By Abhijit Nag
Did you watch Ask the Prime Minister on Channel NewsAsia last night? I was following the comments on Twitter at the same time – and it was a parallel universe. The tweets running from the jokey to the sarky were a lot more unruly than the ones TV presenter Sharon Tong cherry-picked for reading out to the Prime Minister.
The first tweet I saw said: “That’s a nice shirt. Where did you get it? Or did your wife get it for you?” It was utterly off-topic and not PM’s ear-worthy, so Ms Tong was right to ignore it. But if like me you watched the TV show and had Twitter open at the same time, you saw how Channel NewsAsia filtered the comments.
And even the selection was not flawless. Channel NewsAsia showed a tweet from Joyce Chng who asked: “I hope these policies are not reactionary, but truly well-thought out and sensitive to the needs of a diverse society.” She meant “reactive”, not “reactionary”, I think, but how do you edit tweets? You either ignore them or use them, even if the teacher screams “English!”
That’s the problem with social media. It’s beyond control. Prime Minister Lee admitted as much. When Ms Tong asked if governing had become more difficult; yes, he said, and one reason was social media. He recalled Michael Bloomberg, the founder of Bloomberg News and outgoing mayor of New York, who said social media was an instant referendum on everything and could make governing more difficult.
PM Lee said it with a smile, but it was clear the 24/7 digital flak occasionally touched a nerve. The government is expected to do everything, he said, when asked what is it about Singaporeans that he would like to change.
Father and son
Who knows, maybe deep in his heart, he thinks his father had it easier. The old man had to face communists, who could be locked up, not bloggers, who can’t unless they fan racial or religious feelings. Sometimes, even that needs a light touch.
Singapore has changed, the PM said. That was evident in the relaxed manner he talked to MediaCorp editor-in-chief Walter Fernandez and Ms Tong. He answered questions with a smile unlike his father, who could not help looking stern.
Behind the smiling demeanour, however, is a chip off the old block. It popped out not once but twice. “I think you find happiness in achievement,” he said while talking about Singaporeans wanting a work-life balance. “If you look at other countries – Vietnam, China, even in India – they’re not talking about work-balance; they are hungry, anxious, about to steal your lunch. So I think I’d better guard my lunch.”
He sounded like his father speaking about hunger and achievement. And also while talking about politics. Ms Tong mentioned a tweet which said politics nowadays was “about perceptions, about being populist”. “I don’t think politics today is about perceptions and about just appearing good,” countered PM Lee. “I think politics has to be about serious things… you must do the right thing, that you must have conviction in what you are doing, But at one point where I disagree with the quote is that, at the end of the day, we must also make sure that we win the next election because if we can’t win the election, then you can’t do any good for the people.” Echoes there of his super-competitive father, Mr Lee Kuan Yew.
He even managed to pay homage to his father. Asked about the qualities needed to be the next prime minister, he said: “Ideally, we (should) have another Lee Kuan Yew (but) that’s not going to happen.” He added: “There’s only one Lee Kuan Yew in many, many generations, in many, many countries. We’ve been blessed.”
If that looks like a hyperbole in print, it was different on TV. The PM looked relaxed and confident as if talking to friends about things on which they all agreed. The interviewers never once pressed him on anything he said. This wasn’t Hard Talk. It was the head of the government talking to state television. PM Lee to his credit spoke man to man, mindful of the viewers – and voters. He might not have disarmed his critics, but he looked good on TV. Maybe he should do it more often.
In fact, he seemed so comfortable that maybe he should next do an Obama. Remember those townhall meetings? Instead of sitting next to Mr Fernandez, who nodded, frowned and smiled like a man in the know, one insider speaking to another, he could be talking to ordinary people – real, live voters who ultimately hold the keys to Istana even though they are not allowed in every day.
Ask the Prime Minister, mind the tweets
Some hard truths about race
Singapore’s race relations were put under the microscope in an exhaustive survey recently. The results showed that although Singaporeans are generally open to other races in the public sphere, they are not so in the private sphere. After half a century of enforcing and encouraging racial harmony, why this disharmony? Where did Singapore go wrong? Can race ever be wished away? Is race utopia ever possible? P N Balji talks to Viswa Sadasivan, former NMP and vice-president of Sinda’s executive committee.
Q. Did the results surprise you? If yes, why; if no, why?
A. Generally, the results didn’t surprise me – they were what I would expect from a survey of this nature. That is, respondents tend to be conscious of the need to be politically correct. That aside, it should not surprise us that most respondents either accepted the concept of multiculturalism. In fact, it would be odd if they didn’t.
After all, since 1965 we have been reciting the National Pledge which reminds us that, “We the citizens of Singapore, pledge ourselves to be one united people, regardless of race, language or religion….” However, as former Mr Lee Kuan Yew reminded me in Parliament three years ago, what we recite in the Pledge is an “aspiration” – something we desire but that is unlikely to become reality in the foreseeable future.
The hard truth is that while we may, instinctively or otherwise, be persuaded to accept certain ideals at a conceptual level, our willingness or ability to act on them may be a different thing altogether. I would imagine that if we were to ask a murderer if murder is wrong – there is a decent chance he would say that it is, at a conceptual level.
