Go for the maximum resources can support: Mah Bow Tan on foreign labour
By Jeanette Tan | Yahoo! Newsroom – 14 hours ago
Former National Development Minister Mah Bow Tan has called for Singapore to continue bringing in more foreign labour in the coming years — as much as the country’s resources are able to sustain.
Speaking for the first time in Parliament this week as debate on
the government’s population white paper neared the close of the
third day, Mah said Singapore’s continued ability to attract
foreigners will ensure its sustained
competitiveness.
Saying it was quite clear that Singapore cannot be as open as
before due to resource constraints and time needed for people to
adjust, Mah also argued that to be totally closed even for a few
years as the Worker's Party suggested would lead to lost jobs, and
businesses leaving and unlikely to return.
"...[W]hich leaves us with a balanced option: let in some foreign
labour to supplement our local workforce but not as much as before.
Business will want more, some people will want less — the numbers
can be calibrated," he said.
“I support this. I say go for the maximum that our resources —
land, water, energy — can support, whatever that number is. It
shows that Singapore is an attractive place, a thriving, vibrant
city, one where people want to come here to live and work and
play," he
declared.
“If we lose our competitiveness, our verve and vitality, our
cohesion and confidence, not only will we not have foreigners
wanting to come here; our own sons and daughters will leave for a
better life,” he added.
Mah cautioned that after spending a lot of time “looking inwards,
talking about our discomforts, our space”, the debate has not yet
posed the question of how Singapore will compete with the outside
world, something Emeritus Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong alluded to
as well when he spoke earlier Wednesday.
“It is almost taken for granted that the good life will continue
even if growth slows,” he said. “We expect more infrastructure to
be rolled out even as growth slows — more houses, more rail lines.
We want more subsidies for healthcare and housing, but please,
let’s have less foreign workers and a slower pace of
life.
“Where will the revenue from all this come from?” he asked, citing
a footnote in the White Paper which said the government’s revenue
comes from income, consumption and asset taxes, all of which are
dependent on economic growth.
“I believe size matters. I believe we need a bigger population with
better-educated and trained citizens, as well as talented
non-residents to supplement our home-grown talent," he
said.
The former cabinet minister spent some time speaking at length
about the external challenges he perceives important to Singapore —
from the more than 6 million university graduates who emerge from
various parts of China every year to whether or not Europe will be
able to recover from its economic woes.
In these, he stressed the importance of “rid(ing) the wave with
them and not be(ing) caught in the tide and
drown(ing)”.
“We are still a small city state — in fact, we are tiny city
state,” he said. “We still have no oil or gas or gold or diamonds.
Politics has entered a new normal, but we need to earn our living
through wits and hard work, and our need to be useful to the world
— that hasn’t changed.”
He also called the debate on the 6.9-million projection figure a
“semantics trap”, saying the number has been called many things: a
target, a possibility, a projection, and a worst-case
scenario.
“We have been caught in a semantics trap — in other words, what was
said has been taken to mean something other than what was intended.
People believe what they choose to believe,” he said, adding his
worry that members of the House “are not being fair to
(them)selves” when debate places excessive focus on the
number.
“Population is not an exact science; it’s never been... frankly,
right now it’s hard to convince people that the White Paper is on
the right track, or people cannot understand why we are talking
about bringing in more people when in their own day-to-day
experience they feel the squeeze on trains and buses,” he
said.
Mah joined a growing group of MPs petitioning that the government
conduct a review of the White Paper assumptions in five years’
time, so that citizens will see a clearer picture of how things
have changed — whether congestion is easing up, housing prices have
stabilised, fertility rate is going up, and whether companies can
be more productive and cope with less foreign
labour.
“Will these happen? And if so, by how much? It would be a much more
informed and meaningful debate by then.”
Mah’s speech comes at a politically volatile time for the
ruling People’s Action Party,
which is facing grief from Singapore citizens at its handling of
the massive influx of foreigners in recent years that has diluted
what is now being dubbed the “Singapore core”— the pool of
Singapore-born and bred citizens — as the city-state continues to
struggle with an ageing population and one of the lowest total
fertility rates on the world.
))))))))))))
No shame ah, kena voted out still wanna talk cock. Voted out , he has nocredibility.
++++++++++++ $$$$$$$$$$$$ %%%%% ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
This is not a rash govt: Wong Kan Seng
Speaking in Parliament on the fourth consecutive day of its debate on the paper, which has sparked heavy criticism from the public and a few Members of Parliament thus far, Wong reiterated that the “headline number” of 6.9 million people by 2030 is not a target, but used to plan for the requisite infrastructure.
