I refer to the media report “172 file for parent maintenance in last 12 months” (CNA, Aug 19) about the increase in applications to the Tribunal for the Maintenance of Parents (TMP) by more than 70 per cent to 172 in the previous 12 months to July, compared to an average of 100 in previous years.
The number of enquires to the TMP has also increased to more than 160 in the first five months of the year, as well as the number of unsuccessful applications to 16 in the past 12 months.
One of the possible contributing factors to the increase, may be the mis-match between the minimum age that parents can apply to the TMP and the CPF annuity withdrawal age.
When the TMP was implemented in 1995, I understand that the minimum age for parents to apply was set at 60, to co-incide with the then CPF annuity withdrawal age of 60.
Now that the CPF annuity withdrawal age has been extended to 62, 63, 64, and eventually to 65 under CPF Life, parents who may have difficulty obtaining gainful employment before their CPF annuity withdrawal starts, may be more likely to apply from age 60.
Therefore, I would like to suggest that the TMP minimum application age be aligned to the CPF annuity withdrawal age.
After all, the TMP already has provision for parents below age 60 with a disability or illness preventing them from working, to apply.
I would also like to suggest that the TMP takes into account any expected future CPF payouts, in the mediation process, as well as the order for maintenance.
The current procedure for the children to apply for a review of the maintenance order, may be difficult, as they may not have access to information regarding their parent’s future CPF withdrawals.
Another contributing factor that may increase the number of TMP applications, may be the phasing out of the 50 per cent CPF withdrawal rule. In this regard, from 2013, CPF account holders with less than $203,000 ($161,000 CPF Minimum Sum plus $42,000 CPF Medisave Minimum Sum, at their current estimated rate of increase), may only be able to withdraw $5,000 at age 55.
HELP keep the voice of TOC alive!
If you like this article, please consider a small donation to help theonlinecitizen.com stay alive. Please note that we can only accept donations from Singaporeans. Thank you for your assistance.Do you have a flair for writing? Volunteer with us. Email us your full name and contact details to theonlinecitizen@gmail.com
Employers should not retrenched staffs in the 40s since the withdrawal age of CPF is at least 55 yrs old. Anyway, as a child, you should not even think of starting your own family if you are not able to even provide well for your own parents.
Am I the only one who has seen through this elaborate lie and shame campaign regarding ‘filial piety’??
In all modern societies, it is the job of the GOVERNMENT to take care of its vulnerable and handicapped, in the form of welfare and free healthcare. The PAP wants to shirk from this duty completely, and uses the rhetoric of ‘family values’ to get citizens to shoulder the blame.
Why don’t first-world countries have such issues of ‘morals’? Because their governments take care of your parents, so younger citizens are free to pursue your goals and raise their own families.
This is even more needed in sinkapoor, as place where people are overworked, underpaid, and fear for their livelihoods every day. The PAP can surely afford welfare, since it can afford to lose 100 billion on foreign banks, and invest 10 million in ‘integrating’ immigrants.
parents sue their children who cannot afford to take care of them in old age, in turn the children sue the govt for any policy that result in them loosing their job, even stagnanting the salary or suffer pay cut.
on anot? lol….
How come issues like these only exist in Singapore?
How is it that workers in other countries, are able to retire and live on comfortably, and their children able to support their family and parents?
Why does the Pension system apply for some Government Officials but not the general populace?
Why ONLY happen in Singapore? Why? Why?? Why???
We often regarded China as a very backward country. But in China, there is minimum wage for employers to adhere to, to prevent exploitation of workers. But here?
In China, it is illegal to employ women who are 60 years and above, and men who are 70 years and above. But here? Woork till you drop dead if not no one would support you!
Virtually, all their elderly can rely on the govt for pension fees. Many of my talented China friends have commented that Singapore is a place for them to earn the stronger Singapore dollar but not a place to grow old! How true!