It is for this reason that I was disturbed by, and yes, surprised by the findings about Singaporeans (and PRs) having at least one close friend of another race. This set of findings appears to contradict what much of the rest of the survey conveyed. 55% of those polled did not have even one close friend of another race (close friend being defined as someone you feel comfortable enough to confide in)!
If we are not at least disturbed by this, something is wrong. I found myself asking – it must take much effort for an individual who lives in a society that has embraced the ideals of multiculturalism for nearly 50 years, not to have even one close friend of another race. If indeed this is true, then instead of trying to soften the blow, we should ask inconvenient questions:
Were we always like this? Were there specific policies and structural issues that could have inadvertently contributed to this state of affairs? How could this have happened despite National Education and the multitude of PA- and CDC-driven community activities, all of which have been in existence for decades now? Or should we simply accept that this is the way things are, that is that while we may accept the concept of multiracialism we should not be expected to act on it.
Q. Maybe we are all barking up the wrong tree. Race is built into our DNA and deep down we are not colour blind. Do you agree?
A. I agree that we are not colour-blind in the sense that we can see and therefore are aware of the physical and cultural differences and that these attribute to a large extent to ethnic differences. This is where the lack of colour blindness ends. It is one thing to be cognizant of these differences and another thing altogether to impute differential values to them.
There is a distinct difference between ethnic pride and ethnocentrism. My life experience, starting in the 60s, has helped shape my faith in our capacity for not just tolerating but accepting (and in some instances even celebrating) ethnic and cultural differences. This, in turn, helps to bring down the barriers (built on ethnic stereotypes and ethnocentrism or even xenophobia) to building stronger ties across ethnic boundaries.
Unfortunately, there have been mixed signals in this space coming from the government. On the one hand, we are reminded of the virtues of multiracialism and tolerance, and at the same time we have heard senior leaders make statements that unfortunately served to legitimise stereotypes and highlight the inevitability of birds of a feather flocking together. The birth of GRCs and ethnic self help organisations such as Mendaki and Sinda are some of the products.
I am certain that these statements were made with good intentions, but the effect on the various audience groups have been inadvertently divisive. If we are indeed committed to Singapore being essentially a multicultural society, then we need to first acknowledge these mixed signals, and then rectify them.
In short, I don’t think we are barking up the wrong tree. Ethnic harmony, in the truest sense of the word, is not an unworthy or elusive goal.
Q. Do you think we have lulled ourselves into a deep sleep over race because we leave it to the government to handle this issue?
A. I don’t think it is fair to put the entire burden of responsibility for the state of things today on the government. In many ways, I do believe that we have the Singapore government to thank for for a society that is functioning, by and large, on the principles of justice and equality regardless of race or religion.
This is more than what our friends in some other countries in the region have. Also, the government, through educational means (such as National Education), policies and programmes (such as Community Engagement Programmes) and legislative means to protect the interests of minority communities (such as the Sedition Act and the Presidential Council for Minority Rights) continue to provide a measure of predictability that the principles of equal opportunities and meritocracy will not be suspended. This assurance is important and is something that the people – especially of the minority communities – look to the government to provide.
What is needed now, is for there to be more opportunities for open and candid discussion and debate on matters and issues pertaining to ethnicity and religion. The government needs to acknowledge that especially because of the many mixed messages one is exposed to today, especially through the Internet, there is an even more pressing need for honest and yet sensibly facilitated discussions, perhaps in closed-door settings.
What do you tell your daughter about race?
Maya is 14 and is fortunate to have parents who believe in and are committed to multiracialism. “Fortunate” because parents are a critical point of reference, especially in areas that are based on values and cultural norms. She is also fortunate that her primary school (Haig Girls) and now the School of the Arts (SOTA) provided an open and accepting atmosphere for mingling across ethnic and religious backgrounds.
As such, Maya’s school and home environment were consistent in sending the core message that while we may look different and have diverse practices because of our ethnic or religious background, each one of us should be valued for who we are as individuals based on universally-accepted values that transcend ethnic and religious realms.
There have been times when an individual’s negative actions seem to have a cultural or religious basis. In such cases, my wife and I make it a point to discuss the situation in detail with Maya, essentially to persuade her to avoid drawing conclusions that validate stereotypes that are pejorative. What helps is that my wife and I are seldom in disagreement when it comes to this subject.
Q. How many of your closest friends are of another race?
A. If we were to adopt the definition in the survey that a close friend is someone you are comfortable confiding in, I would say that out of a total of about 20 who qualify, about half are non-Indian.
Dear Singapore Girl
By Calvin Soh
I loved you the first time I saw you so many years ago. Then you were one of a kind. You were confident, brave, your ideas were ahead of its time and you had a spirit no one else had. You were my first in so many ways.
Then, you wooed me like no one else had done before, with your Kebaya, meals by famous chefs, Raffles Class, exemplary wines, and inflight service other airlines talk about. You were business “unusual”.
Then, one day, you stopped wooing me. You became corporate (robotic almost), you cut corners and stopped doing the things that meant a lot to me. I felt like a number. Our relationship became business as usual.
So I looked around and other girls appeared over the horizon. They were still mere copies of you but they were catching up very quickly.
We drifted. I started seeing other people who don’t take me for granted.
