A U-turn in PAP’s economic and population policies? We shall see.

January 26, 2010 by admin
Filed under: Current Affairs 

Written by Ng E-Jay
26 January 2010

Has there been a dramatic U-turn in the PAP’s economic and population policies? Despite recent statements by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on the need to raise productivity and temper the rate of import of foreigners, I remain unconvinced till I see actual results.

On Monday, Mr Lee told the audience at the Singapore Perspectives 2010 Forum organized by the Institute of Policy Studies that Singapore has to adopt a revised economic strategy focused more on improving productivity than pursuing growth at all costs.

This blog, Sgpolitics.net, has repeatedly used the phrase “growth at all cost” numerous times over the past year to describe the flawed economic and population policies of the PAP that will end in disaster should they be allowed to go on unchecked.

Mr Lee said that land constraints prohibit indefinite expansion of the workforce by importing more and more foreigners, and in his own words as quoted by the Straits Times: “We have to extract maximum value from the resources that we have; every piece of land must be put to optimum use, activities which are no longer competitive or productive have to be gradually phased out.”

He also said that both local and foreign workers “have to be be upgraded“.

Mr Lee’s latest statements are at odds with what the PAP has been doing for the past decade — aggressively and indiscriminately importing foreigners and shoring up our population base as well as GDP figures by mere quantitative expansion.

Has Mr Lee and the PAP finally realized that such a strategy simply cannot be sustained, and is already wrecking havoc on lower income Singaporeans who find it increasingly difficult to survive in an economic landscape flooded with cheap labour and unscrupulous employers not above hiding in the shadows of the PAP and using loopholes in the rules to exploit both domestic and foreign workers?

Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong also spoke on the same topic the previous day, saying that Singapore’s workforce needs to raise productivity and improve capabilities, and that if the local workforce was more productive, then the country could be less reliant on foreign workers.

Mr Goh has it backwards. The local workforce is already working hard to survive in the challenging job market and economic environment. It is the Government’s flawed policy of uncontrolled population expansion and import of untalented foreigners that have depressed our productivity levels.

Given that many of our Government-linked Corporations as well as MNCs operating here are highly dependent on a constant supply of cheap labour, both local and foreign, to maintain their bottom lines, it remains to be seen whether the PAP Government will walk its talk and address the deep flaws in its economic and population policies.

What we require is not simply a more controlled rate of import of foreigners, but much stricter controls as to what kinds of foreigners we import into the country.

We need talented foreigners who can bring in skills and expertise that we don’t have, not unskilled and untalented foreigners who offer us no advantage but who merely displace born and bred Singaporeans from the job market because they can accept very cheap wages as a result of not having been saddled with an expensive HDB mortgage nor burdened with National Service requirements.

To avoid both local and foreign workers being exploited by companies, we need a minimum wage system as well as strong and independent labour unions that genuinely champion workers’ rights, not a tripartite alliance composed of mere PAP surrogates.

Above all, we need to import foreigners who show a genuine commitment to adapting to the local culture, not foreigners who merely bring in bad social manners and who are only prepared to use Singapore as a stepping stone before venturing to greener pastures.

We need qualified foreign professions, teachers, bankers and innovators who can raise service standards and spur entrepreneurship, not foreigners who hijack SBS buses, scream at the top of their lungs at the MOE building when their children do not get into the primary school of their choice, or insist on speaking Mandarin to customers at BreakTalk when ours is a multi-lingual society with English as the official working language.

What we need are foreigners who, through entrepreneurship or hard work, allow businesses to create higher value jobs for all, not foreigners who merely take away jobs that could have been filled by Singaporeans.

The strain on the fabric of Singapore’s society brought about by flawed PAP policies over the past decade has indeed been felt by the electorate, and that is probably why the PAP is rushing to assure Singaporeans that the rate of import of foreigners will be controlled and more priority given to Singaporeans in areas such as education.

However the announcements and changes made thus far have been cosmetic.

The Singapore electorate can do its part by compelling the ruling clique to make substantial changes to its current policies by making it clear that it is prepared to use the ballot box to bring about the much needed change that Singapore needs.

If voters remain complacent, the PAP will in all likelihood continue down the current sorry path, and that will be disastrous for our long term social harmony and even national security. We would lose much more than a home. We would destroy a nation.

Grow productivity, not just GDP: PM

Source: Straits Times, 26 January 2010

By Jeremy Au Yong, Political Correspondent

SINGAPORE is to adopt a new economic growth strategy focused more on improving productivity than pursuing growth at all costs.

The reason boils down to the country’s land and labour constraints, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said yesterday.

‘Our total land area is finite, and very little of it is lying fallow,’ he told a conference examining the challenges facing Singapore.

‘Our own population is growing slowly, and we cannot indefinitely expand our workforce by importing more and more workers from abroad.’

Mr Lee said Singapore would have to adjust its growth strategy and find new ways to continue to do well.

And, with that change, it has to shift to growing qualitatively not just by expansion, but by upgrading.

He said: ‘We have to extract maximum value from the resources that we have; every piece of land must be put to optimum use, activities which are no longer competitive or productive have to be gradually phased out.’

Similarly, he said, workers, both local and foreign, need to be upgraded.

His call for higher productivity came a day after Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong spoke on the same topic – a clear sign that raising productivity is high on the Government’s priority list this year.

The Economic Strategies Committee report, due for release next Monday, is expected to focus on it.

The Budget statement, on Feb22, will respond to the committee’s recommendations.

The general target outlined by both Mr Lee and Mr Goh is to double productivity growth to 2 per cent to 3 per cent a year, from the present 1 per cent.

