HDB to provide Mdm Lee with new stall
Saturday, 12 January 2008, 1:52 am | 32 views
HDB compromises with Mdm Lee.
Update: Reprieve for ex-hawker by TODAY, Jan 15.
By Andrew Loh
“If you had a mother who’s been working all her life, would you still want her to work at such an advanced age?”, Ms Gina Lau asked when explaining why she had advised her mother to give up the stall at the Hougang Ave 1 hawker centre in 2003.
In return for giving up her business, Mdm Lee was given $18,000 by the Housing and Development Board (HDB) under its Hawker Centres Upgrading Programme.
(The Hawker Centres Upgrading Programme (HUP) was launched in Feb 2001 at an estimated cost of $420m to upgrade markets/hawker centres over a period of 10 years. - NEA)
4 years later, her good intentions have resulted in a controversial decision by the HDB demanding that her mother, Mdm Lee Ah Muay, return the $18,000 compensation given to her in 2003.
Ms Lau told theonlinecitizen (TOC) that business was poor in 2003 and that was another reason why she advised her mother to give up the stall. Mdm Lee made an average of $500 per month from her business of selling clothes then.
Letter of demand
The HDB, according to a TODAY report, said that “its earlier attempts to contact her since 2004 had failed”. However Ms Lau questioned how this could be so. “Why didn’t they leave any notes at my door at least?”, she asked. We also understand that no phone calls were made to Mdm Lee.
In September last year, an officer from the NEA visited Mdm Lee and informed her that “HDB had made a mistake with the payout and the money had to be returned”. Ms Lau questions why it took the authorities so long to find out about the mistake.
In Jan 2008, a letter of demand from the NEA was sent to Mdm Lee, giving her 21 days to return the $18,000.
Ms Lau had earlier said, according to the TODAY report, that she “regrets the advice she gave her mother” and she hopes the NEA “can help secure a new stall for her mother at the refurbished hawker centre” as her mother prefers to keep working and also that her mother’s friends were all there.
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Well-written! Better than the 154th neutral reports.
Yes, a well written report. Especially the part about HDB taking part of the responsibility for the mistake.
Why are Singaporeans always made to pay for mistakes of the government? Isn’t it time govt is accountable and take responsibility for their mistakes?
Gracious society? Making an elderly woman take all the blame, even though it was totally not her fault?????
Maybe the government will like to tell us too that progress package is a big major mistake and now it is payback time through unleashing the full force of price hike, means testing, ERP gantries etc.
Why is it that when government make a mistake, it is an honest mistake and they can get away everytime ? No wonder there are lack of accountability and transparency since they know they able to get away anyway.
Seriously, when IDA paid Singtel an amount mistakenly, was the amount refunded then? Let’s make the BIG vomit out the money if the SMALL FRY had to pay up.
It seems to me that the HDB has had more bungles with Mah Bow Tan as the Minister for National Development than any other previous Minister in that position. But will he be held accountable? The probability of it snowing in Singapore is greater than that. This is what happens when you parachute “talent” into parliment under the GRC system.
I would rather the lady don’t pay HDB a cent. Just let HDB bankrupt her and upset the public more.
What about the opportunity cost to the lady because of HDB’s mistake?
Govt very efficient at claiming money owed to it, but very inefficient when disbursing money owing to its people.
Well done! Keep it up and soon the place will be filled with Banglas and foreign talent. Then you ask them to do NS and protect yr country, and pay yr crazy ERP fees.
RH:
1. It seems that HDB/NEA made 2 mistakes. First, in wrongly paying her; now in demanding it back.
2. Anyone can make a mistake but only fools would compound it further. More sheer stupidity and inability to see the issues in humane, human, commonsense, THINKING ways. Just simply follow rules blindly without thinking deeper on the Rights and Wrongs of the case. Typically PAP methodology.
3. It is totally unbelievable that HDB/NEW cannot contact her for 4 years! Singapore is so tiny and everything and everybody so controlled that if even 1 genuine attempt is made, they cannot fail to contact her. More lies from the LKY LHL PAP Leegime. That they resort to this stupid lie insults our intelligence.
Our government seems to be hunting high and low to obtain money. Just like NLB, the government agencies are now seeking out people who owe them money and dishing out fines. Is our government running out of money and running around to pick up the pennies.
It makes you wonder what kind of directives did the heads of these agencies receive from the upper echelon of the party.
I’m glad that Mdm Lee can get to work again, instead choose to retire, otherwise she is going to die very soon - based on LKY’s analogy.
EXACTLY…ever noticed that IRAS has suddenly become very active?
blackshirt Says:
January 12, 2008 at 11:55 am
Our government seems to be hunting high and low to obtain money. Just like NLB, the government agencies are now seeking out people who owe them money and dishing out fines. Is our government running out of money and running around to pick up the pennies.
