online harassment will not be as prevalent as fake news, because fake news tends to coalesce around certain periods of time and that is when you need to move fast.

Mr Leon Perera.

Just an additional point of clarification to the hon Member Mr Vikram Nair. He mentioned that the process of a judicial review of directives under POFMA would be unworkable because there would be hundreds of cases of fake news every day. Is the hon Member suggesting that the powers in POFMA are likely to be exercised? Does the hon Member envisage that these powers are likely to be exercised several hundred times every day?

Mr Vikram Nair.

It may have to be, depending on the volume of attack we come under. But certainly, in the elections in Europe and the US, during those periods, there were very large amounts of fake news.

Mr Dennis Tan.

Mr Speaker, Sir, the WP opposes the POFMA Bill. Much as I believe that there is a need for some form of legislation to deal with online falsehoods, the remedy must be appropriate. Indeed, the Bill has generated much concern and objection from many Singaporeans since its First Reading in April. I will share some of the concerns I have about the POFMA Bill.

As part of the conditions for the granting of the various directions under this Bill, under clause 4, the Minister must be of the opinion that it is in the public interest to issue such a Direction, and clause 4 provides a list of definitions or a set of different scenarios of what constituted "in the public interest".

I am concerned with some of the definitions provided in clause 4. I find them to be too general, and the precise scope is not clearly spelt out. For example, in the context of falsehoods, what does it mean by "to protect public health or public finances" or "to secure public safety or public tranquility" under clause 4? What acts or words will definitively trigger each of these definitions?

This brings me to the second point of concern about what is in the public interest. For Part 3 and 4 Directions, a person who has been served with a Correction or stop Direction, may appeal to the High Court against the Directions after having first applied to the Minister. However, for both Part 3 and Part 4 Directions, the appeal provisions expressly provide that the High Court may only set aside such a Direction on three grounds of appeal as seen in clauses 17(5) and 29(5).

The issue of whether the Minister was correct or not in arriving in his opinion that it is in the public interest to issue the Direction itself does not come within the three grounds of appeal and cannot be decided by the Court on appeal under clause 17 or 29. Similarly, the exact meaning and coverage of the definitions provided in clause 4 cannot be decided by the Court hearing an appeal under clause 17 or 29.

In this connection, the Minister mentioned the availability of judicial review yesterday. As things stand, the procedure and cost regimes for judicial review will be quite different from the procedure and cost regimes for the appeal procedure under clause 17(5) and 29(5). Does the Minister intend to apply the same cost, procedure and timeline requirements for all Court applications or appeal under POFMA, including judicial review?

Would it not be better for the Bill to expressly provide for the Court's ultimate jurisdiction over all areas of the Bill, including the issue of public interest, and for the same procedure and cost mechanism to apply?

Finally, according to the Explanatory Statement of the Bill, the list of definitions under clause 4 is non-exhaustive. I am concerned about what else may be read by a Minister as a further definition or example of "in the public interest" in the future.

Still on clause 4 of the Bill, clause 4(f) provides for one definition of doing anything in the public interest if the doing is to prevent a diminution of public confidence in the performance of any duty or function of, or in the exercise of any power by the Government, an Organ of state, a Statutory Board and so on.

I believe that the diminution of confidence in the Government as a factor warranting legislative action is not found in fake news legislation elsewhere in the world. I am concerned that the extension of the definition of public interest to include not diminishing public confidence in the Government may deter or prevent bona fide criticism and well-meaning intentions to expose genuine Government failings. Above all, no government will always be correct, perfect or beyond reproach. It is for the Government, by its own efforts, to earn and maintain public confidence in itself and any use of the law to deter the diminution of public confidence will run counter to that.

Next, the Bill provides, at clause 2(2), the definition of a statement of fact and a definition of when a statement is false.

Already, many commentators have said that the distinction between a statement of fact and an opinion may not always be easy to draw, not to mention the difference between a statement of fact and an opinion of a statement of fact. Different surveys using different parameters produce different outcomes; they may all not be wrong, they may even constitute statement of facts in different ways, but they prove that there can be divergence on what can constitute statement of facts.

Under the Bill, a statement is false if it is false or misleading, whether wholly or in part, and whether on its own or in the context in which it appears. The definition is troubling. The definition of "if it is false or misleading, whether wholly or in part, whether on its own or in the context in which it appears" under clause 2(2) is too wide, especially the requirement of "misleading" alone.

It would be misleading according to whose standards or opinion? And how would it be misleading?

For example, if I were to say something in good faith according to my own views, but what if the Minister and even the Court decide that it meant something else and is different from what I have explained? I did not even think of the Minister's view when I uttered those words. Would that not be very unfair to me as I did not intend that meaning? Why should I be subject to his Correction or stop Direction? Why should I have to appeal to the Courts? Should he not apply to the Court if he feels aggrieved in the first place and the Courts can decide at first instance whether a Correction or stop Direction is necessary?

Next, according to clause 2(2), an article can be deemed to be a false statement even if only a part of it or a small part of it is false or misleading. Is there a risk that as a result of a small or even irrelevant or inconsequential factual error in an otherwise cogent article with serious issues, the article can be taken down, preventing the bulk of the meritorious arguments and issues raised in the article from being read and disseminated?

I am also troubled by the definitions of "statement of facts" which have been defined as not false or misleading, rather than just "false" or "false and misleading". Such definitions can be open to different interpretations. For example, if I were to tell some people that I made a Police report against someone, in my opinion, that is a simple statement of fact, period. There is nothing much to disagree or to dispute. I made the Police report, surely, I know that as a fact. But when one applies the definition "misleading", what I have said may be interpreted by another to be something beyond what I ever intended to say or mean. And history has shown that such statements could be subject to different interpretations.

And how would it affect articles or reports of an opinion nature which premised its theories or findings on anonymous contributors? This could be by a journalist or even an academic. Those who contributed their opinion or feedback or even to a survey may have good personal reasons for their anonymity and not necessarily because they are, as a matter of integrity, afraid to stand up for what they have said. How will the journalist or newspaper be able to challenge an order on appeal given the circumstances? I fear that this new law will discourage journalists in their writings, particularly where the source of information cannot, for whatever reasons, be fully disclosed or cited in Court.

To me, the most uncomfortable aspect of the Bill is the Minister being the first and even final arbiter under this Bill. The WP objects to the Minister being an arbiter under this Bill. We think that the Minister in question should apply to the Courts for an order under this Bill and let the Courts be the sole arbiter.

Many in Singapore have voiced this concern about the Government or the Minister being the final arbiter. The Government has been saying that the Courts are the final arbiter. For Parts 3 and 4 Directions, that is only true insofar as any appeal comes within the three narrow grounds in clauses 17(5) and 29(5). If the Courts are the final arbiter, why circumscribe and limit their powers in these ways? Why not let the Courts be the sole arbiter under this Bill?

As I have said earlier, even the Minister's opinion of whether the Minister was correct or not in arriving at his opinion that it is in the public interest to issue the Direction cannot be decided by the Court when it hears an appeal under clause 17 or 29.

And even for appeal under the three grounds in clauses 17(5) and 29(5), it may only be true if the party being subjected to a Minister's order under this Bill does, in fact, actually appeal to the Courts. Until then, there is no judicial scrutiny. And if the party affected does not appeal to the Court for whatever reason, the Minister's order would have gone unscrutinised by the High Court – rightly or wrongly.

Even when the appeal is pending, the Bill expressly provides for the Minister's Direction to continue. Would this not create injustice if the appeal was later allowed, proving that the Minister was wrong in the first place? In such cases, if the aggrieved person has suffered damages, he may not even be able to claim against the Minister.

Further, in certain circumstances, a Minister may potentially find himself in a position of conflict of interest when he invokes POFMA in respect of criticisms or complaints of wrongdoing either on his part or in respect of his own Ministry. Is there any provision to handle such conflict of interest?

Next, we do not have a Freedom of Information regime and well-meaning citizens may not have the same access to information, unlike the Government, and complaints may have arisen from well-meaning people where it may not be convenient to disclose the source of their information.

In the situation where the Government has access to certain information and for whatever reason refuses to disclose full facts in the first place, even on request, it would be unfair to penalise anyone arising from a media report or something discussed in social media.

Significantly, the procedure under POFMA is different from the procedure in POHA where the Court there is truly the one and only arbiter. Any aggrieved person wishing to make an application under POHA applies to the Court. If that works for everyone else, should the same procedure not apply to the Government in the case of POFMA?

In my view, the Courts should be given the exclusive rights to decide on any application under POFMA at first instance and the Courts' jurisdiction should extend to all areas and issues under the Bill.

Next, I think the same Court should handle and decide both POHA and POFMA applications. This is not currently the case as under the POFMA Bill, the High Court hears any appeal against the Minister's Direction or order. On the other hand, applications under POHA are heard in the State Courts.

Without derogating from my earlier position that the Courts should be the only arbiter for POFMA, let me now deal with some procedural aspects of the Bill.

For Parts 3 and 4 of the Bill, if the affected person wishes to appeal to the Court against the Minister's stop or Correction Direction, he first needs to apply to the Minister in question to vary or cancel the order. This seems odd to me as I am rather circumspect that a Minister will change his mind within a matter of days after his order.

The additional step of notifying the Minister is akin to being part of the appeal process itself and will merely add time to the affected person's wait for the Court hearing his appeal, but time may be of the essence to the affected person, especially when the Minister's Direction is wrongful and is bringing wrongful harm to the individual. In any case, I find the idea of, in effect, appealing to the accuser to be a little odd.