Productivity growth is usually considered critical to improving living standards. It means getting more value from each worker, resulting in more income being available to be distributed.

Such a change will take a major effort, said Mr Lee. ‘But we have to do it so that progressively and inexorably, our economy will be transformed.

‘Then, even if our total gross domestic product grows more slowly, our workers can become more productive and our income per capita can continue to rise.’

Previously, Mr Lee has warned that Singapore would not go back to pre-crisis growth levels. Yesterday, he said the average annual growth of 5 per cent enjoyed in the past decade would be difficult to sustain.

This was due to how much Singapore had progressed, and the push for higher productivity would result in slower expansion of the workforce.

‘We must acknowledge that we are now more developed economically than we were 10 or 15 years ago, and we can no longer grow as rapidly as before,’ he said.

‘There will be good years when we should go faster. There will be other years which are tough, where we will do more poorly, but overall, if you take it over the next decade, I think 5 per cent will be a stretch,’ he told about 900 people from academia, business, civil society and government sectors who attended the conference.

Called Singapore Perspectives 2010, it was organised by the Institute of Policy Studies.

Mr Lee also disclosed that the Trade and Industry Ministry is studying what a realistic long-term growth target would be.

He was careful to stress that the push for productivity did not mean just working harder.

Businesses needed to innovate relentlessly and be bold in seeking opportunities overseas, he said.

Workers, on the other hand, had to be psychologically prepared to upgrade their skills over and over again throughout their working lives.

jeremyau@sph.com.sg

Work smarter, harder to sustain growth: SM

Source: Straits Times, 25 Jan 2010

SINGAPOREANS have to work smarter and harder, and pick up new skills to keep the economy growing over the next decade, Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong said yesterday.

Given the Government’s move to moderate the influx of foreign workers, the rate at which productivity is increased will have to double if economic growth is to hit 3 per cent to 4 per cent a year, he explained.

Raising productivity is one area that the Economic Strategies Committee (ESC) will address in its recommendations on Feb 1, he said.

The Government forecasts economic growth of 3 per cent to 5 per cent this year and on Saturday, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong tempered expectations of an overly strong economic recovery.

Speaking on the sidelines of a community event yesterday, Mr Goh noted that average annual economic growth was 5 per cent over the past 10 years. But productivity rose just 1 per cent a year on average.

This good growth came from an expanding labour force, of which foreigners constituted a large part. But reducing reliance on foreign workers meant Singapore had to double its productivity growth to 2 per cent, he said.

He acknowledged this was not an easy task, but said it must be tackled:

‘If we can achieve 2 per cent growth in productivity, then with the slowdown in growth of the foreign workforce, we think we can grow by 3 per cent to 4 per cent a year. So we’ve got to be prepared for slower growth. This is a trade-off.

‘If you want to grow fast, it means a larger foreign workforce, which I don’t think is advisable because already, we have too huge a presence (of such workers) and we’re not emphasising productivity.’

Productivity gains could be made in all sectors, but the service industry was one area with room for improvement, he said. He noted how in Europe, service staff performed multiple tasks: ‘One person serves so many people. Here, we have so many people serving one customer. We are not fast enough.’

Asked if raising productivity would be at the expense of jobs, he said this was unlikely.

Singapore faced a shortage of workers but if the local workforce was more productive, then the country could be less reliant on foreign workers, he said.

But working smarter and harder was also not good enough.

He said workers had to build up their capabilities and learn a range of new skills to stay ahead. The ESC will also be looking at some other areas.

Mr Goh said his focus in the next 10 years would not just be on economic matters. He would try ‘to build a qualitatively different Singapore in terms of our lifestyle, graciousness’.

Citing a Jan 23 article by Straits Times columnist Neil Humphreys, in which he noted an incident where people turned a blind eye to helping a blind man, Mr Goh said this was an area in which Singaporeans could improve in their social graces.

He said: ‘If we can do that with a matured economy growing by 3 per cent to 4 per cent, then… Singapore can be a very fine place to be our home. That’s my own personal aim.’

Yesterday, he distributed hongbao and festive goodies to 42 needy residents in his constituency, and opened the upgraded Marine Terrace Hawker Centre and Market before visiting stallholders and meeting residents there.

zakirh@sph.com.sg

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Comments

5 Comments on A U-turn in PAP’s economic and population policies? We shall see.

  1. MM Sz on Tue, 26th Jan 2010 10:34 pm

    2. Linked. Thanks.

  2. GLOW on Wed, 27th Jan 2010 2:14 am

    3. Why do we, the people, pay million $$ salaries to the ministers for poor, shorted -sighted policies which degrade our standard of living & waste our resources..??..

    I guess the govt is so intellectually poor N idealogically in-bred that its best ideas from ALL the ministers are essentially one and the same or whatever the old man thinks..

    mad rush to the lowest wages .. growth at all cost..
    sacrifice citizen workers for profists of MNCs or bilateral relationships..
    that HDB flats are affordable.. that foreigners ar not villians.. govt policies are the true villians.
    socialise the cost of public services while privatising the profits of such services..

    what a brilliant bunch of million $$ buffoons we,the people, have in the PAP…

    … it has come to this.. the govt can only get NEW , GOOD ideas by reading local anti-pap blogs…

    ……. VOTE …………. VOTE …………. VOTE……….

  3. Tweets that mention A U-turn in PAP’s economic and population policies? We shall see. | Sgpolitics.net -- Topsy.com on Wed, 27th Jan 2010 2:52 am

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