Now you’re trying to win me back. With an ad campaign, with words and with clichés.
“The Lengths We Go To”, showcasing the Airline’s unwavering commitment to putting the customer at the heart of everything it does, in all classes of travel.
Everyone from the POSB Girl to Carrier Man says that. If you don’t believe me, google it. No one says you’re not at the heart of everything they do.
“Making every customer feel at home when they fly with us has always been the cornerstone of our service philosophy. Our customers’ preferences have always been the foremost consideration in the curation process for our new products which are sourced from all over the world. This new campaign sets out to reaffirm this commitment.”
So what’s new? You mean you’ve not been doing that all along? The truth is you’re not doing enough and that’s why we’re estranged.
A tea plantation and teahouse in Fujian were selected as the setting as this is the region from which SIA sources Jasmine tea.
Renowned Glasgow-based Andrew Muirhead & Son, Europe’s oldest tannery, was used as the filming location as it is where the leather used in SIA’s Business Class seats is produced.
SIA’s award-winning KrisWorld in-flight entertainment system features films in more than 10 languages, including a selection of critically-acclaimed artistic films to cater to customers’ varied preferences.
You’re going to win me back with green tea, leather and movies? Really? No one else has them?
The Airline’s YouTube page, youtube.com/user/
Please stop now. I skip videos within the first 5 seconds and stopped reading newspapers and watching TV a long time ago. Just ask Straits Times and Mediacorp.
You can’t win my loyalty, trust and love back with mere words, especially referring to me in the third person.
No, I want action.
And it starts by understanding what I want.
For example, I hate your online booking site more than an ACS boy hates Chinese (I fathered one during our break). I feel you deliberately made it difficult to book so I don’t get to claim my hard earned points. And if by miracle the site doesn’t hang, I find the rules of using my miles skewed in your favour. It’s all you you you.
If instead of doing these ads that I won’t get to see, spend the $5mil redoing your website instead. Make it easier and quicker to redeem my miles. Then do a campaign that says this is how you put me first.
I will watch that commercial, read that ad and click that banner. I will believe the lengths you’ll go to.
And if you want me back, find a way to transfer some of my miles from other airlines over. Can I enjoy some of the perks without having to start from scratch? I have many friends who are relocating to Singapore who’d like that option too.
I know, I know. You can’t transfer miles. Once you start, everyone would want that. But in the past, you’d think outside the box and find a solution. You would invent, innovate, and at least try. You lost your business “unusual-ness”.
These days, I find you’ve become comfortable, complacent and stuck in your ways. Change can be so hard when you’re afraid of losing what you already have. But if you don’t, you will anyway. Just look at the Nokia, Tower Records,
The Washington Post and Borders of the world.
The ones that are relevant to me still have the challenger spirit, constantly reinventing themselves, like Apple, Samsung, Nike, and Starbucks.
You had that same spirit all those years ago, it’s embedded deep in your DNA.
So what’s stopping you? Is it the shareholder? Because in the past, when you focused on me, the shareholder benefited. Never vice versa, remember?
But I can’t wait. I’ve moved on. I’ve changed faster than you have.
I now live in exponential times. Nokia was worth US$132bn 5 years ago, and US$7.2bn now. The Singapore property market recession lasted a mere 18 months. My loyalty to brands also fluctuate exponentially.
I’m not the same person 10 years ago. Heck, I’m not the same person 10 months ago.
I’m surrounded by instant access to knowledge. I can find cheaper and better alternatives anywhere. I can also find out if you’re telling the truth or not.
I can block ads, deny you access to information and I have the power of choice. This is the world I live in.
I am now in control, not you. The customer is King.
I’ve changed so much while you’ve only just updated your 70s Abba blue eye shadow.
I’m the one who is far ahead of you.
I’m sorry Singapore Girl. It’s not you, it’s me.
Calvin Soh is an adman.
Finally, Singaporeans first
By Abhijit Nag
“We are putting Singaporeans first,” Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said in his National Day Rally speech on August 14, 2011, three months after the May 7 general election which returned the People’s Action Party to power with the slimmest majority since independence. Now, two years later, we are seeing the government acting at last on one of the biggest grouses of Singaporeans.
Singaporeans will have to be considered first before companies can hire foreigners. Anyone looking for a better job in this tight labour market, where unemployment is a paltry 2.1 per cent, will be familiar with the boilerplate last line in want ads: “Only Singaporeans and permanent residents need apply.” Now the rule is being tightened. From August next year, companies will have to advertise for Singaporeans first before they can apply for employment passes to bring in – is that the phrase? – “foreign talent”.
The phrase is so yesterday. Once you could not even finish the paper without coming across the phrase. Now it has become the linguistic equivalent of a persona non grata. It seems to have been banished from the vocabulary of ministers and officials.
You won’t find the expression in the official press release yesterday which said: “The Ministry of Manpower (MOM) today announced new rules that require employers to consider Singaporeans fairly before hiring Employment Pass (EP) holders.“ True to style, it goes on to list the penalties for breaking the rule: “Firms with discriminatory hiring practices will be subject to additional scrutiny and may have their work pass privileges curtailed.”
