Singapore — During the Parliamentary sitting on Jul 6, PSP NCMPs Leong Mun Wai and Hazel Poa are to raise pertinent questions regarding jobs and job opportunities.
In a Facebook post on Sunday (Jul 4), Progress Singapore Party (PSP) Central Executive Committee (CEC) member Kumaran Pillai outlined the questions that the two NCMPs will be asking in Parliament.
PSP’s questions are mainly directed at the Minister for Manpower Tan See Leng and are framed around how many nationals from China, India, the USA and Australia have entered and are working in Singapore under the various passes, permits, and what kind of jobs they hold.
According to 2020 numbers compiled by the Singapore Department of Statistics out of a 5.685 million population, the number of Singapore citizens stands at 3.523 million. This leaves the number of Permanent Residents and foreigners at 2.162 million or 38 per cent.
“With our ever falling TFR (Total Fertility Rate) and young couples either postponing parenthood or completely foregoing it, it is wonder that our population has been rising steadily”, Mr Pillai stated in his post. The shift in population away from a Singapore core has stirred up anti-foreigner sentiments as well as “a certain disquiet in our society”.
“Transplanting new citizens has its own set of integration issues. The PAP is simply tone deaf about it and does not want to come to terms with the rising tensions on the ground”, said Mr Pillai.
As stated by Mr Leong in a Facebook post on Sunday (Jul 4), what we can expect from the Jul 6 Parliamentary sitting is that the Government will be delivering two Ministerial Statements to answer the parliamentary questions filed by PSP in preparation for the parliamentary Motion on Foreign PMET Policy (FPP) and Free Trade Agreements (FTAs).
He added that though the Ministerial Statements will be opened for debate immediately after they have been delivered, “this debate cannot be a substitute for a separate and more thorough debate. The reason for this is that parliamentarians will need time to process the content & information revealed through those Ministerial Statements”.
Additionally, when responding to a Ministerial Statement, parliamentarians can only speak for 20 minutes.
However, Mr Leong explained that a Private Member’s Motion tabled by a parliamentarian will give him (or her) time to set out his case since the mover of the Motion is allocated 40 minutes to speak both at the start and the end of the debate.
Mr Leong added that a separate debate would not only allow Parliamentarians more time to speak on the issue, it “would also open up space to discuss FPP and FTA issues on a broader scale”.
“So the debate is not on 6 July. The PSP will decide on the timing to file the motion after receiving the relevant data from the government. The actual date of the debate will depend on other schedules of Parliament as well as the decision of the Speaker”, he wrote. /TISG