the following is Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s 2012 New Year message:
2011 was a significant year for Singapore. Singaporeans went to the polls twice, and elected a new government and President. Having made a significant political transition, we are all now adjusting to new norms in a changed environment.
We achieved steady growth of 4.8% this year. The external environment is uncertain. Debt problems in Europe are far from solved. Next year looks like being difficult for the global economy. As a small, open country, Singapore will inevitably be affected.
Amidst this flux, we need to be confident of our position, and clear about our priorities and plans to build a better Singapore. We are working hard to tackle our immediate challenges. The Government is committed to keeping homes affordable to all Singaporeans. We launched 25,000 BTO flats this year, enabling many first timers to book their HDB flats. In 2012 we are launching another 25,000 BTO flats. In the private property market, the Additional Buyer’s Stamp Duty will moderate capital inflows and foreign demand, and help to stabilise prices.
We will redouble efforts to improve our public transport system and expand the train and bus network. We will identify and put right the causes of the recent MRT disruptions. The Circle Line, completed in October, now transports 300,000 commuters daily. More MRT lines are on the way. We will also continue to enhance bus services to improve the daily commuting experience. However, these improvements will take time, so meanwhile please bear with us.
Beyond these pressing concerns, we are attending to long-term issues to improve Singaporeans’ lives. Healthcare must stay affordable and accessible to give Singaporeans peace of mind. We are enhancing our education system to give young Singaporeans the best possible start in life. We must uphold inclusive growth and social mobility as pillars of a united Singapore. This calls both for upgrading our skills and productivity to improve wages, and for strengthening our social safety nets.
Population is a particularly complex and critical challenge. Like most other developed societies, Singaporeans are having too few babies, and our population is ageing. We must find workable solutions to keep our society vibrant and forward-looking, maintain our economic vitality and strengthen our Singapore core.
There are many factors to consider. Singaporeans need to have enough children to replace ourselves, yet getting married and having children are ultimately personal decisions. A vibrant economy needs enough workers and talent, yet we run into physical and social constraints if we admit too many foreign workers too quickly. Diversity enriches our society, but only provided new arrivals adopt our values and culture. We need to balance all these conflicting factors, make judicious compromises, and accept the unavoidable trade-offs.
These are real and present issues. We are tightening the inflow of foreign workers to a more sustainable rate. Companies are already feeling the pinch, especially SMEs. Individual Singaporeans will feel it too, because many foreign workers do jobs that serve citizens. Admitting fewer foreign workers also means forgoing business opportunities and accepting slower growth. This is one reason why we only expect 1-3% growth next year, and why we must do our utmost to raise productivity, to make up in quality what we will miss in quantity.
These population issues affect us all. We will discuss them over the next year, so that we can understand better what is at stake, and what choices we must make as a nation.
How we manage difficult trade-offs like the population issue reflects the strength of our community. Our society is increasingly diverse. The public debate has become more open and robust. This is expected and natural, as our nation matures. However, just as important is how well we relate to one another in our shared home. This applies not only in good times when there are fewer frictions and it is easier to get along, but also when we encounter tough issues, passions run high and different points of view have to be bridged.
Our success as a nation is increasingly defined not just in economic terms but also by our social capital. We need to strengthen our values of tolerance, mutual respect and empathy. This goes beyond being civil and considerate to one another. It involves us actively appreciating others’ perspectives, caring for our fellow citizens, conducting a constructive public discourse and accepting the need to make compromises that benefit the majority. These are essential attributes of a mature, gracious society which I believe we all want for Singapore.
I am glad to see signs of such positive engagement emerging. For example, nature, heritage and other interest groups are working closely and enthusiastically with the MND on the project to redevelop the former KTM railway land. Interested Singaporeans are making innovative suggestions on how to balance development and nature along the rail corridor. We need to handle other more contentious issues as constructively too, such as when we have to build new expressways, train lines or nursing homes, affecting residents nearby. Much as we would like to, it is not possible to please everyone completely. If all sides refuse to budge, Singapore will be gridlocked and nothing will move. Hence, we need to uphold a spirit of give and take, and actively search for creative and practical outcomes that serve the common good. And, after the final decision has been made, I hope that all parties will rally behind this collective decision.
Overall, we have every reason to be confident and optimistic. We pulled together as one nation to overcome the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. We are transforming our living environment. Punggol 21 Plus is taking shape. Marina Bay has become an international icon, and the Gardens by the Bay will soon be another jewel on our skyline. We continue to invest in our future: the Singapore University of Technology and Design is enrolling its first batch of students in April, and ITE Central’s campus in Ang Mo Kio is taking shape. We will strengthen the SAF and Home Team to protect our security and our harmonious way of life. We are enhancing our social compact too: nurturing our children’s values and characters, strengthening support networks for our elderly and improving our social safety nets to help Singaporeans help themselves. All these will contribute to making Singapore the best home for ourselves and our families.
Because we have been successful, Singapore’s international standing is high. Many foreign visitors commend the Singapore spirit and how well we work together. When I travel abroad, people often congratulate me on Singapore’s achievements and want to emulate what we have done. I recently met a young Singaporean participating in an APEC event in Honolulu. She was amazed at how respected Singapore was among her fellow international participants. Businesses know about and benefit from this Singapore premium, but Singaporeans in general are less conscious of this important fact. It is a tremendous asset, based on our track record, reputation, and justified confidence in our people and our institutions.
We must never lose these strengths. I am confident that in a changing world, we will continue to bond as one people and walk shoulder to shoulder into a brighter tomorrow. Let us cherish our dreams, look forward with optimism and resolve, and work together to achieve the best we can for all our people, and for our Singapore.
I wish all Singaporeans a very Happy New Year.