This is really uniquely Singapore. PM Lee is so thick skinned. The government pay themselves million of dollars, yet not doing their duties as official. Instead, they passed all the responsibilties to the Singaporean.
Now, the elderly need someone to take care of them. But think of it, when the working condition of singapore is made so competitive. Even the working adults have difficulty in taking care of their family too. All these happened because of the government policy, huge influx of FT, growth at all cost, etc.
I just don’t understand, what the fuck is the PAP DOING? I beieve this is the only fucking country in the whole world to behave as such, drawing million of salary, telling the people everything is well.
Are they blind or what? Everyone is telling PAP what went wrong, yet the PAP are telling people other things.
They are such disgusting, thick skinned people, worse than ….. I don’t really know how to describe the PAP.
What if you have no children to sue? Sue the govt?
First They don’t want to take care of the old folks, so They make you work longer and longer.
Then They try stopping you from taking out your CPF so that They can avoid the burden of looking after you when you stop working.
And when your money finally runs out, They encourage you to sue and fight your children so that They can continue to be free from looking after you.
I wonder which developed country have such a law where parents can sue their children, breaking up the family unit and deteriorate the social fabric of society.
Just think about it: Father sue son no.1; son no.1 sues sister no.3; brother-in-law no.3 counter sue son no. 1 and also sue son no.2. Multiply this by the hundreds and what do you get?
Is this the kind of Government we want? 50 years old, world class in so many areas but so …..soooooooo very backward in resolving social problems, ….. always using the law and the courts to settle such matters. What kind of leaders would build a nation like that???
Disagree with this :
“Anyway, as a child, you should not even think of starting your own family if you are not able to even provide well for your own parents.”
Your child is not an investment! As a parent, if you lack financial intelligence, don’t have a kid.
Lets put this way, any legislation that allowed parents to sue children for maintainance has very little jurisprudence.
So, elsewhere in every developed countries, government will provide old folks home and a pension for them, if they are unable to be self sufficient.
Reason being, the society has benefited more from the labors of many of these old folks rather than the children. Besides, the children who toils are creating wealth and contributing to state coffer.
This is the logic that society should shoulder much of maintaining the old. But I agree that this logic can be flawed.
So far only Singapore allowed parent to resort to state apparatus for mandating children to maintain parents.
If we regard nature institution or moral grounds, of course children need to maintain their parents when they are old. But the state should have no part to play with this.
PAP’s ardent in this issue is not out of charity to the old. It is to ensure that state do not have to pay for maintainance of old folks.
9) DI on September 29th, 2009 7.58 pm
I agree with you very much…each is really responsible for his/her own..the children, ideally is to act as 2nd line of defence.
Not the parents, squander everything, and expect the children to take care of them in the old age…
But then, all these are already beyond law, i.e. seems like in the end the children will have very hard time,
some familee value this is!
only people without moral integrity will trumpet- sue, sue, sue.
residents should sue their Town Councils (TCs) for loosing money! why are TCs even hoarding so much money!!
Reform the CPF now.
Parents would normally run through fire to save their children. When the children are still babies, they wouldn’t even let a single mosquito bite to touch the babies smooth and soft skin. It is their responsibilities acording to us, since most of us believe that it is not our choice to be born. Yes it is their resposibilities, but it is carried out of unconditional loves according to others.
This is just one belief and perception over the others. Nobody is in the right nor anybody is in the wrong. The basis of this country is based on ideal and merit. Thus ideally everyone is responsible for something until his or her service is no longer needed. It is the land of “Survival of the fittest”.
My mom had cancer and even in her last hour she still think about all of her children. What If? What If? and What if? said her. We are all working adults and we surely know how to take care of ourselves. I was walking to my office when she took her last breath, according to my sister she just call my name the way she usually called me. When my mom was still around I would normally call her and say, I am bit under the weather and she would say, why don’t I cook something. I would normally didn’t have time to drop by but the thought of her being so caring, enough to give me some sort of comfort.. I had a slight fever yesterday and was just looking at my phone and she wasn’t there for me to call. So I called my sister and she said yeah, mom always cook for you and the rest of us whenever we were sick, but you were the only one who seldom turned up. Today I feel like the biggest jerk in the whole wide world, for I just found out that she would still cook even though she knew what the odd was.