Government means business
The government means business. It is specific about the conditions that have to be met before companies can apply for employment passes:
“Firms making new EP applications must advertise the job vacancy on a new jobs bank administered by the Singapore Workforce Development Agency (WDA). The advertisement must be open to Singaporeans… and run for at least 14 calendar days.”
Since the companies will have to advertise on a WDA jobs bank, it will be easier for the government to check if they are following the rules.
Singapore already has rules regulating the ratio of foreign workers to local workers. What MOM’s latest rule really comes down to is a leg up for young, white-collar Singaporeans. The press release says as much:
“Elaborating, Acting (Manpower) Minister Tan (Chuan-Jin) said, “What we are doing is to put in place measures to nudge employers to give Singaporeans – especially our young graduates and Professionals, Managers and Executives (PMEs) – a fair chance at both job and development opportunities.”
Cynics might say that’s the constituency the PAP lost in the by-election in the largely young, relatively well-off Punggol East — the sandwiched middle class likely to vent online instead of just drowning their sorrows in the local kopitiam.
But, of course, you can’t please all the people all the time. There will be grumbles even about the new rules: Why August next year? Why not now?
Maybe companies still need time to adjust to the new Singapore.
Good for business?
So, yes, the government means business, but is it good for business? The SMEs’ lament about the labour shortage is well known. But start-ups have been complaining too. Generally, university graduates prefer working for multinationals like Google, Facebook or Microsoft, making it difficult for start-ups to hire people unless restrictions on foreign workers are loosened. That’s what some entrepreneurs said at the first dialogue session with the Entrepreneurship Review Committee, attended by Minister of State for Trade and Industry Teo Ser Luck, in July, reported sgentrepreneurs.com.
The Singapore International Chamber of Commerce in its annual closed-door dialogue with MOM also spoke about the need to hire and retain foreign workers, “particularly for certain industries that are in need of skill sets, knowledge and experience not readily found among Singaporeans”.
Even the former US ambassador to Singapore, David Adelman, stressed that Singapore must remain open to foreign talent in order to attract foreign capital. Commenting on the debate on foreigners in Singapore, he told The Straits Times: “American businesses and investors are watching it closely. I would even broaden it – all foreign investors are watching it very closely.”
So business-friendly, MNC-wooing Singapore is really shrugging off the concerns expressed by quarters crucial to its economy – SMEs and foreign investors.
Who comes first, who spoke first
But, of course, Singaporeans come first.
“The new rules… draw on feedback from Singaporeans who have submitted their views to MOM through MOM’s Our Singapore Conversation on Jobs and from key stakeholders such as the National Trade Union Congress (NTUC) and employer groups,” says the official press release.
Concerns were expressed earlier too. The Workers’ Party captured the Aljunied GRC – the first GRC lost by the PAP – in the 2011 general election on a manifesto that, among other things, claimed: “The PAP government’s immigration policies appear to be focused mainly on meeting the manpower demands of businesses, and ostensibly to grow our population in the face of declining local birth rates.”
Now the policy has changed.
Over to you, Mr Low Thia Khiang.
How did the sports boss get it so wrong?
By Tan Bah Bah
The failure of Ng Ser Miang to win the presidency of the International Olympic Committee, the most powerful position in international sport, was a fierce reality check. In more ways than one.
Sure, dare to dream. But there are also limits to what a small nation can do. The local mainstream media tried to build up Ng as a leading contender against the other candidates, including Thomas Bach, the eventual winner with 49 votes to Ng’s six. The reality is that Ng, who was nearly eliminated in the first round of voting, was at least a lap away from being a contender.
After the hooha, we want to ask: what was the whole thing all about, anyway?
One answer would be: Why not? The whole experience of the campaign is useful. We learn how to deal with powerful nations and powerful organisations and the way they work. We make new friends. We make ourselves known. We tell others who we are and we push the Singapore brand further and higher.
For a moment, we were up there with the big boys. We tried. But, as a Rolling Stones song puts it, “we can’t always get what we want…” Even China could not get what it wanted. Beijing went all out to get the 2000 Summer Olympic Games which was valued because of its millennial landmark theme. The games went to Sydney instead.
Also, Ng was already one of the IOC vice-presidents, so going for the top post was just a logical follow-up step.
And Ng did beat Sergei Bubka (five votes only), the legendary multiple-gold-medal winning world and Olympic champion pole vaulter from Ukraine, a great sporting nation.
So what?: That would be the next question. Was the spending of $300 million for the Youth Olympic Games 2010 part of the deal or game plan?
The questions should be answered as part of a wider picture – which was made clear by the IOC presidency race.
Were we so intense about getting the IOC post that we lost sight of who or what we are? Are we doing enough at home to shore up our place in this part of the world – before we take on the rest of the world?
The results of the IOC race must have an eye-opener. Ng was supposed to be Asia’s man to succeed Jacques Rogge, or so we were told. Out of the 200 plus nations voting at the IOC Session, there were so many more Asian votes than six. Yet, only six gave their votes to Singapore. The voting was secret, of course. So we do not know exactly who voted for whom.
I do not wish to guess either.
But the small number of Yes votes makes it rather easier to analyse who did NOT vote for Singapore.