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Complain non-stop,
It is quite obvious that stronger alternatives have emerged through the last GE. If the fights had been made fair, with the entire removal of the GRC system, and stops placed on over-wooing
the foreigners for citizen conversions, we would have seen a different nation today. I invite you to consider the fact that if the foreigner-wooing had been so successful both by numbers and citizen benefits, they would have blown their trumpets over and over again.
I am not saying that all policy makers are bad, and I am happy for the good and committed ones to stay. We have a sizable number of them who are poor performers themselves, and scratch the backs of other poor ones in this multi-million exclusive club. These are the ones who do nothing but drag everyone from one abyss to another.
We are not asking for handout. We are asking for free competition. As a SME I faced many obstacle in operating my nanoenterprise and the irony is, my competition are not my fellow competitors competiting on fair ground but the government regulators. As we all know, all rules, regulations, Guidelines and ACT are written in a way that it can be interpreted in any manner that it think fit. And when the government interpreted to their advantage, there is no way we as layman can argue or interprete in our advantage. They these were done to protect the government related businesses and companies. All their companies and businesses are so large and big that they will be able to fulfil every aspect of it. Even if they do not comply, there is always a safety net for them, somewhere in the whole pile of rules, regulations, ACTs have an exemption for them. I have been operating my nanoenterprise for the past 11 years and I have nonstop encounter with the regulators. This is because every now and then, they either amend the regulations or update them. It is continuous, you can operate a business for years and suddenly a new ammendments come in and out go the business. It was a uphill struggle all these years.
I have come to a point that I tell myself, forget about it, pack and go. I can say that because I have reached the age of retirement but what about those young enterpreneur? Everytime, I read the newspaper about our PM and DPM telling Singaporean to be enterpreneur, take risk, do new things. I just laugh it off, dear fellow Singaporean, don’t be deceive by them. These are only their dreams, these are what they dream that they want to do for their fellow Singaporean. In reality, nothing is implemented. I know best because I have been “hammered” left, right, centre for the past years.The reasons : Our government are obsess with the control mentality and if they do not have a tight ACT or rules to control you they will not let you go. I have tried send my case to PM office, MTI office. But the end result is the same, same answers, no one bother.
The PM do not realise there are many issues that are not right in the ground level, that is why the people are not happy. I believe many people are not asking for the sky and the moon, they are just asking for simple things. Unfortunately, the heavenly scholars in the government sector like to make things sophisticated and complicated.
Haha, PM’s briefing to PAP MPs on the ministerial salary review report was held at NKF HQ. How ironic!! People’s furore over Mr. Durai’s peanut pay will serve as a good backdrop for a useful democratic internal discussion to accept the real-world iron ricebowl pay scale (in case Gerald Ee still does not fully understand that an iron rice bowl is always iron and not to exceed outside pay)
WHAT PM LEE SHOULD CONSIDER IN REVIEW OF MINISTERIAL SALARIES
Democracy and capitalism, are good and universally accepted as model of government. However they have been abused by people in power for their own hidden agenda and purposes rather than serving the best interests of citizens. We have seen all over the world how democracy and capitalism ended up with abuses like legalised corruption, cronyism and all the malpractices of public investment and banking corporations culminating in financial and government crises such as the Asian Financial Crisis, US Sub-subprime crisis and Eurozone crisis which drove millions out of their livelihoods. Not only that, Nobel laureate economists Joseph Stiglitz and Amartya Sen as well as many others, have noted the current economic yardsticks such as gross domestic product (GDP) focusing on material consumption do not include quality-of-life factors. Standard measures of GDP do not reflect, for example, the degradation of the environment, the depreciation of natural resources or declines in individuals’ quality of life. The concepts of democracy and free market capitalism are no longer sustainable. The first step is to correct all the abuses of democracy and capitalism by cutting back ministerial over-blown skyhigh salaries back to iron-rice bowl salaries corresponding to the protectionism enjoyed in security of tenure and refusal for transparency and accountability (read Change, on how to solve problems, a work being published soon)
Yeah, not easy to please every Singaporean, but then there are not so many Ministers to please! Its a cinch to continue to line their pockets even as they screw up big time!!
@ Grateful
Totally agree with you.
Mah Boh Tan as MND minister then wanted to protect the interests of everyone including property developers (by allowing prooperty prices to rise so the developers can make huge profit) when prices have been shooting through the roof.
LKY advised people not to sell their HDB flats because prices would go up. Yes, resale HDB prices go up, but private property prices go up even more, and new HDB prices also go up. Our salaries hardlly go up except that of our Ministers and civil servants.
One aspiration of many Singaporeans working very hard is to be given the availability of options to stay in a private property or own a car. It will be beyond their reach now and in the future as foreigners and the rich buy these things up now.
Ask our MBT, KBW and PM, ministers and senior civil servants how many properties they have (in the past 10 years lest they play with numbers like not mentioning those they have sold). Is that the reason why they want prices to be keep going up? Remember the Jade Mansion, or was it later called Lee Mansion and then Don’t Mention in the 1990s, the developer gave discretionary discounts to different buyers. Now they are doing so, that is probably why the Hillier units by Far East are selling fast. To make matter worse, the developers are jacking up prices before absorbing the stamp duties, causing price index to rise and people to panick and rush to buy.
What is the point of introducing measures that serve the opposite of what the government said they were intended for or is that what the government actually wants? Together with the measures, they reduce the confirmed land sales, hence reducing land supply for property development. The outcome is going to be that of the past “measures”.
Ordinary people have to borrow 30 or more years to buy a flat (of course the PAP government if they still stay in power will in the future build studio or shoe-box size flat to make it affordable) and to work till we drop dead. That is not right.
If a single party government is not serving our interests, then we should go for something else because it can’t be any worse off than now.