“If we search our hearts and conscience, we will know that this is not a rash government,” he said. “It is a government that is honest with the people. For decades, the same government shared the country’s problems openly with the people. This way, it hopes to rally the people to find solutions to the difficulties we faced together.”
Wong praised the government for “(taking) the bull by the horns” instead of taking the easy way out of not raising the issue till after the coming general election, or even the one after that.
He, like Emeritus Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong, tracked the challenges Singapore faced and tackled over the past decade. Having previously also served as minister-in-charge of population, he admitted that “with the benefit of hindsight”, the government was “a bit too liberal” in bringing in transient foreign workers and granting people PR status here.
“Could we have built up more infrastructure and housing then, when barely a few years before that, our prospects were not very optimistic? Again, with hindsight, many think the government should. Admittedly, the government was caught off-footed,” he said.
The paper, therefore, is the government’s effort to prevent a repeat of history, said Wong, maintaining that the point is not what size the population should be, but instead how to keep Singapore’s economy growing at a sustainable rate, create better-paid jobs for citizens and provide care and support to the elderly — and the people’s consensus on the plan is necessary.
“In the light of global uncertainties and rapid changes, the jury is still out (on) whether we can achieve our goals. We cannot take economic growth for granted,” he added.
In order to maintain that growth, he said, growing the workforce is necessary given Singapore’s ageing population and shrinking citizen labour pool. In turn, he stated three ways to do this — encourage procreation, increase labour participation rate and bring in foreign workers “with the right profiles”.
“But no matter what measures are taken, the number of Singaporeans above 65 years old will increase,” said Wong.
Adding that the first option is a “highly personal choice” and that our labour participation rate is high by global standards, he said, “We now know that pacing the influx of transient foreign workers is important and the government is calibrating the inflow. There are no silver bullets.”
MP Zainal Sapari: Help lower-wage workers first
Also joining the population debate on Thursday evening was Pasir Ris-Punggol MP Zainal bin Sapari, who spent the duration of his speech championing the concerns of low-wage workers.
“We have heard in this house over the past few days alternative labour force, GDP and population growth projections. Unfortunately, to the many Singaporeans who are facing stagnating wages, coupled with rising inflation, it means nothing to them,” he said, addressing the House.
Without mincing his words, Zainal, who serves as director for the Unit of Contract and Casual Workers in NTUC, declared that “the Singapore narrative for the low-wage workers must change for the better” as the country heads toward 2030.
Acknowledging the financial support and social assistance schemes in place, he maintained that the government cannot raise a person’s dignity through handouts.
“The time to take class-based affirmative action is now,” said Zainal. Speaking of the recent National Wages Council (NWC) recommendation of quantum pay increments for low wage workers, he said the reality is that many companies continue to show resistance to the national initiatives, citing cost concerns.
He singled out the National University of Singapore as an example of an organisation that failed to incorporate the progressive wage model into its requirements for cleaning contract services.
“How many cleaners (were) affected? I am not sure, but behind each of these cleaners is a family that most likely will find it difficult to cope with the rising cost of living,” he said. “When a premier academic institution of higher learning shows resistance to efforts to help low-wage workers, I am worried what the situation would be like in 2030.”
Zainal called on the government to be more aggressive in its measures to ensure “a more systemic impact” to improve their salaries. He also noted that joining unions may not necessarily help them to get better pay either.
“While unions can ensure they are accorded their statutory benefits according to the Employment Act, it is a challenge to negotiate for better wages if the workers are working under an outsourced contract with their salaries determined largely by what the company is getting from the Service Buyers,” he explained.
Despite the rising proportions of Singaporeans expected to take on professional and managerial-level jobs, Zainal argued that although there is hence a need for foreign workers to take on blue-collar jobs, the concern remains that this impacts low-wage and older workers, many of whom have for a long time faced stagnant pay from cheaper foreign competition.
He called for the government to make it mandatory for all companies to adopt the NWC’s recommendations for low-wage workers, and to recognise industry-wide agreements on wage levels, particularly for occupations like cleaners, security guards, retail assistants and landscape technicians.
“It is said that a society or a nation is judged on the basis of how it treats its weakest members; the last, the least, the littlest,” he concluded. “What we can do in the future is judged by what we can do now.”
Is this mah guy angry at singaporeans ? Is he trying to punish us ? One has to start wondering.