There are 10 members in Asean. Maybe all the six IOC Yes votes came from Asean, maybe not. But the point is this: Not every Asean member voted for Singapore, a fellow Asean member. So much for Asean unity.
I have grave doubts that China with whom we claim so much special relationship voted for us. Australia, our good friend? Nah. USA? I think not. Good old Britain who were so excited to be awarded the 2012 Olympic Games when the announcement was made in Singapore? Good try.
What I do know is that it is time to do two things.
First, have we been alienating ourselves from our neighbours in this part of the world? If Singaporeans – and their government – do not care to cultivate generations who can speak the language to connect with, say, Indonesians and Malaysians, why should they care about us?
The second affects our ambitions to be a better sporting nation. Let us relook our whole sporting strategy.
The development of sports should not be in the hands of bureaucrats who have not the slightest idea of what the excitement of sports is all about. These bureaucrats can help to run the show but the final decisions, the overall feel of what are the right steps to take, must come from people who have always have a passion for sports. We have these people. Let them play a bigger role. We desperately need a Lord Sebastian Coe – or an Edward Barker.
Tan Bah Bah is a retired journalist. He was a senior leader writer/ columnist with The Straits Times and managing editor of a local magazine company.
Why SIA is desperate for a deal
Singapore Airlines’ third stab at the Indian market by joining hands with a partner to start an airline there shows how desperate it is in wanting to maintain its premier position. The headwinds moving against SIA are there for all to see. There is intense competition in the long-haul and medium-haul markets from Gulf carriers like Emirates and neighbours such as Garuda and Malaysia Airlines. The low-cost carriers are also squeezing the airline’s profits. One way for it to stay on top is to widen its portfolio. This is where the latest attempt to tie the knot with Tata Group comes in.
Here P N Balji, editor of The Independent Singapore, discusses the issues with Siva Govindasamy, Reuters chief aerospace and defence correspondent for Asia.
Q. What has changed in India that gives SIA the confidence that this time they will make it?
A. The regulatory environment has changed and India last year allowed foreign airlines to finally own a stake of up to 49% in an Indian carrier. The Indian airline industry remains buoyant, with passenger numbers rising in both the domestic and international sectors. The long-term growth potential, aligned with the development of airport infrastructure, is immense.
Q. Are tie-ups, like this one, the way to go for SIA as it gets crowded out?
A. It is part of a broader change in SIA’s direction. The CEO is pushing for a different direction – one that is less reliant, over the medium to long term, on the flagship carrier and instead has a slew of new subsidiaries that generate revenue in growth markets. This comes amid growing pressure on SIA from the Gulf carriers and other neighbouring full-service airlines.
Scoot, for example, is SIA’s play in the medium and long haul low-fare leisure market that the flagship left sometime back. India can be a separate revenue-generating business unit, as can future investments in China for example. So this is a change from the dependence on the flagship to a holding structure with diversified revenue streams.
Given SIA’s large cash pile of over $4 billion, the company has the ability to make these investments and the wherewithal to see them through the initial losses and hiccups. It can afford to have a long-term view with these investments.
Q. What has been the success of tie-ups like this for SIA? Do countries fear SIA? It failed twice in India, did not really succeed in Australia and New Zealand.
A. There are many issues at play. One question is how much control over the management SIA will have – it did not with Virgin Atlantic, and that was a major factor in the failure of that venture and hence the sale of the stake to Delta Air Lines this year. In New Zealand, economic factors came into play.
SIA’s 19.9% stake in Virgin Australia, on the other hand, is to cement a partnership that is mutually beneficial. There is no reason to influence management there beyond ensuring that the alliance stays strong.
In India, it will be important for SIA to ensure it has some degree of control over the new airline’s strategic direction – and it should be able to effect a change, if needed. Otherwise, it will likely let the new airline’s management chart its own course. And that will be the best option – excessive inference from a parent has never been good in the airline industry.
Beyond that, success will depend on how the new airline’s management navigates a course around India’s bureaucracy, tax regime, politics and the cut-throat competition. There are risks, but SIA needs to take such risks if it wants to be successful and if it wants its new strategic direction to be successful. The medium to long-term rewards in an airline market like India could be immense if this pays off.
Watch the ships for signs of the economy
By Thusitha de Silva
With another economic malaise hovering over the horizon, what are we in for? Repeat of earlier crises or just a correction?
Contrary to the popular narrative, Singapore has a key natural resource, namely its location. This has helped Singapore develop as a major air and shipping hub, and keep its pulse on regional and global trade flows. The city-state’s top trading partners include the US, Europe and China, which are the world’s biggest economies. All these suggest Singapore’s economy can be regarded as something of a bellwether for the global economy.
If this is the case, the latest trade data out of Singapore indicate that not all is well in the world, despite some talk in the mainstream media of a recovery in both Europe and the US. Singapore’s non-oil domestic exports fell 6.2% year on year in August, according to International Enterprise Singapore, accelerating from a decline of 1.9% in July. Both electronic and non-electronic exports showed weakness. In particular, exports to Europe contracted by 20.8% in August, extending a 38.5% decrease in July. This is a bad sign because Europe has been Singapore’s biggest export market in the past. It suggests that Europe is still mired in its debt troubles, and there is a lack of demand for imports.
