Leong Sze Hian -
I was about to leave home to attend the National Volunteer & Philanthropy Centre (NVPC) 10th Anniversary Giving 2.0 Forum, when The Online Citizen’s Chief Editor, Andrew Loh, asked me if I would like to write something about YOG, and suggested that I may possibly relate it to Comcare.
My initial reaction was: what has YOG got to do with Comcare?
At the forum, the Guest-of-Honour Mrs Yu-Foo Yee Shoon, Minister of State for Community Development, Youth and Sports (MCYS), said that charities and volunteer organisations should ask, “What outcome do you want to achieve?”
It then dawned on me: isn’t the YOG and Comcare both under MCYS?
In the same vein, I would like to ask, what outcome does Comcare want to achieve for the needy in Singapore?
Before I get into Comcare, let’s talk about YOG.
Why is there a three times budget overrun?
Shouldn’t there be some accounting or inquiry as to how this happened?
What are the lessons to be learned, so that this may not occur again in the future?
Where will the money for the budget overrun come from?
Is it from MCYS?
As there were media reports of less than expected ticket sales, what percentage of tickets has been sold? The Straits Times on 7 July reports that out of the 245,000 tickets available, 100,000 have been sold so far. Out of these 100,000, it is telling that the Ministry of Education has bought 80,000 of them! [See picture, right]
Who bought the other 20,000 tickets and what percentage of tickets has been given away?
As there were also media reports about less than expected sponsorship, how much was raised from sponsors?
What was the percentage of the sponsorship budget achieved?
If it were any other country or organisation, there would surely have been an inquiry into what the final budget overrun will be, when the YOG ends.
Will this happen in Singapore?
And now to Comcare.
I guess Andrew and others may be thinking – imagine what the amount of the YOG budget overrun can do if it is made available to help the needy under Comcare!
By the way, the YOG budget is now more than four times Comcare’s $92 million annual budget.
According to the article, “Longer-term aid for two needy groups” (ST, Jun 8):
“The CDC received more than 48,000 social assistance applications last year, about 11,700 or 32 per cent more than 2008.”
If just one CDC (South West) had 48,000 social assistance applications in one year, how many applications were there in total, for the five CDCs?
The case cited in that report, of how the CDC helped needy families – a family with seven mouths to feed, living from hand to mouth, and the children staying in class during recess time to study because they did not want their friends to know that they could not afford to eat, being given $300 a month of assistance by the CDC, most of which went to paying utilities – begs the question as to whether the assistance is adequate for needy families.
How does a family of seven, or for that matter even a typical family of four, survive on just $300 a month?
As I understand that the maximum financial assistance to a needy family is about $300+ a month, is there some process to access the adequacy of the assistance given?
Whilst I applaud the South West CDC’s new initiative to extend the normal interim assistance to longer-term aid for chronic needy families and vulnerable elderly folk, extending the period of aid is but one part of the solution, what is equally if not more important is the adequacy of the assistance.
I find the findings of the survey of more than 3,000 vulnerable elderly folk in August last year rather alarming, as although nearly seven in 10 have at least one chronic illness, only one in five relies on savings and/or receive financial support from the CDC and other help agencies.
Why is it that so few (only 20 per cent) of the vulnerable elderly are getting financial support from the CDC or other help agencies?
As one in four does not even know whom to approach for financial assistance, it may indicate that much more needs to be done in reaching out to them.
Finally, why was MCYS’s budget operating grant decreased by $52 million or about 11 per cent, from $478 million in FY2009 to $426 million for FY2010, in the midst of Singapore’s worst recession?
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For most International Sports Events, it does not stay withing the budgeted figures. It does get over shot.
However, in Singapore’s YOG case, it is way too much. 3x…
It must have been a Kuku bird, doing the budget or a parrot who did not know the requirements and thought it was cheap and easy.
Even before, submitting a proposal, the budget should have been prepared, inclusive of inflation and Mics expenses.
3 Times more….Vivian looks like a bobo.
Now I just hope, it becomes a big success after so much of expenditure.
Yo YOG,
It looks like YOG will be a YoYo Successssss…..
I am so happy that I am a Yogi
I dont mind if they spend so much money, providing it generates direct benefits to the country. I just want to know what type of benefits will we get? Perhaps some one should ask VB to list out the areas that would benefit from YOG. So far I dont see many people who seem to even know what YOG is. I dont regularly visit this site. As I spend most of my time in subscription sites like Ekunaba.