Next, in POHA, an aggrieved party applying for an order has essentially the burden of proving his case to the judge deciding on whether an order should be given. In POFMA, the aggrieved party, in this case a Minister or the Government, does not have to prove to any authority or adjudicator when it first decides on a Direction under the Bill, such as a Correction Direction or a stop communication Direction.

Even when a defendant who is subject to a Part 3 Direction feels that the Minister is wrong in issuing such a Direction and wishes to appeal to the Courts, the Minister does not seem to have the primary burden of persuading the Court de novo that it is entitled to issue the order in question. In any case, this is not clearly or expressly set out in the Bill.

In both civil and communal actions, it would be fair to say that the plaintiff and the prosecutor, respectively, bear the primary burden to prove the case in Courts. The burden of proof in an appeal under clause 17 or 29 of POFMA appears to be on the person who is the subject of a Minister's Directions under POFMA. This should not be the case. Surely, the Minister and the Government, as the aggrieved party, must always bear the burden of proof for any Direction or order under POFMA.

In closing, the Minister cannot be an arbiter for any order or Direction under POFMA. The Courts should be given that role exclusively. Like many Singaporeans, I fear that the Bill, if passed, will create a chilling effect, whether for journalists, legitimate interest groups, academics or the average Singaporean. It may deter people from speaking up. It may encourage journalists or academics to err on the side of caution for falling foul of the law. If a Minister or the Government is not forthcoming in providing clarificatory facts, it may encourage journalists or even common citizens to practise self-censorship at the expense of truth. It will discourage bona fide criticism and stifle public debate. Along with my WP colleagues, I cannot support the Bill.

Assoc Prof Walter Theseira.

Mr Speaker, in 1633, the scientist Galileo Galilei was put on trial by the Roman Inquisition of the Catholic Church. The charge? Promoting the heliocentric theory that the Earth travels around the Sun. We take this as fact today. But the geocentric model, which incorrectly puts Earth at the centre of the Universe, was accepted fact for thousands of years. Galileo’s contribution was to use the first astronomical telescope which he invented to precisely observe the stars. Galileo argued these observations meant the heliocentric model was a provable fact, and not a theory. This forced the Inquisition to act.

The Inquisition did not reject Galileo's scientific evidence. However, they found his evidence fundamentally incompatible with The Bible. The Bible has passages stating the Earth is immovable. The Inquisition interpreted this as a matter of fact. Galileo was forced to recant, on pain of being condemned as a heretic. His books were forbidden. Legend has it that Galileo said, after recanting, “And yet it moves”. Mr Speaker, beliefs do not change the nature of reality.

What are the lessons for this debate? I take three points. First, when we speak of the problem of online falsehoods, the real concern is our shared reality as a society. I agree with the Minister that this is the central concern: what is the infrastructure of facts that we depend on as a society? Galileo was part of a wider battle to define shared reality at the end of the Renaissance in Europe. Would reality be defined by science and reason, or by tradition and religion?

Second, governments are concerned about shared reality, because our beliefs have practical consequences. Galileo's findings supported a reality that threatened the temporal power of the Church. Populists today and in history have spread lies to promote the alternative reality where society is under threat, justifying the use of extraordinary powers to save democracy.

Points one and two, taken together, mean that judgements about shared reality by governments are inherently political acts. I do not mean they are always partisan acts, carried out for narrow political gain. A good government would not act that way. I trust that this Government would not. But they are political acts because they serve the definition of public interest that the government of the day believes in.

Third, governments can get assessments of fact wrong. The Church of Galileo’s time was not opposed to science. The earliest degrees granted by universities were in the fields of law, medicine and theology. Galileo’s supporters included princes and priests of the Church. They were among the few people in Europe who had the education at the time to appreciate his findings. But even a government of experts can have blind spots.

This brings us to the central dilemma. A good government must act to defend the shared reality that best serves the public interest. But even a good government may face the temptation to gradually conflate the public interest with their own political gain. This may be subtle. It may be through sins of omission, by neglecting to fix blind spots in judgement, rather than by promoting falsehoods outright. It may be true to believe that the public interest demands the suppression of all competing ideologies. But as with Galileo, these good intentions may eventually lead a good government to ignore reality. That is why the best government of all will shackle itself where necessary rather than grant itself more power.

I believe this Government understands this dilemma more than most. That is why this Government sincerely believes it has crafted a Bill that shackles itself while granting the necessary powers to defend our infrastructure of truth. Our disagreement is about whether this Bill has got this balance right.

Sir, let me put on the record who is concerned about this Bill. One hundred and twenty-four academics in Singapore and abroad, including 52 Singaporeans, signed a statement expressing concern that the Bill could adversely affect academic research on Singapore, especially in social sciences, where critical research contests established facts and narratives. Other parties expressing concern include 30 Singaporean civil society and arts community organisations, The Asia Internet Coalition, traditional and independent online media, the International Commission of Jurists, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, and the ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights.

I will stand corrected, but I do not think these parties are enemies of Singapore. I do not think they are agents of the forces who propagate online falsehoods. You will find in their statements broad agreement with the Bill’s legislative intent. I agree with the Bill's intent.

Online falsehoods are dangerous. Even if there is no malevolent intent, they may distort our shared reality and lead to harmful decisions. They are not readily corrected through self-regulation or education. They spread virally, and when there is a threat of imminent harm to society, the Government has a duty to act immediately to stop the threat. This Bill will create novel and proportionate tools, such as Correction Directions, that preserve online speech and promote public education while minimising harm.

I do not agree with all of the concerns expressed by the parties I have cited. The Minister has been kind to correct some of the misconceptions out there. My concern rather is that some of the debate around this Bill has conflated criticism of the Bill with support for irresponsible freedom of speech or with sinister intent towards Singapore. Sir, constructive criticism is not an unpatriotic act.

Let me now speak for the group I am most familiar with. Academics do not challenge the right of governments or the public to dispute scientific facts. Knowledge advances by dispute. But such disputes must honour the essential character of scientific research, which is evidence-based, driven by scientific methods, and held up to the highest standards of scrutiny.

Academics are concerned that when a government adjudicates scientific disputes there is a fundamental conflict of interest, as in my earlier example of Galileo and the Catholic Church. All governments have a political objective to defend a shared reality that suits their interest. For example, the US Environmental Protection Agency changes its views on the climate change science depending on who is President. Is it in the public interest for science to be unnecessarily determined by politics?

The other concern is scientific reputation. An academic whose scientific findings are the subject of a Direction would not be able to communicate them online without risk of contravening the Direction. She might have to write to scientific journals to ask for a retraction or correction. The journal would ask why. If our Government is not able to answer to the satisfaction of international experts, it would bring scientific condemnation on our country. Sir, the US can survive an administration with anti-scientific tendencies because good scientists have nowhere else to go for now. Is it in the public interest to discourage, even inadvertently, research that uses Singapore for field studies or to further our knowledge of social science and ourselves?

Let me now turn to why we tabled these amendments. We are concerned the Bill does not sufficiently limit, guide and oversee the exercise of Executive powers against online falsehoods. Members have received our Explanatory Notes. Before I explain our amendments further, I wish to first touch on points of agreement with the Bill. I thank the Minister and his staff for consulting with us throughout, though, of course, we are solely responsible for the amendments.

We accept the two-part test for Executive action, including the definition of falsehood and the broad definition of the public interest. While we have concerns that these give the Executive very broad powers, we could not develop constructive amendments that would be feasible for the Courts in trying facts, while also granting the Executive the discretion to act urgently to protect the public interest. We also accept the Executive must have the power to act urgently. Developing an amendment to create a role for ex-ante judicial or independent oversight proved challenging and risks considerable harm in the event of an immediate threat. Nonetheless, accepting the Bill as it is in these areas means we accept the Executive should have considerable latitude.

Rather, we decided to do what is the best way we feel of limiting the discretion of the Executive was to ensure that we develop robust institutions within and without Government, to address online Falsehoods without fear or favour. These institution-building amendments have two major parts, namely, the Principles of Act, and the Independent Council Against Online Falsehoods. In addition, our amendments require that any Directions issued are publicly justified and require that the appeals process is expedited. My colleague Ms Anthea Ong has spoken on the Council. I will discuss the Principles which provide a guide to the exercise of powers under the Act.

The Principles of Act state that well-informed, free and critical speech is necessary for a well-functioning democracy, so the Act should be applied carefully to avoid chilling such speech. It codifies that the Act is targeted at statements which are materially false and not opinions, comments, critiques, satire, parody, generalisations or statements of experiences.

It sets out that the Act should be used proportionately, so the least restrictive tools, such as Corrections, are used first, with the most restrictive, that is, takedowns used only when necessary. It also protects the role of research in society as research often contests established facts or ideas in order to advance knowledge by stating that differences in facts established by an authority and a researcher do not imply falsehood just by that difference alone.

I believe the Minister’s view is that the Government accepts many of these Principles. However, the Minister also believes the Principles create legislative confusion because they may already duplicate elements present in the Bill or in law. For example, I believe the Minister's view – and that of a Senior Counsel – is that proportionality in the exercise of powers is already incorporated in the "necessary or expedient" term used in the public interest clause of the Bill. I stand corrected if I have misunderstood.