Economists, however, see an improvement in the global macroeconomic picture based on some of the latest data from around the world. A closely-followed data set is the PMI, or purchasing managers index. This is essentially a survey of companies conducted by an authority in a country (in Singapore, it’s the Singapore Institute of Purchasing and Materials Management) to see how they are doing in terms of metrics like new orders and hiring. The data has been positive of late, signalling expansions in economies. But real economies have been slow to catch up and reflect this data.
US recovery, really?
Meanwhile, a lot of data coming out of US don’t gel with the idea of a recovery there even though President Barack Obama says things are getting better. For instance, a new census report in the US. has revealed that 46.5 million Americans are living in poverty. Also one in every five households in the US were on the federal government’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), or food stamps, in June.
The problem that has continued to plague the US since the global financial crisis in 2008 is how to kick-start the economy. The whole world needs a healthy US economy and this hasn’t been the case for a while and doesn’t look like it will happen any time soon.
The Quantitative Easing (QE) initiatives introduced by the Federal Reserve in recent years haven’t done much to help the real economy, though it has ostensibly helped to raise asset prices. And now the Federal Reserve is in a bind because it doesn’t know when to unwind QE, which is essentially an asset purchase programme. And the Federal Reserve has unexpectedly decided not to taper its asset purchases, preferring to wait for confirmation of improvement in its outlook. The market is high on liquidity and doesn’t want the Federal Reserve to turn off the tap.
With the US and European economies still sluggish, attention has turned to Asia as an engine of global growth. The biggest economies in this part of the world are China and Japan, and both countries are grappling with serious domestic issues. China has spent so much money in the last 20 years developing its infrastructure that it is now facing overcapacity issues and is focusing on improving consumption as an engine of economic growth. Japan, meanwhile, is trying to pull itself out of a deflationary phase with its own version of QE but results are unlikely to be seen for some time, if any. The award of the 2020 Olympic Games to Japan is a positive sign for its economy, but the benefits are likely only to be seen in the years leading up to the Games.
Fend for yourself, Singapore
So, for Singapore to survive the current global economic malaise, it has to somehow create growth opportunities for itself. That’s one reason why Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong visited parts of China, like the Liaoning province in the west of the country, that he hasn’t visited before. It could also explain the plan to build a park in the open-air car park of Terminal One in Changi airport as well as plans to move Singapore’s port to Tuas, freeing up seafront land in Keppel for property development.
For a small country, Singapore’s gross domestic product (GDP) is massive–according to the World Bank, it hit US$274.7 billion in 2012, resulting in GDP per capita of US$51,709.45. This is ranked inside the top 15 in the world by the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, the CIA World Factbook and the United Nations. While many believe it’s time to slow down the frenetic quest for more growth, the government’s default mode seems to be to always go for GDP growth. One of the negative outcomes of the government’s method for this is a widening income gap (see theindependent.sg article “Minding the Gap” dated September 12, 2013)
Positively though, the government has somewhat tempered down its growth expectations compared to the past as it recognises the difficulties that the global economy continues to face. We don’t hear of 5% to 7% GDP growth anymore. Even then, it showed some optimism about the city-state’s economic prospects by raising its economic growth expectations for 2013 in August. After the economy expanded by 2.0% in the first half of the year, the Ministry of Trade and Industry raised its GDP growth target for 2013 from 1.0%-3.0% to 2.5%-3.5%. Its upward revision suggests a stronger second half of 2013 on a year-on-year basis.
However, with export numbers down, there have been suggestions of a weaker third quarter. The manufacturing output data for August due on Sept 26 will give a better indication on how the economy will fare in the third quarter. If those numbers do not shine, there could be a downgrade in the government’s economic forecast for 2013.
Thusitha de Silva has been working in financial media for the last 20 years.
What Singapore did right — and wrong — in health care
By PN Balji
Editor, The Independent Singapore
MediShield Life is a step in the right direction offering the hope that all Singaporeans will enjoy some minimum level of health insurance to protect against financially catastrophic illnesses. When Medisave was introduced and the government hospitals corporatized in the 1980s, moving from a state-funded model to a larger share of private spending, there was too much emphasis on co-payments by patients to prevent the risk of abuse in healthcare spending. This has led to current concerns about the affordability of health care, says Dr Jeremy Lim, author of Myth or Magic: The Singapore Healthcare System. The Germans and the Swedes also impose co-payments, but these co-payments are pegged to the individual’s income rather than the pricing of services. Hence, patients feel the pinch but in proportion to their income, he adds.
Q. Are the steps that the Government announced recently enough? What else needs to be done?
A. The recent announcements are steps in the right direction. When health policy commentators discuss health systems, we speak of the balance among three critical factors; cost, quality and access. In Singapore, we have some of the world’s best doctors, nurses and hospitals. Physical access is not an issue because of our compactness, but the issue is cost or, more precisely, affordability.
MediShield Life, which is a major shift in policy thinking, offers the hope that all Singaporeans will enjoy some minimum level of health insurance to protect against financially-catastrophic illnesses.