But even over there, none of us are even aware about YOG. This is very depressing. As it means many young people may not even be aware there is actually a Youth Olympics event going on. Or they are aware, but they dont seem to be very engaged. This could be remedied very easily I supposed if VB had contacts in the online world to get either Mr Wang, the Brotherhood, Singapore Angle, Sintercom, Mr Brown, Mr Miyagi to publicise such a once in a life time event.
I hope they can get those issues I highlighted in my above post sorted out pronto. Otherwise how can they possibly justify such free wheeling spending in difficult times like this? Some people in Singapore are still jobless. Those who have jobs fear they have no jobs. And many have had to make cut backs in one way or another.
Well,come to think of it,what is sgd 387 mil? pittance,mere pittance!
they closed both eyes when they gave away hundreds of BILLIONS OF TAXPAYERS’ money the taxpaeyers themselves can never get to enjoy.
here,they even ASK jobless singaporeaans to contribute to charities when they tell singaporeans in no uncertain terms that if ‘YOU DIE,YOUR BUSINESS’.
When it comes to singaporeans’ interests,they become rather PRUDENT(?) but when it comes to outsiders,they are totally reckless or should we say,BRAINLESS!
Vivian can copycat DBS…and “rules out sabotage”
else there’s probably a glitch in their budgeting software :)
sunni sampiran karpe pundek ore kase puniyo ellai tewdeya vb
this is a way too much and why have all this news not being publish in strait times?? why are all this been hidden here?
vote out pap in this coming election. will never have a second thought of it. no point to vote them and awaiting them to squeeze our singaporeans money into their luxury games while we suffer in great pain
South Africa said the country has made USD1B for the world cup stage there, in tickets and what else.
It has also said the world cup has given the country some status.
Trouble is after the cup, there will be white elephants all over, built at cost of more than 1B usd.
Does the country really has that kind of money, beside selling diamonds.
I know singapore does not have that kind of money or diamonds, TH and GIC has lost big time. Somebody has to pay for all this YOG.
Looks very likely, it’s you and me..
It’s most likely a left pocket out to right pocket in, situation as usual, government pays top dollar overpriced fees for useless services/products to GLCs.
aiya.. even if it isn’t a success, the gahment would still congratulate themselves on a ‘succesful failure’, well worth the experience, blah blah and then another 10% bonus given out to their top brass.
and in SG, it is the poor who continues sucking the thumb while others splurge on the riches of life. welcome to our world!
Mr Leong,
There will be no “inqury” on the huge budget overrun. Vivian and Ser Luck will tell us that this was an “honest mistake, so let’s move on”!!
Worldcrass govt we have!!
can we have some more budget give away? say about $500 for each singaporeans?
since they can spend 387 millions then a little more give away package should not be a problem to help the needy to pay bills.
anyway they give we pay bills they have it back right? so can government please do the hand out of this package sooner? vivian balakrishnan can you be part of this hand out of package for us singaporeans since you can triple the YOG why not us right? hear from you soon.
toc please highlight to them about this package give away. thanks
give us package coz there will be a returned. don’t bull us singaporeans there is no returned.
we pay for gst,taxes and bills with gst, house and more. so the government earn constantly every month millions and billions from us, so what is it hard to give package more then $500 every 3month or 6months? when they can spend millions after millions in just a few days and lost after lost in each of their games.
did they bet millions too in world cup?
can vb tell us if so. and how many billions did he bet in world cup using singaporeans money? which country he bet?
if win do we get some token? if lose no need to say. bill go up everything go up.
haiz……sinkapor kena kapor never ending
I am surprise that Viv@n the smart Alex take soooooo damn long to know that budget overrun by 300%. Wonder do he pay his credit card bill?
Or he charges us?
Is he reliable? He told us immigrants r here to create jobs right. Now I am still jobless.
Is he a liar?
All these budget over-run goes to contracting the services of big corporations to give them international exposure…Certis Cisco,SFI etc..but think deeper..who owns these company?It may be a good time to make up for investments lost by pumping in public millions using this opportunity so that the report card looks better come election..
Now go find out how much each company’s contract is worth..
Hey ….
YOG is to show off to foreigners so we should spend as much as we can and if we don’t have it, we can always borrow.
Commcare is about helping Singaporeans in need. Therefore we must squeeze it …come on we are not a “welfare” society……
Don’t you guys understand your place in the scheme of things!! ;)
The stripper is expensive
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/former-stripper-does-the-youth-olympics/story-e6frf7l6-1225889152183
Does anyone remember the Comcare ad about a family having to dilute the milk powder for baby in order to stretch their dollar? Here, we have a MCYS minister with obvious access to “reserves” to the tune of at least $280m, and what does he blows it on? 13 days extravagant paid-holidays for foreign youths (plus some Singaporean elitist youths of course).