But given proportionality is so important to avoid unnecessarily restricting speech and to build trust with the public, we believe the Bill must state clearly the principles behind what proportionality means in practice. We can accept that there may be better ways of phrasing the Principles. However, we disagree that it would be sufficient to have the Bill without the Principles of Act at all, or other amendments in plain language that have similar effect.

The Government has previously defined plain language Principles of the Act in the Mental Capacity Act and the Vulnerable Adults Act. This is important because these Acts give Government officials significant power over the autonomy and rights of persons. This Bill will also give Government officials significant powers over speech.

It is crucial that every Government official involved in the exercise of powers abide by a common set of principles in administering the Act. What is the difference between doing so in the Bill, versus leaving it to subsidiary legislation or internal regulation? Sir, the difference is governance. Subsidiary legislation can be changed without a Parliamentary vote. The primary legislation cannot.

The real value, Sir, of these Principles comes in using them as a basis for building an institution that the public trusts, an institution that is not dependent on the political interests in charge. I believe the opposing benches are agreed that one such institution is the Judiciary. But we know there may be practical difficulties with having the Courts decide on fast-moving online falsehoods.

So, why not a third way, why not strengthen the capacity of the Civil Service to implement these rules fairly, guided by the Principles?

I will now discuss what this Act will mean in practice. How would the Executive use the powers under this Act? One way to answer this is to examine how the Government has already been addressing the problem of online falsehoods. I conducted a review of Government actions against misinformation from 2015 to 2019. This review documented all posts on the Government's Factually website, as well as Fact Checks issued by MOM and the Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF).

I first established for each Government action whether POFM would apply. Is there a specific subject statement that is potentially false? I assumed that the public interest test would be satisfied since these cases were serious enough for a Government response. Then, I examined the dispute. Is it mainly a dispute over facts or a dispute over conclusions drawn from facts that are not themselves contested? Finally, I examined whether the Ministry responded using keywords that declare publicly whether this case involves a matter for clarification, a misrepresentation or an outright falsehood.

Mr Speaker, may I have your permission to display a slide on the LED screens?

Yes, please. [A slide was shown to hon Members.]

Thank you. I analysed 170 cases of Government action against online misinformation from 2015 to 2019; 110 cases involve no disputed facts, they are simply clarifications of policy. The Act would not apply. Of the remaining 60 cases, while facts were disputed, seven did not identify a subject statement. The Act would not apply.

Most Government actions on misinformation over the last few years would not have used any powers under the Act because it does not apply. There is either no specific disputed fact or no identifiable subject statement.

The remaining 53 cases are for specific subject statements with an identifiable source. These are cases where the Act may have potentially applied retrospectively, for example. Forty-three of these 53 cases are disputes involving the facts. The other 10 involve disputes over the conclusions drawn from facts.

Overall, the Government is quite clear about how it labels disputes involving the facts. Most are considered falsehoods, although some are considered clarifications or misrepresentations instead.

What I am concerned about are those cases which are declared to be falsehoods by the language the Government uses, although the dispute is actually over conclusions drawn from facts.

Let me illustrate with one example from MSF, although I am not picking on the Ministry; it is actually one of my favourite Ministries. In 2017, MSF reported data showing a sharp rise in ComCare assistance recipients between 2012 and 2015. A subject statement made the claim that this was, and I quote, "the worst poverty result ever officially reported in Singapore", end quote. MSF called this and I quote, "not true", end quote, and MSF explained that a growth in ComCare recipients reflects more generous social welfare policies. Thank you, MSF.

My view is that this is a difference of opinion based on the same facts and not a falsehood. I will stand corrected, but I do not think there was an attempt by the subject statement to make up or distort the ComCare numbers. It was simply an interpretation of the facts. I think a Ministry should be free to make value judgements about criticism, including labelling criticisms as false. But more caution is required to avoid the incorrect exercise of powers under the Act. The Ministry must set the record straight. But these differences in opinion may arise because the public may only have partial information. In this case, they may know about ComCare receipts but they may not know about changes in social welfare policy. We should not label such differences in interpretation as falsehoods, especially if the Ministry has not released all the relevant information.

Sir, I know this Government shares my conviction that the Government must be transparent and open in administration. We must ensure the public continues to have trust in the Government. This is why we have proposed the Principles of Act, which will help to build an institution that appropriately limits the exercise of these important powers.

Mr Speaker, I will not stand against the Bill that I believe, in the hands of a just and capable Government, will be used in the public interest. I agree with the principles of the Bill, and I support the Second Reading of this Bill. But I find it difficult to support final passage of this Bill unless I am satisfied the Bill contains strong protections against abuse by an unjust future government. I understand why Members of the Government may not share my reservations. I accept they have great confidence that their present good governance will continue. But for me, this is a matter of policy and of conscience. I hope the Government will consider allowing a conscience vote for its Members.

Mr Cedric Foo.

Before I speak on this Bill, Mr Speaker, I would like to comment on what Assoc Prof Walter Theseira talked about. I think as a Member of the House, I, too, appreciate and support free speech. I, too, support the investigation and exploration of new ideas and so forth. I believe that if there is indeed a "Galileo" today in Singapore, we will all be cheering rather than stopping what he is doing.

This Bill, which met with quite a lot of discussion, is actually not that complex. While there are many discussions about what truth is, is it epistemological truth? Is it David Hume's version of it? Is it evidence before the Courts? But fundamentally, we have a real practical problem, and we have to deal with it.

Rather than tinkering with the separation of powers at the state, be it elected Members and the party having the largest number of Members forms the Government and separating this Executive power with Legislative power and Judicial power – and we have modified that with Presidential powers – to tinker with this, just for the purpose of this Bill, is quite dangerous. I think all parties should give deep thought to whether or not we should introduce another layer of power structure, which the Nominated Members of Parliament called the Independent Council to oversee the Government when Ministers supported by civil servants are already elected, already have a mandate, to ensure peace and order in the society and is always accountable for their actions in this Bill through a judicial review or statutory appeal, but more importantly, every five years at the ballot box. Would an Independent Council be subject to that? I think we need to think carefully before we decide which direction to take.

It is very heartening that most Members of Parliament who have spoken agree that fake news is a real problem and we need to deal with it, especially when public interest is at stake. As I understand listening to Minister Shanmugam, this Bill applies only on two conjunctive conditions. One, falsehoods. But that is not enough. Two, public interest is harmed. So, the parts of the public critique and comments and criticism that do not impinge on these two conditions, would be free to flow, as they have been. But the disagreement seems to be, "Who should be the decision-maker?" Should it be the Executive branch, which I interpret as the Minister supported by the Civil Service; or the Courts; or a separate council? Now, I understand from the Nominated Members of the Parliament that the separate council is not the party who would make the decision whether an issue is true or false, but to be a review committee, over and above, for Executive branch decisions. I do not see where they get the mandate to do that.

There can be three possible bodies which can be the decision-maker. Let us see which makes the most sense. To answer this question, it is important to know that fake news that have gone viral and yet undermine public interest have to be dealt with very, very quickly. So, "speed" is the first criterion to judge whether the Executive branch is best-placed, Judiciary is best-placed or an independent council to oversee is best-placed.

We have heard many examples that have been discussed here. I will just point out two. In March this year, videos circulating on Facebook, Snapchat and so on claimed that kidnappers in vans are abducting children for prostitution and illegal organ trades. This happened in the French area. The accusations were made, falsely of course, against the French Roma community or the Gypsies. The Gypsies were attacked by unprovoked vigilante mobs, even though this rumour is totally false and baseless. Two men from the Roma community were hospitalised and their van burnt.

Another example, in Medan, Indonesia, in July 2016, a woman complained about the use of loudspeakers at a mosque near her home. Rumour has it, then fake news, that she also threw items at the mosque and disrupted prayer sessions. This incited angry mobs who started burning and ransacking Buddhist temples with damages running into billions of rupiahs. So, a lack of speed, and these are the consequences.

The second criterion, I believe is, the issue on "accountability". If the Government is elected and the party with the most seats in Parliament forms the government, they have not only the mandate and responsibility, they are accountable to make sure that public peace and social stability are at all times preserved. It also has the resources, being backed by the Civil Service and the expertise in many, many domains, whether it is medical, security, health, water and so on. Falsehoods can be quite insidious in any one of these areas. I really do not see another institution in Singapore which has this deep expertise in many, many domains, as I described.

In management science, it is logical that the party who is held accountable and with the resources and the expertise, must be the party who should act. So, I believe and I support that the Executive branch, supported by the Civil Service, should be the right party to act.

I also want to point out that in the SC report, there was a Recommendation 12, and I have an excerpt here, and I quote, "New legislation", talking about POFMA, "will need to be implemented to combat online falsehoods and such legislation should have the following objectives." And prime among them, No 1, I quote, "the measures will need to achieve the objective of breaking virality by being effective in a matter of hours." I am quoting the SC report.

I would also want to point out that Mr Pritam Singh is a member of the SC, and the Committee collectively agreed that whatever law is legislated and whoever is the decision-maker, it is very, very important that actions must be able to be taken in a matter of hours.

Just yesterday, I heard Mr Pritam Singh debating on the POHA Bill. He was basically asking that, if the aggrieved party wants to have an Expedited Protection Order (EPO) and so on, would the Court be fast enough? So, I see a contradiction of why the WP is supporting the Judiciary as the party to make such orders in the case of POFMA. As a Member and the WP Leader in the SC, he agreed to Recommendation 12, that whichever party is to be made the decision-maker, that party must be able to act in a matter of hours.