It is just how things are with my parents, so I can’t judge others.
commentator
post #7 on September 29th, 2009 7.29 pm
“What if you have no children to sue? Sue the govt?”
if you are male & gone through NS, the govt have the duty to return favour!! ;)
First class government comes with first class tax.
http://www.pap.org.sg/corevalues.php
The mission of the PAP is to build a fair and just society where the benefits of progress are spread widely to all.
PAP core value:
6. Self-reliant: No one owes us a living. We will avoid creating the dependency syndrome a welfare state generates.
Attributes:
11. Far-sighted: We operate with a very long-term horizon. No problem is too remote just because its effects may only be evident in the future. We CAN SEE AHEAD to guide our people along the best way forward.
13. Compassionate: We must be able to instinctively empathise with our people. We CAN FEEL their worries, concerns, as well as share their hopes and dreams.
I had asked myself this question many times when I first started working in Singapore: Why should I spend the rest of my life working in Singapore versus somewhere else that provides me with a social security net when I am old and/or retired and/or disabled?
But of course the PAP would have you believe that Singapore is different – we are an Asian society with Confucious values. Umm…..I then wonder why they would pay themselves hefty pension as senior civil servants and neglect the rest of us? Double standards again? Is it any surprise that thousands of young Singaporeans are now queing at the Australian, NZ and Canadian embasies applying for PR to get out of this island ASAP?
More work for lawyers!
To 18) Observer,
I had asked myself this question many times when I first started working in Singapore: Why should I spend the rest of my life working in Singapore versus somewhere else that provides me with a social security net when I am old and/or retired and/or disabled?
>> It’s a hard choice. Many left, or planning to leave and financial is the least considerations.
But of course the PAP would have you believe that Singapore is different – we are an Asian society with Confucious values. Umm…..I then wonder why they would pay themselves hefty pension as senior civil servants and neglect the rest of us? Double standards again? Is it any surprise that thousands of young Singaporeans are now queing at the Australian, NZ and Canadian embasies applying for PR to get out of this island ASAP?
>> If AU, NZ and Canada are half as liberal as Singapore allowing foreigners to come in, I guess there won’t be any true blue singaporeans left other than the Elites.
Nonetheless, in my opinion, it’s both State responsibilities to support the elderly that cannot fend themselves, as well as a child’s responsibilities to support their parent(s). Let’s not screwed ourselves by arguing whose responsibilities it belongs to; as it only relegated down to lowering our “moral” values.
Lastly, let’s not further “screwed” ourselves again in the next election. In my opinion, “Absolutely Power” corrupts absolutely.
I see there is only 1 option left for me : migrate.
I am sure that many children, if they are able, will love to give their parents big houses to stay in and buy them anything they want. But today, with livelihoods robbed by the govt-backed foreigners, the normal sinkee can’t even take care of himself!
WTF ! They can spend so much of our $$$ to set up National Integration council and $10m for PRC’s to learn English and so much $$$ on scholarship for foreginers, ect.. But they can’t spend any for our senior citizen. To hell with LKY & PAP. THEY SHOULD BE PUT UNDER Firing Squard… TRAITORS…………
Who are the people that causes all these parents sstarted suing their own children these days, ASK YOURSELF THIS QUESTION! the same people that took away all your entire cpf life savings, forced your old folks out there collecting tin cans and selling tissue papers, forced them out of their home and now they started pointing fingers at YOU PEOPLE to be responsible for your folks well beng by making it a law that its now your resposibility and NOT THEIRS ANYMORE!
Pappys are not far-sighted as they claimed to be, so we are having these problems of the old cannot take care of themselves and Singapore citizens not enough. It all started 44 years ago when LKY ask the people to stop at 2. This led to smaller family units being formed over the years resulting in less number of family sibblings to share the burden of taking care of their aged parents. As I have seen bigger family units are better able to cope with is problem and their aged parents are well taken care of.