And they want to preach virtues like Filial Piety, practising Confucius values? They must think Singaporeans are really stupid.
Who cares about the poor and the needy? According to LKY they are “physically, mentally and culturally anemic” -
“We must encourage those who earn less than $200 per month and cannot afford to nurture and educate many children never to have more than two… We will regret the time lost if we do not now take the first tentative steps towards correcting a trend which can leave our society with a large number of the physically, intellectually and culturally anemic.” – Lee Kuan Yew, 1967
With ALMOST 400million bucks in a fund, Then life be much easier for POOR N NEEDY SINGAPOREANS.
JUST ASK AROUND, MOST SINGAPOREANS DON’T GIVE A DAMN ABOUT YOG ANYWAY.
SEEMS ONLY THE GOVERNMENT IS EXCITED ABOUT YOG.
YOG $387m Vs Comcare $92m and both under MCYS. It’s robbing the poor to give to the rich.
“…As I understand that the maximum financial assistance to a needy family is about $300+ a month…”
Vivian will say: “$300 per month is enough to provide food for a month ok! Where do you want to eat hawker centre, restaurants or hotel?”
Below shows that MCYS Minister Vivian
Balakirishnan CARES FOR THE NEEDY N POOR;
IN HIS DREAMS/IMAGINATIONS, i.e.
“If you were a poor person, anywhere on this planet, Singapore is the one place ………, where you will have food on the table. EVEN IF YOU CAN’T AFFORD IT, WE WILL HAVE MEALS DELIVERED TO YOU. ”
“………..if you were a poor person, anywhere on this planet, SINGAPORE IS ONE PLACE WHERE YOU WILL HAVE A ROOF OVER YOUR HEAD, ……..”
http://zh.sgforums.com/forums/10/topics/394784?page=1
Above shows that MCYS Minister Vivian
Balakirishnan CARES FOR THE NEEDY N POOR;
IN HIS DREAMS/IMAGINATIONS, i.e.
I am not really sure why we bidded the YOG but I rather see the money be used to help the poor & sick. It’s really sickening to know that we are now going to spend S$380m on this project, while they have to debate till the cows come home for the S$300+ monthly allowance for the needy. I think Bala got his priorities all wrong; he should be more concerned that the poor are getting help & not those foreign sports-kids getting caught in a traffic jam!!!
If something like this happening in our neighboring countries, the real story will be like this:
Real YOG cost: $150m
VB and his cronies take home pay: $237m
durin the mexico olympic hostin..mexico almost went bankrupt tryin to hold an olympic event beyon the country finance capacity… Los Angelos learnt from mexico’s mistakes and make a profits out of the next olympic events…
there are ways to make profits/maintain if you bothered to learn/study the knowhows…singapore overpaid/overfed ministers know NOTHIN @ ground zero all the way to the roti prata figurehead..
all this eatricewasteseeds government ^SERVANTs^ are very very good @ spendin OTHER PEOPLES money..the poor singapoorium peasant$ blood/sweat/tears without battin an eyelid…
still want to boost to the wholewideworld..singapore is a CANCAN state…
Splurging at the expense of taxpayers money and squeezing every cent from peasants with its mother of all price increases.
Wow, slightly more than three times off
budget.
But how come I don’t seem to be infected by any bit excitement, maybe because the YOG is of a much smaller scale than its parent.
The two mascots, what’s their names? I feel shameful – they are just too cutesy
and silly, like fluffy toys for primary children. For God’s sake, it’s the Games for adults, not small children.
I guess the designer just copied the Chinese from China in designing silly
cartoony copies. Still a small child.
I was in a mercedes cab the other day which was 1 of the 400 booked by mcys to ferry the officials to and fro during the entire YOG event from 5-26th aug. When he told me he is given 500 sgd per day which amounts to 15000, I was so disgusted. Wth! They can’t take normal taxi Meh? According to the cabbie the 7 series Benz high end Mercedes and limousines are booked. Do the math 400 carsx$500×22 days! No wonder the budget is 3x overspent Liao!!!!
Oh yah just in addition the cabbie also mentioned he can make 2x more during the f1 race..=30k in a month as he can charge $40 per trip to and Fro within the marina area and hotel( ritz Carlton)5-6 star hotels in orchard area.
Hi@theforgottengeneration, incidentally VB is a Christian who goes to church on Sundays and then goes and hold lee kwan you’s hand on weekdays for the millions!
So, as NgE-Jay on 9 July 2010 last point paragraph stood out glaringly when he said:
“Dear contrarian
There similarly has been a massive improvement in the standard of living (hygiene, sanitation, roads, etc) in other neighbouring countries but I don’t see politicians from there justifying their pay based on this.