Also, there was a paragraph in the SC report, paragraph 364(B), where Assoc Prof Goh Yi Han, Dean of the Singapore Management Univeersity School of Law, was a proponent of the Executive option. He is a learned man, in the School of Law and he supported the Executive option, which means that the Minister, supported by the Civil Service, will be the party making such decisions. And here again, I want to quote what the report said: "Assoc Prof Goh explained that the judicial process, while important, may not be sufficiently fast to deal with the rapid spread of online falsehoods. Court processes require an application for Court Order to be made, together with a supporting affidavit. The application must then be served on the person against whom the order is sought and that person can then file an affidavit in reply. So, the Court may require a hearing before coming to any decision."

So, there are eminent and learned persons who support the Executive being the decision-maker.

But to be fair, there were also some representors at the SC who were sceptical of the Executive action, but they, too, and I quote from the report: "also accepted that there are situations, such as those involving public order, national security and workings of public institutions where only the Executive...", and these are the sceptics who were representing to the SC, "where only the Executive will hold the facts and where the facts should be backed by the authority of the Executive." Here, I assume the whole machinery of the Civil Service supporting the Executive.

While POFMA is to empower Ministers and the Civil Service to act, of course, the Court is empowered as a final arbiter of truth. Actually, to think about it, at the end of the day, the ultimate arbiter are the voters at the ballot box. Ultimately, the court of public opinion will be the final judge of whether the Government has done its job well.

So, I am less excited about the idealism or the imagined complexity, or some may say, the falsehood around the POFMA Bill, than the practical need for us to act quickly against a very real present and very critical problem – fake news.

Mr Pritam Singh.

Mr Speaker, I was out of the Chamber when Mr Cedric Foo made his speech, but I have noted Mr Cedric Foo's comments. Just to be sure so that I do not misquote him, I understand his two main issues were that I was part of the SC and the SC's recommendation was that quick action was important – response time being within a matter of hours. That was the first. The second was that yesterday, during the POHA debate, I asked whether Courts will be fast enough.

I will deal with the second issue first because that is more pertinent. We found out during the POHA debate yesterday that when there is an issue affecting an individual or a company, there is an easy form to fill out – or at least this is what the Minister assured us – for individuals or companies to take action to deal with online falsehoods quickly. And let us remember, virality is not an issue that only affects the Government. It also affects individuals and companies. And we know that there was a reference made to making that process more straightforward, streamlined, easier.

I used an example during the POHA debate about a matter that was brought up by Minister Shanmugam on 13 April in a Channel NewsAsia interview where he said that you can have a situation of a company, an online falsehood has been made against it, and in four or five hours, billions of dollars could be lost. If individuals are expected to rely on the Harassment Courts for quick remedies, it is my position that we can expect a speedy response to come from the Courts. Of course, it would mean raising the Courts to be able to deal with those problems. That I can concede, that you will need Courts to respond quickly.

But it does not contradict my signing off from the SC Report on an option to ensure that the response is a speedy one because I believe that the Courts can respond speedily and that the expedited timeline or an appropriate interim order can deal with the prima facie falsehood. That means that the case the Government brings to the Court, the PHC, is this a prima facie falsehood? Questions of having to sieve through evidence really turn on how real the issue is, and the prima facie nature of the evidentiary threshold should deal with the issue of speed.

Er Dr Lee Bee Wah.

Mr Speaker, in Mandarin.

(In Mandarin): [Please refer to Vernacular Speech.] Fake news can bring real harm.

Last year, there was this fake news that seniors can get a $30 transport top-up if they go to the community centres (CCs) before 12 November. Although the authorities had clarified, many seniors still went to the CCs with their walking stick in hand and waited there. The seniors do not know how to verify online news and can be easily fooled by fake news. Some people also spread fake news that after people died, their Central Provident Fund (CPF) cannot be passed on to their inheritors in cash form. This has caused much anxiety amongst the elderly.

As for those who create such fake news, do they not have elderly parents and grandparents, too? Why do they target the seniors? I hope that after POFMA is passed, if such incidents happen again, we can prevent more seniors from being fooled and bring the perpetrators to justice.

Our racial and religious harmony can easily be harmed by fake news. Recently, in France, accounts from foreign countries have been spreading anti-minority fake news, resulting in the increase of inter-racial violence. We all know that many Asian countries also have "fake news factories" trying to do damage to our racial and religious relations.

To protect the elderly and minorities, we must quickly correct falsehoods and limit their spread. If we only rely on the Court or an independent committee, they still have to verify with the Government agencies. The speed of correction may not be that fast. Ministers will also have to stand in elections. If they abuse the law, Singaporeans will definitely make wise choices.

Lastly, many residents asked me: if someone inadvertently forwards a fake story, what will happen to him? I hope that the Minister can clarify.

(In English): Sir, I support this move to criminalise the creation and dissemination of falsehoods that would harm the public interest.

I would like to highlight two groups that are especially vulnerable to the effects of fake news, namely, the elderly and minorities.

Many elderly people have gradually become accustomed to using Facebook and WhatsApp. But they are a lot less savvy when it comes to identifying and clarifying fake news and understanding how photographs and videos can be altered. They are inclined to take things they see on the Internet at face value, especially information circulated by their friends.

Last year, there was a hoax which claimed that all senior citizens would get a free top-up of $30 on their EZ-Link cards at the CCs on 12 November. The Ministry of Transport clarified that seniors have 10 months to apply for subsidies. But we still saw long lines at many CCs. Although we deployed staff to explain, many frail seniors still waited in line for a long time. When staff sent me pictures of the elderly lining up, some with canes or wheelchairs, it really pained me.

There are also other hoaxes that make the elderly worried about their CPF savings, saying the savings would not be given in cash to their heirs. Even when they are clarified, the clarification does not reach everyone, and many elderly are still unnecessarily distressed. And when the elderly are victims of fake news, for example, when elderly stallholders are accused of selling contaminated food, they might not be notified promptly or might not know how to clarify online.

I do not know why people would create fake news that targets old people. Do they not have elderly parents and grandparents, too? I hope that with these new laws, we can stop the news from spreading and punish such despicable people.

The other group that can be badly affected are the minorities. In many countries, fake news about minorities has led to attacks against them. Often, this fake news comes from fake news factories abroad, including in mature democracies like France, where the Roma people were attacked after rumours of them kidnapping children, which my colleague, Mr Cedric Foo mentioned just now.

We know there are fake news factories in many Asian countries, so this could happen to us, too. Already, we see many hoaxes saying that halal-certified food is actually haram, spreading panic in the Muslim community. Worse rumours could arise, too. How will we enforce the law when falsehoods originate from overseas? Do we have agreements with other countries and tech companies to help us investigate and prosecute these criminals?

When fake news circulates, especially if it targets the elderly and our minorities, we need to make sure the clarifications reach everyone. We will save these vulnerable groups plenty of heartache and even prevent violence against them.

Therefore, I agree with the idea of the Government making a quick decision to ask the tech companies to clarify or take down fake news. If we leave it to the Courts, or a committee, they will be comprised of generalists and, to determine whether something is true or false, they will have to get information from the Ministries anyway.

By the time the decision is made, maybe riots will have already broken out. Certainly, the fake news would have spread far and wide.

The Ministers' decisions could be challenged in Court, and they can be voted out if they make a decision that is obviously just to suppress critical opinions. Compare that to a committee that is appointed and paid by the Government, and gets most of its facts from the Government, but cannot be voted out, which one is more accountable?

My next question is, many residents have asked me, if they do not know a story is false and forwarded it, what will happen to them?

Sir, the WP Members of Parliament have made much ado about the Bill, claiming that it is an insidious attempt by the Government to deter critics. They do not seem to have read the Bill and have made a variety of misleading statements to fearmonger on the Bill.

Mr Low Thia Khiang claims that the Bill gives the Government absolute power. He completely overlooks and fails to address what the Minister said yesterday that the Bill contains a narrower set of powers which increase oversight for the Courts. What is the Member's basis for saying that the Government is trying to increase its powers? If the Government was really as power hungry as the Member describes, why put forth a Bill that is narrower in scope? People can easily and quickly bring a challenge to Court and the Court will decide on whether there is a false statement of fact. Why would a Minister expose himself to a challenge he will lose?

Mr Low Thia Khiang also gives misleading examples to claim that the Bill has an expansive scope which will affect Singaporeans' daily lives. He says that if a Minister says that the older generation cannot accept a non-Chinese Prime Minister, this will be an opinion, but if a political opponent says the same thing, a Minister may use the Bill against that opponent.

Mr Low Thia Khiang also suggests that the Bill may be used against comments, for example, saying that the Pioneer and Merdeka Generation Packages are to buy votes. He is completely wrong.

These examples Mr Low cited are all clear opinions. The Minister for Law clarified this yesterday, both in his speech and through the list of examples he circulated.

And if the Government were to use the Bill as the WP alleges, do you think Singaporeans will take it lying down?

Mr Low should not mislead when the position in the Bill is clear. He is trying to mislead people and create fear. Mr Speaker, Sir, I support the Bill wholeheartedly.

Mr Cedric Foo.

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for allowing me to answer Mr Pritam Singh's earlier question. I just want to ask him if being a Member of the SC and having had the chance to read the SC report and agreeing to it, specifically Recommendation 12 where in the first instance, the first principle, in order to deal with it, we must deal with it with speed, in a matter of hours. So, the first part of my question to him is: does he deny that now? Does he now say that countering fake news can take much longer? Or does he still subscribe to the fact that it has to be dealt with in a matter of hours?