MediShield Life will be mandatory and so all Singaporeans and Permanent Residents will be covered, but the questions still remain: What services will be covered and what out-of-pocket payments do people have to pay? For the last question, what weighs on people’s minds are not just the co-payments and deductibles but also the annual premiums. This is still rapidly evolving. Gerald Giam from the Workers’ Party asked Health Minister Gan Kim Yong about this. Minister Gan informed that MOH was still working out the details. All in, it is too early to say whether the changes will be enough.
Q. The government talked about “peace of mind” for Singaporeans when it comes to healthcare. Is that ever achievable?
A. Economist Robert Yates summed it up very nicely saying that the ambition is for “All people to receive the health services they need without suffering financial hardship”. Healthcare is characterized by finite resources and infinite demand and so it is not possible to satisfy every single person. What I think the government can achieve is an agreed ‘basket of services’ that the citizen is entitled to in the event of illness without suffering financial hardship (and what this term ‘financial hardship’ means also needs to be debated) and a deeper sense of fairness in the system that personal wealth is not the major determinant of access to quality healthcare. The outcome should be that citizens feel that ‘peace of mind’ both clinically and financially whilst knowing also that the government cannot provide everything and they too have a responsibility to do their part.
Q. Is there a system in any country that has an ideal healthcare system, or as close to an ideal system?
A. In my book, I describe the ideal health system as one where the tensions between costs, quality and access are balanced in ways that the country’s citizens are politically comfortable with or at least accepting of the system . In the Singapore context, I wrote recently:
“Firstly, the need for a healthcare financing system that provides “peace of mind” but is at the same time efficient, sustainable and congruent with the dominant political philosophy which is deeply concerned with ‘moral hazard’ and abuse of the system. Secondly, healthcare financing needs to be aligned to and support how healthcare is practised and not the other way around. Hence, the financing orientation may need to move away from the false dichotomies of “inpatient versus outpatient” and “specialists versus GPs” to instead look at episodes of care, regardless of the “where” and “who”. Thirdly, how about a health system that actually promotes health rather than disease treatment and rewards quality over quantity?”
There are no ideal healthcare systems but different countries have elements that I think are worthy of emulating. For example, the Germans and Swedish impose co-payments to address moral hazards like the fear of abuse, but these co-payments are pegged to the individual’s income rather than the pricing of services. Hence, patients feel the pinch but in proportion to their income.
The English have a National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) which is independent of the government and makes decisions on what treatments and services should be funded on the basis of cost-effectiveness. Whatever the mechanism, I think it is vital that all systems have a framework to limit the provision of healthcare services and the spending to what the system can avoid. One has to cut the coat according to the cloth. In healthcare; this is very difficult politically but it has to be done. The best ways are to strive to leave these ‘technical’ decisions to independent bodies which include patient and citizen voices.
Q. What does Singapore need to do to achieve this?
A. Singapore has the ingredients for a very good health system. When I speak to overseas counterparts, I describe Singapore as having the ‘least imperfect’ health system. Mr. Ngiam Tong Dow describes the Singapore model as very balanced, having co-payments, insurance and so on.
To me, the biggest issue is the balance between state and individual/ family responsibility and assumption of risk. In my book, I describe how Singapore has emphasized the primacy of the state and the almost absolute need for the government to be strong and in the driver’s seat. What this results in is the imposition of perhaps even onerous levels of co-payments and the unrealistic burden of risk placed on citizens. It is a bit of a zero-sum game. Because healthcare needs and utilization can be unpredictable, there is a very strong element of uncertainty. Someone needs to set aside monies for healthcare and someone needs to take the financial risks. If the government structures the health system to have substantial co-payments and deductibles, it means citizens have to assume the financial burden. If the government decides, as it has, that MediShield has to have annual caps and lifetime spending amounts, it means that citizens bear the financial risk of busting this cap and being on their own.
In fairness though, there have been tremendous strides made. When MediShield, for example, was first implemented, the age at which Singaporeans ‘fall off the cliff’ and are no longer eligible to enroll was 65 years. It was gradually ratcheted up over the years to 90 years and PM Lee at the recent National Day Rally announced that MediShield Life would have no age restrictions. So it is a journey where Singapore has made much progress, especially in recent years.Q
Q. What roadblocks ahead do you see?
A. I think the tensions will always be with us because of the inherent nature of healthcare being about finite resources and infinite demand. The balance between state and citizen is a mental model that is constantly being calibrated in the minds of policy makers, taking into their calculus what the government’s financial health is, what the political realities are and so on. Even within government as DPM Tharman has alluded to, there is a whole diversity of views and positions along the political spectrum. How the situation plays out will depend on how the mental models held by individual leaders evolve and how the consensus amongst the Cabinet shifts.
At least, Singapore is moving from a position of strength in reforming the health system. There are substantial monies in Medisave accounts collectively (to the tune of over S$60 billion) and with the government being in a strong financial position, can do more and has articulated it wants to do more. The technical decision then is how and to what extent.
Q. Are you a pro-euthanasia or anti-euthanasia man?
A.‘Anti’. I am a firm supporter of palliative care and hope the palliative care sector will flourish and be able to provide support for all patients towards the end of life.
Q. If you were put in a time tunnel and sent back to the 1980s, what would you have done to avoid the difficulties that Singapore healthcare faces in the 21st century?