Of course, you will probably say next that other countries have corrupt politicians, which i don’t dispute certainly.
The key point is that the concept of duty and service has been replaced by the mantra of greed, and THAT is what we should oppose.”
There’s guy in as SIG in TR who clear agrees with LKY’s mantra of “Service with GREED”! Do go there NgE-Jay and others and put him in his rightful “place” as he’s there to bend vulnerable minds for you know who.
IF YOU want tickets to catch the Youth Olympic Games, you will have to act fast.
Ticket sales to the first Youth Olympic Games have been brisk, with more than 100,000, or close to 50 per cent of tickets, having sold out.
The truth is most of those tickets have been bought by MOE and MOD.
Best to use the 10 million dollar integration fund to buy tickets for new citizens to watch the games and cheer for their original countries instead of cheering for singapore.
MOE buys 80,000 YOG tickets for all schools
Wed, May 26, 2010
The Straits Times
By Carolyn Quek & Amelia Tan
STUDENTS in Singapore will be out in full force when the Youth Olympic Games (YOG) hits town in August.
The Education Ministry (MOE) is buying 80,000, or a quarter of the available tickets…..
http://www.asiaone.com/News/Educatio…25-218376.html
MOE buys 80,000 YOG tickets for all schools
Wed, May 26, 2010
The Straits Times
By Carolyn Quek & Amelia Tan
STUDENTS in Singapore will be out in full force when the Youth Olympic Games (YOG) hits town in August.
The Education Ministry (MOE) is buying 80,000, or a quarter of the available tickets…..
http://www.asiaone.com/News/Educatio…25-218376.html
If 80,000 is a quarter, what is 100,000 equal to :
1. half
2. less than half
3. a little more than quarter.
4. a little more than half
Maybe this should be a maths question for the year 2010 PSLE Maths Paper.
We have ‘School Pocket Money’ to raise fund, a few millions a year from the public to put food on the table for poor students.
“This year, the fund has to raise $5 millions to help 12,400 children.”
There we have to burn $387 millions on a single event. Importing BIG NAME sportsmen and women, must have cost a lot of money.
Thought sport here is made famous by short cut, foreign imports?
It is incredible how a govt with the the most highly paid ministers in the world, can continue to make basic blatant mistakes.
Does Vivian Balakrishnan know how to put up a budget paper? How can there be an overrun of more than 3 times the budget approved? Was he sleeping when the budget was proposed? It is an utter disgrace. There should be an independent inquiry to ascertain what went wrong. If no satisfactory answers are found, he should resign or be sacked.
The govt’s incompetency cannot continue forever. I have lost count on the number
of cock-ups that had happened the last few years.
How switched-off can the govt get? How much longer can the citizens tolerate?
Blatant incompetency cannot be tolerated.
It’s all talk, but when it comes to performance, it’s zero, zero and zero output. MM, SM AND PM should resign as acknowledgments of the Party’s incompetency. Enough is enough. We can tolerate no more.
1. $387 Million for 13 days work out nearly average $30 million per day! WOW! MORE MILLION DOLLARS COCK-UP and THIS time at home too. Sorry have to increase from $104 Million to save face and SIGNED commitment to Olympic Committee!
Who proposed it? IS it that Liu Tuck Yew guy as I didn’t follow this one? But then VB, Tharman, PM & his apa too must have approved it right! like this can still remain high like HC no problem lah!
2. And how much is one ticket by class? Also exactly total how many many classes of tickets are there? Answers to these should clarify “@ Got Picture Got Talk” questions I hope?
3. Know the old adage of “Pride comes BEFORE a FALL”! looks like PAP has been on the decline ever since Dear Dr. Goh Keng Swee and camaraderie retired in quiet wisdom to let Lee prove it all on his own!
Well, for all their brags starting from their mentor and emboldened another wisdom goes like this “at the end of the game the winner will be known”!
So good luck to PAP with or without their “mentor”. As HC was already laughable and still is up to now!
PAP is on the decline and need to be changed, said an old staunch PAP supporter to me last year. I think he is right as he had been most faithful to PAP. Not the only one with this opinion. Take a deep deep deep breath PAP!
if left hand didn’t make right hand MOE buy so many tickets, the over budget would have been even more glaring?
might as well get the other ministries each one buy some more, finish selling all the tickets, oversubscribe 7 times and call it Not Real Demand because Astroturfers in ministeries are Buying Left Hand’s Tickets.
it is often said that the ability to laugh at oneself shows some form of enlightenment.
we obviously know who are the people standing now who are unable to laugh at themselves.
we, regular and original people of Singapore have no qualms about laughing at the fix we’re in right now. we even laugh at how we got ourselves into this fix in the first place, a “democracy” that is unable to use the vote to change its circumstances.