Mr Pritam Singh.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I thought I have made that clear, but I will repeat myself. Obviously, there will be instances where the response has to be dealt with within hours. But the question is whether the SC report commits itself to the Executive being the decision-maker. This is the key point. The SC report does not commit to the Executive as the decision-maker. And I think the point that needs to be re-emphasised is that there is no need for me to take my name away from any conclusion of the SC report, I stand by it. But a speedy response can be foreseen, can be fathomable through another decision-maker, namely, the Judiciary.

Mr Cedric Foo.

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker, and Mr Pritam Singh for answering and affirming that he agrees that "a matter of hours" is of utmost importance. He also said just now that he agrees that the Judiciary needs to be "bulked up" or whatever exact words were used, in order to respond in a matter of hours. And coming back to the earlier point, I am not saying that the SC report made a decision or conclusion on who the decision-maker must be. I agree with him on that. But if the Judiciary has to be bulked up to be able to handle issues in a matter of hours as opposed to the Executive branch which is supported by 16 Ministries, about 135,000 officers with years of experience in different domains like security, economics, health, education, and fake news can occur anywhere, how long does it take to bulk up the Judiciary before it can respond in a matter of hours?

Mr Pritam Singh.

Mr Speaker, the point that I think Mr Foo is making is that the Court needs to be bulked up. Yesterday, during the POHA Second Reading, we were informed that the process of applying against online falsehoods for individuals and companies would be a quick one and separate Courts have been set up for this for Singaporeans, for individuals and for companies. And it is in that context that I believe that a speedy response is possible through the Courts because those Courts are going to be set up by virtue of the amendments we passed under POHA.

Mr Cedric Foo, are there any new points?

Yes, probably the last engagement to give others a chance to speak. POHA is for private matters, and if somebody felt that they had been harassed, as a private individual, they will go to the Courts. I think the Minister and the Senior Minister of State have spoken about how to make the Courts a little more efficient and lower costs for such purposes.

POFMA that we are debating now is about public interest, it is about riots, it is about possible spread of wild fire, it is about racial disharmony. These are huge, these are public interest matters that have to be dealt with much faster than individual interest under POHA which, whilst important, are not as urgent as in cases under POFMA which are both important and urgent, and have to be dealt with right away. So, if it is to equip the Courts to have the same capacity, response time, experience and domain knowledge as the Executive branch, then I think it is a very far-fetched idea. I do not see how the Courts can reach that state.

Mr Leon Perera.

Mr Speaker.

Mr Pritam Singh then.

Mr Speaker, it is not my understanding that in cases of online falsehoods targeted against individuals and companies POHA is going to present a slow outlet for these individuals. That process also can be quick. If not, there would be no provisions for interim orders. So, I disagree with this idea – unless I have gotten POHA completely wrong – that individuals and companies cannot expect a fast, expeditious solution to falsehoods that have been carried against them. So, again, the WP will stick to the point and we believe that the Courts actually can respond to online falsehoods speedily.

Minister Shanmugam.

Thank you, Sir. Mr Singh, Recommendation 12 opens with "The Government should have the powers to swiftly disrupt the spread and influence of online falsehoods" – "The Government". The Government should have the powers and the objectives should be achieved as follows: provide access, limit or block exposure, disrupt the digital amplification, discredit the sources. And then, it goes to set out these capabilities should be able to apply to all relevant platforms; and it goes on to say, "Legislation will be needed to achieve the above objectives. Such legislation should have the following objectives: measures will need to achieve the objective of breaking virality by being effective in a matter of hours." On the face of it, the recommendation is that the Government should have these powers. The opening words cannot be any clearer: "The Government should have the powers...".

Second, equally importantly, let us not argue with qualitative words – "Courts can move fast, no reason why they cannot move fast" and so on. Let us stick to the clear recommendation – "matter of hours". The Member is a lawyer. I have been in practice. Does the Member think that in every case that is necessary, the Court can decide in a matter of hours? The Member knows the process: it would have to be filed, it would have to be served. The defendant may wish to come to Court and say, "I want to argue this" which means due process. How long do you think it will take to get a duty judge? I do not know whether the Member has tried. But over 22 years, I have tried several times. It can take two days. If the duty judge is in a hearing, it can take up to end of the day. This SC would have been mindful of all of that. It is not possible for the Member or for me or for anyone else in this House honestly to say that the Courts can do this in a matter of hours. That is just plain wrong. It is not possible.

So, let us stick to the SC's recommendation – "in a matter of hours". Four hours, five hours. What if it is a weekend? You know how long it takes to get a duty judge? When are you going to get a duty judge? When the Courts reopen. Sometimes, you can go to his house and see him. But "matter of hours"? What if he is engaged in something else? He can only give you the time that he can and it is possible that the defendant will turn up. You cannot say all the time that it should be ex-parte. Even in ex-parte, there is such a thing as contested ex-parte. If it is a responsible or respectable party, like a platform, you could say, the platform turns up and says, "No, we want to argue this case". Due process means you must allow them to argue. That means you have to set a hearing date. How long do you think that will take?

In POHA, the process is as follows: we have set up dedicated Courts but we have not pretended that in POHA it can come within a matter of hours. It may not be possible. But private interest, in general, we think they can go and try, but we hope that it can be done in two days; in sufficiently suitable cases, hopefully a day sometimes. But there will be other times when the judges are not available. That is why this Recommendation 12, which is a critical recommendation, says, "The Government should have the powers to swiftly disrupt the spread and influence of online falsehoods". And it says, "It should be done in a way to achieve the objective of breaking virality by being effective in a matter of hours".

If anyone in this House says that you guarantee that a Court will decide every single time, within a matter of hours, when you need it, you are not telling the truth. And I will say so by looking you in the eye. The Courts will tell you that is not possible. So, let us not use words like "Courts can decide quickly". Of course, they can decide quickly. But, as I said to the Nominated Members of Parliament yesterday, what does that mean? These are qualitative words. We are talking about "hours". I have given concrete examples where things happened within a matter of hours.

For private interest, you cannot have any other way other than going to Court. We set up a dedicated set of Courts for the State Courts. We asked them to set up a separate tribunal but that does not mean that an order can be obtained within a matter of hours. We can do the same thing in the High Court. But that does not mean that a Court order can be obtained within a matter of hours. You just think in terms of process. There might be times when there is no defendant and you can try and get an ex-parte, sometimes over the phone but, often, there is a platform where these things are carried, and the platform might want to be heard, Facebook, Google or somebody else.

So, I think the WP should try and clarify without using subjective terms and bringing in POHA which is quite different from POFMA, that is, this Bill, together with the SC's recommendations. Is the Member walking back on it? Is he saying he no longer stands by it? And if you stand by it, how does your current position make any sense because you accept that is a serious problem? You accept that something has to be done. The Government must have these powers. It must be broken within a matter of hours. The only difference that I see between you and us now is who makes that initial call. And your method does not gel with what the recommendation says. So, maybe, I can hear from the Member.

Mr Pritam Singh.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. I think a number of points have been made by the Minister. First, it has to do with my position on the Committee and the recommendations per se. I do not think it is an attempt to try and wriggle around the words, "The Government should act swiftly. Legislation should be provided to the Government". POFMA is the legislation that the Government has put forward. I think the issue is really response time. I think that is the key pivot that the Government and the WP have —

And that it says "The Government have the powers to swiftly disrupt" and says "This is the way it should be done."

The SC report, we went through several revisions of it. I was part of the team that looked at Recommendation 12 closely. I do not want to share what the deliberations of that small group were because those are confidential and I do not intend to abuse my Parliamentary privilege for that purpose, but I have those emails. I do not intend to read from them. But very clearly, my decision to remove the Executive as the decision-maker was made quite clear in the original draft. And I think that is the point. The point is, I believe the SC had to put forth an approach on how we are going to deal with the problem, but as to the specific modality, that was something for Parliament to decide.

So, that is dealing with the SC's phraseology and how the issue was put out.

Let me deal with the second set of issues that the Minister spoke about, which was about speed. Certainly, there appears to be two regimes when the Government needs to apply for an interim order to move quickly against either an individual or a company; in this case, let us say, a tech company like Facebook. Yes, I would agree that if we came to a tech company I would expect them to challenge what the Government wants to do. But in that sort of situation, the fact is POFMA gives advantage to the Government. The prima facie case is something that the judge can rule upon as a matter of course. That means, the order is given but as to the arguments that have to be dealt with later, these can be dealt with accordingly.

Let me give an example if the Minister could just bear with me. Targeted Correction order, this is clause 21, Part 4 of the Bill, is issued to the Internet intermediary that provided the Internet intermediary service by means of which the subject material has been or is being communicated in Singapore requiring it to communicate by means of that service to all end users in Singapore. And then, it goes on to say a statement, a specified statement and so forth.

We look at the identical option under POHA, for individual or company, there is a requisite standard to meet for an interim order, which is the prima facie standard. Once that standard is met, let us say, by a duty judge, the question of hearing the arguments can be dealt with later. And I think this is the point which suggests to me that there is some scope for the Courts to deal with the urgent issue that the Government wants to resolve, at least in the interim, and then when it comes to the proper hearing, the Government can make its case in full and the aggrieved party will have the time to respond.