I support you Robert Ho, all the GIC and Temasek money have gone west, so government, IRAS etc try all means to get back money owed by the ppl.
Lies lies and more lies. In America, even if this kind of situation takes place, Mdm Lee won’t even have to pay a cent.
HDB paid her to give up the store, now they want the money back but never offered her a store in the 1st place?
WTH is that???
It’s like me paying 123 for a phone, 4 years later I want my money back from them but not giving them the phone.
What is our society degrading to? HDB now bullying an old ah ma?
I hope Mdm Lee won’t have to pay a cent. We’re all on you side!
“Due to an oversight, Madam Lee was offered the ex-gratia payment of $18,000. Madam Lee opted for the payment and terminated her tenancy,” said the HDB spokesman. (The Straits Times 12th Jan 2008, section H2)
Question 1 : Whose ‘oversight’?
Answer 1 : HDB.
Question 2 : Oversight = mistake?
Answer 2 : Yes.
Question 3 : What’s the difference between ‘a mistake’ and ‘an honest mistake’?
Answer 3 : The former can be made by all, with exception of the civil service. The civil service does not make ‘a mistake’. The applicable term is ‘an honest mistake’.
There are existing laws and regulations to whack those who run foul of them, whether intentionally or otherwise.
So, who whacks the civil service for ‘oversights’ and ‘honest mistakes’?
what a gracious society, gracious government, gracious hdb….suck honest ppls blood until dry dry….its all money talk and no heart in this society
Why don’t HDB get their officer(s) who are in-charge of the “oversight” to pay the money back? The “oversight”, after all, belongs to HDB and HDB only. Why don’t HDB say anything about who are the people involved in this oversight? Maybe, these people have been moved up in corporate ladder during these four years and it would be embarrassing to name them now.
Ha ha…juz happended to read of another “honest” mistake…some civil “servants” got higher take-home pay last Friday.
This is the same stat board that retrenched staff, gave them very gererous severance angpows, and then gave the same people jobs in the corporatised arm.
Apparently this Mdm Lee has the support of a well-to-do family (albeit new money). If a lesser economically stable family were faced with a similar situation, they would surely kick up a bigger fuss.
De-crying of typical high-handedness aside, is it me or is this another case of when a mistake is made, there’s no need for any form of responsibility? We’re not talking about stirring up a mob to lynch someone, getting a whole department fired or anything crazy but so long as the big boys can get away with it, there’s really no need for any improvement, is there?
Anyone recall the joke of HDB dwellers being made responsibly for windows that were not up to standard…?
The obvious question one would have to ask is: Why was the HDB and then the NEA so ineffective in getting in touch with Mdm Lau since 2004? It is quite unfathomable that Mdm Lau would not be contactable for 4 years.
Was someone dragging his feet at the HDB or NEA?
In Jan 2008, a letter of demand from the NEA was sent to Mdm Lee, giving her 21 days to return the $18,000.
Sounds like one person **** up, made the payout, and now that the mistake is discovered, they’re trying to collect back the sum of money urgently to ‘balance the books’ or whatever.
*Comments edited by moderator
^Basically covering their own asses.
Wonder when was the last time HDB was audited? Perhaps they will do it after 50 years
If claimback is wrongful, then HDB’s and NEA’s latest offers are shams!
IF there is grace within the legal fraternity, this is an opportunity to do some pro bono work and advise Mdm Lee BEFORE she has to decide on (a) taking up HDB’s installment plan offer or (b) considering NEA’s replacement stall offer.
believe it or not, hawker case has implications on singapore-malaysia bilateral ties.
Sophie’s World
It time for the next election, we have not experience how’s the opposition runs the government if we dun give them a try, anyway it time for us to give the ruling party a 5 years vacation which they are entitle to ,from there the whole singaporean will find out the truth nothing but the truth of the past, present and future, as we have all witness the senario of the election rally, “WHO ADOPTED THE KIA SU CHARACTERISTIC” that makes singaporean follow path, so after the 5 years vacation, singaporean citizen will only decide truly from their wholly heart who should and shall not be entitle the vacation. let us make a choice once in a life time. ” IF YOU KEEP DRIVING ONE MAKED BRAND CAR YOU WILL NEVER KNOW THE DIFFERENCE OF OTHER MAKES CARS.
This is just crazy. An old woman, with all good intentions, gave up her hawker stall and livelihood for the consideration of $18k. The HDB or NEA or whoever cannot now renege on the deal and claim it was a mistake and now demands the $$ back. It is pure high handedness and makes no sense.
Imagine i purchase a property at $1 million and then 2 years later go back to the buyer and tell him “it was a mistake”. Will this stand?
From my offhand knowledge of the law, she shouldn’t need to pay 18000 at all because of promissory estoppel. She can always go to a legal clinic for professional advice.