Another killer from this stop at 2 policy is the resulting fall in the resident Singapore Citizens over the years and they are worried about their economic gains resort to drastic open FT policy to replace the shortfall of Singapore Citizen population. As the FT are of positive economic value to them, they are even willing to spend S$10million to integrate them to Singapore society. As for the disabled and older Singaporean who are of negative economic value, they will not give a dime to them. When you are old and not productive, please dont look to us PAP but to your childern and your CPF Life; you either sue your children or rather be dead than alive.
Luckily, my children will not be suing me for bringing them into this sick society.
AND I WILL NEVER SUE THEM FOR NOT PROVIDING FOR ME, it is my duty to bring them up after having produced them in this sickly society.
And
it is their duties to bring up their offsprings.
I always have self euthanasia as a solution if living is too miserable to bear and the Government is always welcome to charge me for the Coup De Grace.
patriot
It come down to gahment policies, past and present that contributed to this aging problem. Who is the clever boy then? It is only fair for the gahment to take responsibilties for the problems their policies had created. It is most unfair to force the children of these old folk to take financial responsibilty. In the first instant, is the children of these old folk financially sound enough to take this extra responsibity? We cannot have a gahment that will exercise its authority without hesitation and yet fail to take its responsibilty with the same ethusasiam. A gahment cannot pick and choose its responsibilties as its see fix. These old folk are citizen as well and had contributed to the country. We must hold this gahment accountable.If this happen to these old folk will it happen to us as well in the future? Those of us with CPF maybe fine for now but no one know what the future hold for us.A social policy to address this issue is in the interest of the country and in our interest as well. Let us hold the gahment accountable. I could understand if the country is broke and poor but we are not there yet. We are one of the richest in S.E.Asia as we had been told time and again.
the govt will compare & contrast SG with welfare countries where its people pay high taxes to support such a social system – most of the time the “threat” of higher taxes will coax us all into submission. the govt will definitely hit it where it hurts – many of us trying to eke out a decent life amidst rising costs of living and stagnant pay.
the govt is willing to spend $ on “integrating FTs” because they will be economically productive. spending $ on maintaining old folks only drains their resources coz these old folks can’t contribute to the economy at all.
that’s why it’s the “duty” of children to look after their aging parents. we all know that the govt are the biggest siam kings/queens. i doubt we need to pull out examples to illustrate thus.
The government is basically copping out from its duties to take care of the elderly. It most definitely will threaten with high taxes to support a more social system. But we are already being taxed blind by our government. We pay, pay and pay ‘taxes’ via HDB flats, COEs, ERP etc.
Haiz, hopeless… if there are so many imported cheap labours disguised as talents in Singapore, taking away our jobs, causing us to be unemployed, do you think you have the money to support your parents? our wages being depressed by foreigners, work long hours for min pay, can only save that little bit per mth, not even to buy HDB, while the foreigners buy private estate back in their hometown. Luckily, my parents can still work…
Anyway, one of the solutions is to raise wages by forcing the foreigners to go home. When ppl hav more than enough money, they can buy HDB, they can support parents, then, we will see less elderly collecting cardboard or collecting drink cans, some even rumaged the dustbin.
You see Singapore guys dimissing Singapore girls as arrogant & high maintenance. Instead, they should be more humane & think. With their meagre salary, can they even support their parents? Alot of elderlys are unable to work due to certain reasons like dementia, disability, ill health & illiteracy. If you cannot even provide well for your parents, why think of marriage at all? A guy with backbone should work hard & earn more to allow their own parents to live comfortable lives 1st before getting a wife & starting a family. Would you want to marry a guy if he can’t even make enough to take care of his own parents? Moreever, unlike China & Vietnam girls, Singapore girls had parents living in Singapore & needs to be taken care of too.