Minister Shanmugam.

Mr Singh, that does not quite answer the question. On Recommendation 12 and whether the Executive is mentioned or not, I think we stick to the wordings here because I am also aware of those emails. And it is quite clear what Recommendation 12 says, but I do not want to put you in any sort of embarrassment on that.

Let us just deal with the point on hours. I think it is unarguable, prima facie or whatever, the starting point is for you to file and get an attendance before a duty judge. You will accept that that is not always possible in a matter of hours. That is the first point I make.

The second point I make is this. If you serve it, and sometimes you will have to, particularly, say you decide to make the platform the defendant, and they turn up, and they say, "No. Before you make a prima facie order, we want to make an argument. We want to be heard". What happens? The Court, are you sure, will each time make a decision within a matter of hours, assuming you can even get the judge? If the judge is in a hearing for the whole day, you get to see him at the end of the day, if he wants to see you, if he is able to see you. It is a simple point, Mr Singh. It is unarguable, is it not, that there will be times you cannot guarantee that if you go down this route, you will always get it within a matter of hours, prima facie or otherwise? That is the only point. I mean you are good enough to accept that, I think we can move on.

Mr Pritam Singh.

On the first point, Minister, it is no question of an embarrassment for me. I think I am quite clear as to what I think is the appropriate position taken by the SC report. Decision-making – it was not explicitly stated which would be the entity and I think I want to leave it at that.

The second point I think is an important one. The first question was in a matter of hours. And I think the Minister makes a fair point in the case of the duty judge. If, indeed, there is only one person, then it really comes down to a question of whether that should be increased. Should we have more duty judges? Again, it is an arguable point. The Minister may say look it is going to be quite difficult to execute in practice. I happen to think that, again, depending on how urgent the problem is, how bad the situation is, that can be dealt with.

The second point about service. It is an important point because it deals with issues of natural justice. It is an important point. Again, we look at POHA and interim orders, for example. Clause 16 says: "an interim order takes effect in respect of the respondent", and this is an individual or company, "when the order is served on the respondent in such a manner as may be prescribed", but critically, (b) says, "where the Court dispenses with the service of the order, when the service of the order or the respondent is dispensed with by the Court, or at such a later time as the Court may specify". Again, it suggests to me that the regime can be dealt with to deal with the problem of a falsehood provided that prima facie threshold is met. Serious problem. Serious falsehood put out there; and the Court may decide, "Look, I think service is of a second order importance right now, we need to deal with this problem but parties have to come back before me".

Minister Shanmugam.

Mr Singh, I think let us try and get clarity. The first point is not just a question of resources. Judges have cases. It is not as if there is one judge sitting there, doing nothing else but waiting for the Government to come in and apply. There is a duty judge regularly to hear urgent cases. Week after week, the duty judge changes. Sometimes, it carries on. As I told you, there can be weekends, there can be public holidays, there can be other issues.

The simple point is that neither you nor I nor anyone else can guarantee that it can be gotten in a matter of hours. I assume you have practised in this area. But if you have not, I will make that point to you.

Second, in terms of service. If it is a known platform and there is an identifiable defendant who is not a rogue party, when you go to the Court and the Court says, "Why have you not served on this party, why are they not before the Court?" What do you say? Okay, let us say we make provisions in urgent matters, we can come and get an interim order in the first place even before service. Assuming we provide for that. Then, what really happens is, each time you just go and get an ex parte order, all that the judge has is what you are giving him. And he confirms that you should get the order. Even then, after you get the order, you are going to break the virality within a matter of hours, as supposed to an immediate order by the Minister?

I think you have an insuperable problem there because of the availability of the judges. And if your point is, each time the Government wishes, it goes ex parte because it is urgent, then how is the Court to substantially check other than the fact that the Government puts up an affidavit, explains it and says, "I think it is urgent" and the Court gives it? But my fundamental point is, are you sure it is done in a matter of hours? Are you standing here as a party and guaranteeing that, every time it happens, it will be done within a matter of hours? If you say that, we will just leave it as that; if that is your position.

Mr Pritam Singh.

I thank the Minister for that. I think it requires a caveat, of course. A caveat is important and that caveat is that there has to be capacity for a duty judge to be available at that time. That is the caveat.

Let us move on. Mr Leon Perera.

I would like to pose a clarification to the Law Minister. I had intended originally to pose a clarification to Mr Cedric Foo. But I think in light of the Law Minister's comments at this point, I will just pose some clarification to him. It is quite simple. Is it the position of the Law Minister and the Government that our Courts could not be sufficiently resourced, structured, if necessary a new process, a new expedited process created, if necessary a new process for assigning judges created, additional capacity created? Is it impossible? Is it inconceivable that this could be done in the future in order to issue interim prima facie decisions in urgent, time-sensitive cases under POFMA? Is that impossible by definition? By definition, is that impossible in the future if we take all these steps to put in the resources to put in the process, if necessary create a special of class of judges and so on, so forth. Is that impossible by definition?

I would add that in other jurisdictions, to the best of my knowledge, and I may stand corrected, in other jurisdictions, for example, in some states in the US, it is my understanding that an arrest warrant has to be approved by a judge under certain circumstances. These arrest warrants are very time-sensitive and the judge has to make a decision on the balance of probabilities whether to arrest the person. That is a serious matter, whether to arrest a person in extremely time-sensitive circumstances. Sometimes, late at night, the law enforcers will go and see the judge. Because that system has been created and structured and resourced in such a way that it is possible. So, that is my clarification.

A number of points here. The first of which is this. Let us take the sequence, the process of these things. First, you got to draft something and file in Court. We are now talking about the SC's recommendation to do something within a matter of hours. You got to draft and file. You got to put aside some time for that. After that, you must find the judge. Let us say in the Member's scenario, we have a High Court Judge who does nothing but sits there 24/7 because it can break out anytime, and will be available as soon as the Government calls. It is technically not impossible. Of course, you can have a judge who does nothing but this, and no other cases. Because if he is hearing a case, he cannot break the case and come and listen to you. He has to go to finish the case for the sitting, until lunch time or until the evening, depending on the scenario. Duty judges hear their cases, too. So, we are saying, if supposing something has happened and I want to stop the communication within the next two hours, do you think it is possible by going to Court?

Then, there are further factors which have further levels of uncertainty. You file, you go before a judge and you say, "Look, Judge, it is so urgent that I am not going to serve this on Google, Facebook or whoever, wherever it is spreading. I just need an urgent order, ex parte, and then later on I will serve". Sometimes, the judge may agree but the judge may also disagree. Supposing he disagrees, then it takes a further length of time. The decision-maker, the person who has the facts, might take one view and the responsibility for dealing with that situation also rests with the Executive. Have you not known of instances where within 24 hours, there have been riots and people have been killed? Supposing the judge says, "I think I would like to hear the other side, urgent as it is". It has happened. Urgent ex parte applications have been heard on a contested basis. Any of these are possible. The judge could give you ex parte. But he could also ask for contested ex parte. He could ask the other side to turn up quickly. And if he does that, and the other side turns up, and then they say, "We do not have time to file an affidavit but we want to know the basic facts before we can argue. We need until this evening; we need until tomorrow morning." Once you set up a Court process, then, you must allow for the due process.

So, my point to you, Mr Leon Perera is, having now heard this explanation, is it your position that definitionally, it is possible, every single time, whenever we want it to be dealt with urgently, that it can be dealt with urgently, in a matter of hours? Is that your position?

Mr Leon Perera.

I thank the Law Minister for his explanation. And I think that there are a number of points that the Minister made which relate to judicial capacity, for want of a better term, and process. I would imagine that, based on what the Law Minister has said, he can envisage that the necessary capacity can be created to deal with such a caseload, based on what Law Minister said.

Possible, if the judge does nothing else but waits for the applications. That was what I said.

Mr Leon Perera.

Yes. So, I would take it that necessary capacity can be created. We can create a special class of Courts, duty judges. Capacity is a question of resource planning. So, with sufficient resources applied, necessary capacity can be created.

Next, there is an issue of process. And I think the Law Minister alluded to the fact that while the Government will have to word the submission, even an ex parte submission to the Court, and that is time-consuming, and while this is going on, the clock is ticking away and the falsehood is viralising and so on. But within the Ministry, or the Statutory Board or agency, the civil servants also have to word the submission to the Minister or communicate with the Minister. Can we not create a process whereby the communication, the form and the format of communication between the civil servant and the Minister is very similar to the form and format of communication between the Government and the Court in those very time-sensitive cases, to obtain an initial prima facie decision?

So, my point there is that I think, at the level of process, a process can be created to minimise the time lag from Ministry to Court. I would put it to the Minister that a process can be created in that way. And I think we have addressed the issue of capacity and we have addressed the issue of process. The Minister has been talking about the current situation, right now, with the capacity we have and the process we have. If we can add more resources and capacity, and we change the process to make it expedited to arrive at that prima facie decision to stop the viralisation, I would put it to the Law Minister that that is perfectly conceivable.

And I also want to address the other point that the Minister made, that in some cases, the judge will not agree. That is precisely the point. In some cases, the judge will not agree. If the judge feels that he is being asked to make a prima facie decision, but he is looking at it on a balance of probabilities and he feels that the Executive is over-reaching or the Executive is abusing its power, so he may not agree in that case. And that is precisely the value of the check.