Let’s face it. Our papy govt is saturated with hypocrisy, and greed.
The following two comments MUST be AWARDED First-Class Honours for statements of Facts and Humour too! I’ve always enjoyed dry British humour and also watched “Mind Your Language” repeatedly! But these will have me laughable all night till i fall asleep from exhaustion! A BIG THANKS GUYS! I bet you LKY-PAP are having stomach cramps if they read these comments! Know something, a wisdom does say that “A person who cannot laugh at self has little wisdom! So PAP = Periodic Acting Party?
QUOTE
laugh at ourselves 9 July 2010
we even laugh at how we got ourselves into this fix in the first place, a “democracy” that is unable to use the vote to change its circumstances.
rwkc 11 July 2010
Let’s face it. Our pappy govt is saturated with hypocrisy, and greed.
UNQUOTE
This money is not from their pockets and as such it’s not painful to them.They can easily get it back through other scams like increasing GST,taxes and other charges to alleviate their astronomical flops.We’ve been their sacrificial lamps for many decades and they have no qualm in pushing through measures that work for their benefits solely.WE’ve been treated as morons for so long and time is critical for us to unite as one people to get rid of these leeches.
@ BUT the MCYS MINISTER DID SAY….
“If you were not a poor person, anywhere on this planet,Singapore is the only place, where, if you can juggle 2 balls and wag your tail at the same time,you can become a $million minister and affort to talk craps”
Dun worry, Singapore quite cheapskate, where got new facilities being built. All use existing facilities, so dun worry about white elephants
I think everyone should appreciate the governments efforts in organising the FIRST EVER Youth Olympic Games.Even if there are mistakes made,considering that Singapore is organising an international sporting event for the first time, so far its a good job done.There are no lessons to be learned from other countries as well, as it is the first YOG.We’ll, some might argue that Singapore can learn from countries which have organised the full Olympics but given the nature of Sinagpore’s community and sporting facilities I don’t think the lessons learnt there would be very applicable.I don’t agree that it is “cheapskate” in not building new facilities.A lot of upgrading is being done to the currently available facilities already and as many say, if the new facilities are built,then cost is going to rise more and Singaporeans are going to mourn about the cost rising even higher and speculating that the cost is going to fall on consumers head.As for the issue on the YOG budget tripling, many question why couldn’t the government give that kind of money to the people.One possible reason could be the problem that many people starting to work less because of more government transfer payments.I’m sure Singapore does not want to see a welfare state in which everyone gets paid by the government for not working.Another user also stated that the CDC only provides $300 to needy families and asks how does a family of 4 survive on $300.I feel that this user has a be more broad minded.Of course a family of 4 cannot survive on $300.But are you saying that the family is earning zero income?Of course not!Furthermore I’m sure these families receives tax exemptions and other forms of suppport from NGOs.Many users also state that the PAP should be voted out in the next General Election.But if they are not going to be voted in then whose is going to replace them?Is there anyone out there at least close to the ability of the people in PAP?During the last General Elections, there was a debate on why only a minority vote for the opposition.One of the reasons stated was that the opposition do not have the experience.So why take the risk of choosing the naive?It’s better to be safe than sorry….One major problems with Singaporeans is that we don’t appreciate the govenrments efforts in improving the country in every way.We should be fortunate that we don’t see people begging and sleeping on the streets all around the island.Furthermore we are always not happy with have and want more.It is a good attitude an extent but this has led to ask being greedy.So its time that we realise that we should change ourselves instead of we trying to change the system here.
Holger> Wah wall of text man.
1st ever YOG so what? Going 3x over budget is not something that should have happened in any situation.
There is credible opposition; I hope more of the useless PAP buggers are voted out. They are a bunch of hypocrites more interested in their wallets than the country’s needs.
>Finally, why was MCYS’s budget operating grant decreased by $52 million or about 11 per cent, from $478 million in FY2009 to $426 million for FY2010, in the midst of Singapore’s worst recession?<
Because the gahmen couldn't show us in more clearer terms how little it cares for its people
Holger Batstuber
I’m sure Singapore does not want to see a welfare state in which everyone gets paid by the government for not working.
………………..
this 1 i support you 101%..
if you are free..when you are free
feel free to asked leekingyou why he worked so less and still get paid over $100,000 for not workin a 44 hours weak..
so is leekingyou leechin on the stateswelfare?
Sickening that they’d rather spend $400m on YOG than buld a new Science centre for our kids.
Jus get all these “Clowns Puppies” out of my sight !