A. This is a very interesting question. I devoted many pages in the book to the political situation in the 1980s as that was when Medisave was introduced and government hospitals corporatized. Moving from a state-funded model like the NHS with little constraining mechanisms in spending to a larger share of private spending was the right thing to do but Singapore overdid it and emphasized too much on co-payments as a primary mechanism to tackle moral hazard and the risk of abuse. This has led to the current concerns about ‘peace of mind’ and the affordability of healthcare.
On the healthcare delivery side, with the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, I think Singapore should have maintained its strengths in primary care. The thinking that primary care was ‘simple’ and amenable to market models of competition and consumer choice was unfortunate and resulted in the fragmentation and focus on minor ailments and wellness which are the most financially prudent areas private general practitioners can pay attention to. If we had maintained our strengths as a system in primary care and preventive health, the challenges we face now in aging and the ‘epidemic’ of chronic diseases would have been easier to manage.
Another related issue would be addressing the health needs of a rapidly-ageing population. Singapore decided strategically the government would concentrate on acute care and leave the so-called ‘Intermediate and Long Term Care’ (ILTC) sectors to the voluntary welfare organizations. This was a mistake that is now haunting us. What needs to be a tightly coordinated enterprise between tertiary care and ILTC is now terribly fragmented and unbalanced in scale. We have far too few ILTC resources, both in manpower and physical infrastructure.
Dr Jeremy Lim is the Principal Consultant of Insights Health Associates, a healthcare strategy advisory firm and the author of ‘Myth or Magic: The Singapore Healthcare System’ which is available at all major bookstores.
Why the Chinese speak loudly
By Pauline D Loh
Managing editor, Sunday/Features/Food, China Daily
Crowds in China cannot be ignored. And according to some legal definitions, three people will make a crowd. Certainly, especially in confined spaces like trains, coaches and planes, a trio of excited Chinese talking all at once is enough to grab your attention, often against your will.
So why is it that we talk so loudly. I asked my young Chinese colleagues, and they came up with several very interesting suggestions.
It’s the loudspeaker mentality.
Not so long ago, being able to speak through a loudspeaker meant you were a person of authority. Only community leaders had the privilege of rousing them in the morning or at noon for the daily lessons on how to be better citizens.
It was so throughout those turbulent decades of the 60s to 80s, where strident street parades took place frequently throughout the country. Perhaps that was when the “loud and proud” culture seeped into the general consciousness.
I am tempted to subscribe to this theory, because loudspeakers still blare daily from the school next to our apartment, broadcasting the discipline master’s constant displeasure on how slow the students are gathering for assembly on the basketball courts, or how lethargic they are in doing the mandatory morning exercises.
Frankly, the loudspeakers are redundant. We hear him clearly without them, and he is intimidating enough to almost scare us into obediently going through the motions with the students.
No, no. It’s the village mentality, says another young colleague. You had to shout in order to be heard above the cacophony of chickens and ducks. And you had to hail across to the next hamlet separated by dense vegetation, hillock or stream.
I thought that was a little too farfetched, but what do I know, having been transplanted two generations ago to another mainly urban Chinese community abroad that still clung tenaciously to the Confucian tenets of gentility and the middle way, propagated in properly muted tones.
My own theory is that we Chinese are natural show-offs, no matter the nationality.
Take the young businessman sitting behind me on the high-speed train back from Tianjin recently.
He was toying with his latest iPhone 5 all the way. How do I know? Because the distinctive cricket ring tone was chirping almost non-stop throughout the half-hour journey.
I was made aware that he was going to be on his way to Urumqi on a business trip the next day to close a 400,000 yuan deal, and that he had got someone at his office to book his flight, business class.
How do I know? Well, actually half the train carriage knew as well — because he took care to raise his voice during all the necessary arrangements to proudly broadcast his elite positioning.
So we are now privy to the fact that he is an important person in the company, trusted to sign important deals, and that he is transported in style. We were in the first class train carriage.
And all in the space of 25 minutes.
In another train journey, a few months ago from Guilin to Laibin in Guangxi, a young mother sitting opposite us in a crammed carriage was gently telling her son not to speak too loudly.
She cajoled him, made sure he did not kick out under the table too often, and her husband quietly offered to help us with our bulky luggage at the end of the line. She’s from Laibin, by no means a large city, but she had the earth-anchored qualities of a diligent middle-class working wife and mother.
But her most redeeming quality, to me, was the fact that she was teaching her young child how to behave in public.
It seems that at least two to three generations of Chinese have forgotten how to teach their children manners, or they may have lost the ability to differentiate between loving indulgence and raising a public menace.
If China is to allow the world to better understand it, then perhaps she should start looking at how she is represented at home and abroad. Every Chinese who steps out of the country is a cultural ambassador, and the whole country is also judged by that one person who misbehaves when a visitor is abused in the country.
Unfortunately, opinion is dictated by chance encounters.
I really hate to think what foreign tourists at the airports thought of the recent spate of violence when irate Chinese passengers physically attacked airline staff.
And, it is only when the vast majority of Chinese going abroad manage to speak in civilized tones, learn to wait in line like the rest of the passengers and have the subtle sense to moderate their purchasing excesses that China will be presented as what it should be: A world leader in economics and culture that had had 5,000 years to perfect the art of civilization.