I would ask Mr Perera not to put words in my mouth. When I said "not agree", it may be because he says, "I want to hear what the other side has got to say". So, my point to Mr Perera is: therefore, we can take it, and it will be very simple, can I take it your position is that, definitionally, every single time it is necessary to make a decision, you believe that the Courts can be used to make a decision to break the virality within a matter of hours; every single time, when it is necessary to do so? Is that your Party's position? Is that your position? If it is yes, yes. If it is no, no. That is all. It will be very good to clarify that.

If the Courts are sufficiently structured and resourced and the process is defined to enable that to happen, then the answer is yes.

And you believe that that can be done by simply putting some submission to the Court? Is that it, whatever the civil servant submits to the Minister can simply be submitted to the Court?

What I am saying to the hon Minister is that a simplified process can be created to absolutely minimise the lead time between the Minister and the Court to get a decision. There is a certain amount of lead time, in any case, for the internal conversation between civil servants and Ministers in such cases. What we are talking about is the additional lead time between the Minister and the Court to get that decision to break the virality. So, I would put it to the Minister that a process can be defined that is very simplified to minimise that lead time.

Yes. I have got the clarifications I needed, Sir. Thank you.

Thank you. Mr Leon Perera, your speech.

Mr Speaker, Sir, all Members in this House and both the WP and the PAP agree that fake online news is a danger that modern society must address. We have seen what happens elsewhere when falsehood fans sectarian hatred, swing elections and harmed national security. We need tools to limit the reach of truly dangerous falsehoods spread by malicious actors.

But while we agree on the goal, the WP and the PAP disagree about the means to achieve that goal. We disagree because we look ahead to the future of this country after this Bill is passed and we see a country where too much power is vested in the hands of any and every Minister. We see a country where free speech debate and thinking could become stifled, especially on the very important matters of public policy and politics on which so much health in national life turns. We disagree because the cure that the PAP Government has placed in front of us could lead to outcomes worse than the disease. As the hon Member Mr Pritam Singh said, section 22 of POFMA defines falsehoods as statements of facts that are false or misleading, not false and misleading. So, a misleading statement can be deemed false by a Minister by virtue of omission of facts.

Sir, in political, intellectual, legal, academic public debate, individuals often present facts that support their arguments and devote less time and space to facts that tend to support the opposite argument. This has been the case for centuries.

Yet, section 2 suggests that a particular collection of facts may be construed as misleading if the "opposite facts", as it were, are not given what the Minister thinks its sufficient weight. The same Minister may not correct statements made by the Government or its supporters that present mainly their facts as it were.

How do we deal with statements like, for example, "Housing and Development Board (HDB) flats are more like rental flats than owned assets since lessees lack strata titles. The HDB controls many aspects of what you can do with your flat and the value declines over the long-term towards zero dollars at the end of 99 years".

Sir, Minister Lawrence Wong denounced a similar notion as legally and factually wrong. Would such a view be deemed subject to a Correction Order under POFMA?

On POFMA, a falsehood can be deemed grave enough to warrant correction or penalty for being a misleading collection of facts, even if it does not contain one single false statement of fact. If this wide definition of misleading facts is maintained, the Courts should at least be the first arbiter of truth in respect of formulations, such as this one, rather than Ministers who have and will be seen to have their own political interest, a point I will come back to.

Next, section 4 sets out various criteria by which false statements are deemed harmful to the "public interest". However, the language lacks any reference to a real risk threshold. In section 4, it would seem that anything that impinges on national security, public health, public finances and so on, in however microscopic or indirect manner, would be upheld as vulnerable to corrections or penalties. The language of section 4 states "expedient" and "necessary". But expedient and necessary for what? To what degree of harm to those things?

Should section 4 not be worded to define "public interest" with reference to a real risk posed to the things described? In lieu of this, any statement having however minor an impact on the things described would qualify as correctable. How could meaningful judicial review thus operate? And this is setting aside section 17, Part 5's circumscription of the scope of what has been said will be fast and cheap POFMA High Court appeals to exclude consideration of the degree to which public interest is impacted, a point which my colleague Mr Dennis Tan and which my Party Chairman Ms Sylvia Lim will expand on. This lack of a threshold of significance stretches the risk of abuse of POFMA powers to correct matters which have a very minor impact on the public interest.

Next, my colleagues have spoken about the chilling effect POFMA may have on free speech. This is not political point-scoring. It is by virtue of this Bill's peculiar cocktail of three things, of section 2, defining what the Minister deems a misleading presentation of facts, not only false claims of facts, as correctable. That is one. Two, section 4F defining harmful falsehoods as including those that diminish confidence in the Government. And thirdly, section 6, which establishes Ministers as the decision-makers of truth and falsehoods in the first instance. It is through the combination of these three aspects of POFMA that this Bill is likely to chill free speech and debate about the Government, policies and politics, particularly, expressions of views that run counter to the Government narrative.

Why do I say this? Look ahead to the future. Correction and takedown orders could damage, if not destroy reputations and careers, for journalists, activists, academics, public intellectuals, politicians, professionals of various kinds. In fact, for many, many citizens. If your post becomes subject to such orders, what would your employers think, your lecturers and tutors, your professional colleagues, friends, spouse, business associates, partners and customers? When we bring in the risk of massive fines and lengthy jail time under section 7 for a single offence of "having reason to believe" that one statement is false or harmful as POFMA defines it, which includes undermining confidence in the Government, and with no threshold of significant impact on public interest specified in the law, the risk, Mr Speaker, Sir, is not just chilling free speech, but of hurling it into an industrial freezer.

By free speech here, I refer particularly to public speech regarding policies and politics that may contain criticisms of the government of the day or the ruling party.

I note in passing that for offshore sponsors of deliberate online falsehoods like state actors or offshore extremists or sectarian groups, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to subject them to these criminal penalties. The burden of these penalties and the fear they generate will fall primarily on domestic actors, on Singaporeans.

Of course, penalties for harmful falsehoods are necessary. I want to be clear about that. But when the penalties are severe and attached to language like that in sections 2 and 4 and with Ministers as the first arbiters of truth, the prospect of chilling public political debate is very real.

What would Singapore look like if most Singaporeans avoid commenting publicly in ways that may be seen as critical of the Government and its narrative? What may take hold is self-censorship and the restriction of online comments in favour of verbal conversations amongst friends or talks held amongst small groups. And the reason for this is clear to see. Many citizens will not have the stomach to risk a Correction order or a criminal charge even if they are confident about their facts, as many will not want to take on the effort, time, cost and risk entailed by a legal appeal, let alone a full-blown judicial review action. Under POFMA, the burden of proof falls on the person saying something, not the Government for saying that something was false. Many will choose not to take up that burden and simply not speak up.

Next, Sir, section 11 raises a related issue. Its language regarding Correction statements is broad. A Correction statement must be worded "in the specified form and manner" specified by the Government. Is there any requirement that Correction statements be as concise, factual, reasonable and non-pejorative as possible? Where is the requirement of proportionality in wording Correction statements?

Next, look ahead to the future. A price we pay for this Bill may be to live in a country where alternative media activists and journalists are afraid to bring certain information to light, possibly information about lapses, abuses, scandals or corruption, because they need to protect people who have shared information confidentially but are too afraid to be named.

In this case, under section 7, potentially, even the expression of public suspicion on the publishing of information from confidential sources by reputable journalists and writers using accepted, investigative and journalistic methodologies, may attract criminal penalties. The POFMA Bill, as it stands, lacks a public interest defence, something the UK is reportedly considering including in its eventual fake news law. There should be a public interest defence whereby a statement that was "false", according to the strict standards of POFMA, that is, it could have been deemed misleading at the time that it was made, may still not be an offence, or would be a far smaller class of offence carrying smaller penalties if made in good faith using a defensible process and to serve the greater public interest.

Sir, let us look ahead to the post-POFMA future. Will practitioners in the media industry and academia err on the side of caution?

Does that help Singapore's reputation as the global business, research and development and knowledge hub? Will scientists and public health professionals with a different view from the Government on the public health impact of e-cigarettes, for example, hesitate to publish clinical research showing harm reduction to confirmed smokers for e-cigarettes out of fear that they may be subject to Correction order because they did not also publish in the same statement facts about how many young first-time smokers are taking up e-cigarettes in the US and, hence, that research will be deemed a misleading collection of true statements?

As a result, will they refrain from publishing such facts due to the personal consequences they will have to face? How does the impoverishment of policy debate that may ensue from that help the formation of good policies? How do we mitigate the risks that the academics and the media may come to see a need to soft launch their ideas before publication with Government officers to minimise the risk of POFMA action or, worse yet, simply self-censor or water down outputs that disagree with the Government's narrative and hence may be deemed to undermine confidence in the Government under section 4?

Next, let us look ahead to the future post-POFMA in respect of politics. Singapore will be a country where any Minister can determine in the first instance what is truth and falsehood – in the first instance. Post-POFMA, ours will be a country where Ministers with the political interest they are seen to have, can correct statements they deem misleading, but the very same Ministers will not be subject to the stringent, immediate and broad strictures of the POFMA law. Ministers and Government spokespersons can say what they want, including misleading statements with a partisan political character.

What is the restraint on the Government here? Can victims of possible Government falsehoods go to the POHA Courts? Evidently not. They can sue for defamation, but again, how many would do that? Would defamation apply to statements made by Ministries and agencies as opposed to Ministers? How long would that take? What if a falsehood perpetrated by a government affects the outcome of an election? Would a positive defamation verdict for a victim of government fake news after the election help?

Section 4F describes diminution of confidence in the Government as one definition for falsehood being harmful to the public interest, a feature of this law that is different from most similar fake news laws or draft laws in other countries. Is vesting powers this broad in the Government of the day, from now to when this law is repealed, if ever that day comes, the responsible thing to do for future generations of Singaporeans?

What if a rouge government uses these powers to stifle criticism, block the circulation of embarrassing information about lapses, abuses or corruption, perpetuate fear and entrench itself in power? What if such a rouge government exploited the reluctance of many Singaporeans to sue the Singapore Government in Court to its advantage? What if such a government exploited the lack of a public interest defence to suppress genuine and responsible investigative journalism?

Do we serve future generations of Singaporeans by passing such a law and passing into the hands of the government of the day such a powerful weapon not knowing how it might be used?

When asked about the possibility of a future rogue government abusing POFMA, the Law Minister said, and I quote, "I cannot vouch for how a future government will act." Some would say, and the Law Minister also said in the same interview, I am not taking it out of context, that a rogue government or a Minister who abuses their POFMA powers will be held to account in elections. A number of PAP Members of this House have made a great deal of this point.

But Mr Speaker, Sir, this ignores the fact that a rogue government can precisely use POFMA powers to stop voters from learning negative information about their actions which could be a factor in those very elections. The powers can be used to partly insulate against electoral accountability. To say Parliament is a check against abuse is neither here nor there. The abuse may affect the composition of the Parliament itself.

Mr Speaker, Sir, this argument is, to a large extent, circular.

Some might say that chilling free speech a little is the right price to pay for preventing foreign powers, extremists and opportunists from destroying our communal harmony or even our independence as a country. Sir, we recognise the need for a surgical tool to fight fake news, which is why my Party Leader, Mr Pritam Singh, argued for an alternative regime, a regime with broad definitions and powers in POFMA are curtailed by virtue of the Government requiring judges to approve Correction Orders at the point of implementation, which is closer to one aspect of the model being debated and implemented in France. Resources can be provided to ensure that duty judges provide fast, prima facie decisions in time-sensitive cases. The Court should be the first arbiter and not the final arbiter. Sir, in Malay, please.

(In Malay): [Please refer to Vernacular Speech.] This Bill may reduce the reporting of information seen to be critical of the Government. It can also be misused by an irresponsible government, if Ministers, who may be seen to have their own political agenda, issue correction directions that are written in a way that will embarrass their critics, or they may even commence actions to take down the news that was published as well as stop the circulation of information that can embarrass the Government.

Sir, under this law, the Government decides whether a particular item of news is considered to be false or otherwise, and it is the responsibility of the person who issued the statement to prove that it is not false, and this must be done in Court.

The WP requests for a fake news law that places the responsibility of proving falsehoods on the Government, and not the person who issued the statement. The Courts must be the first arbiter in making the decision, and the Ministers should not be given dangerous powers, such as those stated in this Bill, powers that can be misused by an irresponsible government to retain their power.

Sir, we in the WP do not oppose for the sake of opposing. But we oppose when we see something that does not support elements of the national interest like this Bill.

(In English): In conclusion, Sir, purging destructive falsehoods from the public square is the right thing to do. But this Bill is a cure worse than the disease. When we look ahead post-POFMA, we see a country where only the rich and brave may dare to speak up. In time, the chill on free political speech may also affect our young people in our schools and higher education institutes. Will they come to self-censor their thoughts and their expressions to align with the Government's narrative? Will they internalise the fear of not diminishing confidence in the Government as section 4F of POFMA details? What will this mean for Singaporeans becoming independent thinkers who can navigate a world of disruption? Bear in mind what the hon Member Prof Lim Sun Sun said about how, among the general public, people are now using POFMA as a verb, "I will POFMA you".

Sir, the problem of fake news needs a surgical tool welded by objective, non-conflicted surgeons to strike at the diseased organ and not the healthy limbs. But this Bill is not a carefully crafted tool, it is a blunt weapon, handed to a conflicted surgeon, able to cause a great deal of collateral damage to the democratic body politik in this country. The Bill, as it stands, needs a radical overhaul, not just minor tweaks. We do not oppose for the sake of opposing. But we do oppose when it is right for Singapore and this is one such time.

Ms Joan Pereira.

Mr Speaker, Sir, with the prevalent use of the Internet and social media, massive amounts of information are being shared online, particularly among the young. On one hand, the free flow of information is a form of knowledge democracy; on the other hand, due to the low or non-existent barrier to online participation, falsehoods and misinformation are pervasive. The online space has remained unregulated for a long time. Cases of how the Internet has been manipulated to gain profit, cause racial and religious disputes, incite harm and cast doubts on public institutions abound.

The consequences for us as a nation would be dire if we leave such a situation unchecked. We will have difficulty telling the truth from online falsehoods, affecting our ability to make informed choices and decisions. We have already seen how online abuse and misinformation had led to injuries and deaths in other countries, spurring them to take action.

Global sentiment is shifting as governments around the world now realise that regulation of the Internet space is needed. Germany had enacted the Network Enforcement Act which took effect this year. France passed the Law Against the Manipulation of Information last November. The UK is now holding an open public consultation on the Online Harms White Paper that sets out the government’s plans for measures to keep users safe online. We, too, need urgent and comprehensive measures to address the menace of online falsehoods and manipulation.

Even tech companies now acknowledge that there is room for greater government intervention as they cannot be dealing with these problems themselves. I am very concerned about the impact of online falsehoods and fake analyses on our young. We must teach them how to discern truth from lies, how to analyse information they read online and how to think critically. Values are ingrained in people from a very young age. Hence, from young, we must teach them fundamental values which transcend religious and racial differences, such as mutual respect and tolerance, integrity, justice and fairness, kindness and empathy. If they are taught well, they will be inoculated against anything which violates basic human rights and values.

For parents, they will have to develop media literacy themselves and be able to discern facts from online falsehoods, so that they can have meaningful conversations with their children. These conversations have to be consistent and ongoing. Dialogues must remain open between children and parents, so that our younger generation can be groomed into a people who can think critically and independently.

Our education system must be constantly updated in methods to teach the younger generation media literacy in a fast-evolving sector and equip them with the necessary skills. I am pleased to note that research-based assignments are very common in schools now. Teachers can engage students through these projects to examine various sources of information. Students learn how to determine which sources are credible and which are not. They are exposed to questions and frameworks where they can apply themselves and determine, in each case, if information is true or false. In this sense, our education system is forward-looking in preparing our young for the future.

There is also a need to enhance digital literacy for the elderly as they may be a vulnerable group that is susceptible to fake news. Unlike the young, they may be less familiar with technology and the dangers that are lurking in the online space. I understand that the Government has introduced some programmes and initiatives, such as the Silver InfoComm. IMDA has developed a set of customised curriculum to increase infocomm literacy among seniors aged 50 and above. Silver Infocomm Junctions are senior-friendly learning hubs that offer affordable infocomm training and customised courses. These are encouraging steps forward to enhance digital literacy among senior citizens.

The Bill provides measures to mitigate the impact and harm caused by online falsehoods. It would be better if the abuse of these platforms can be prevented in the first place. I, therefore, welcome the upstream regulation of technology companies through the inclusion of codes of practice, which will go a long way to ensure a clean online space. I sincerely hope that tech companies will cooperate and work closely with our Government so that Singaporeans will feel safe and have greater confidence when using their services. I would like to ask the Minister what is the process for developing the obligations in the codes of practice? Will stakeholders be consulted on how the obligations should be framed? Sir, in Mandarin, please.

(In Mandarin): [Please refer to Vernacular Speech.] The Bill provides measures to mitigate the impact and harm caused by online falsehoods. It would be better if the abuse of these platforms can be prevented in the first place. I, therefore, welcome the upstream regulation of technology companies through the inclusion of codes of practice, which will go a long way to ensure a clean online space. I sincerely hope that tech companies will cooperate and work closely with our Government so that Singaporeans will feel safe and have greater confidence when using their services. I would like to ask the Minister what is the process for developing the obligations in the codes of practice. Will stakeholders be consulted on how the obligations should be framed?

(In English): In conclusion, we need continuous efforts to keep our Internet space safe for all Singaporeans and I am confident that the Government will continue to do more to educate our young and the elderly on the dangers of fake news and what they can do to protect themselves and their loved ones. I support the Bill.

Mr Gan Thiam Poh.

Mr Speaker, Sir, in Mandarin.

(In Mandarin): [Please refer to Vernacular Speech.] Yesterday, I listened to the speech of the hon Mr Low Thia Khiang. He accepts that online fake news brings harm to the society and must be curbed.

He also accepts that the Court can act as an arbiter of fake news, although he is of the opinion that it should be decided by the Court instead of the Minister. Despite the differences, they are the same. Because the Court has the final ruling.

The focus of today's Bill is on information falsifiers who disseminate false information online with the intention of causing harm, rather than the responsible and constructive network users.

It has been said that good people will gravitate towards doing good and the bad towards evil. Most people have a natural understanding of fairness and justice. Although Mr Low Thia Khiang’s worries can be understood, he does not need to worry too much unnecessarily.

Each of us has received interesting information forwarded by friends. I also often remind myself that for the information which is questionable and cannot be verified, when forwarding, I also alert the other party that the information may be false and cannot be substantiated. Everyone can develop this habit, so that they can have better peace of mind.