http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/singapore/11175810/Lessons-from-Singapore.html
When British ministers scour the world for policy ideas, one country is most often singled out for praise and emulation: Singapore. In the mid-Nineties, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown travelled there seeking guidance on how to reform the welfare state, and came back promising a “stakeholder society”. Unfortunately, they turned out to have learnt little apart from some new phrases: the radical overhaul of benefits that they promised after studying Singapore’s social insurance model failed to materialise. More recently, education ministers have looked to the south Asian city-state for inspiration when it comes to raising exam performance. There, 15‑year-olds are 10 months ahead of those in the UK in English and 20 months ahead in maths. There are lessons for the monolithic NHS, too: Singapore’s system of personal health accounts produces better outcomes than ours for half the price.
Next year Singapore celebrates 50 years of independence, and today its president, Tony Tan Keng Yam, becomes the republic’s first leader to pay a state visit to the UK. He represents a country of just over five million people that is nothing short of a phenomenon – one viewed in the West with a mixture of awe, envy and a certain amount of suspicion. How is it possible to have such centralised direction, while retaining the liberties needed for a free market to flourish? The answer is that Singapore seems to be run less like a state and more like a corporation, one aware of the vulnerability its small size brings and able to adapt to changing circumstances.
Whatever its democratic deficiencies, Singapore’s model has – with no resources and limited land – produced a small state, efficient public services, a competitive economy and high per capita income. There must be something we can learn from that.
When British ministers scour the world for policy ideas, one country is most often singled out for praise and emulation: Singapore. In the mid-Nineties, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown travelled there seeking guidance on how to reform the welfare state, and came back promising a “stakeholder society”. Unfortunately, they turned out to have learnt little apart from some new phrases: the radical overhaul of benefits that they promised after studying Singapore’s social insurance model failed to materialise. More recently, education ministers have looked to the south Asian city-state for inspiration when it comes to raising exam performance. There, 15‑year-olds are 10 months ahead of those in the UK in English and 20 months ahead in maths. There are lessons for the monolithic NHS, too: Singapore’s system of personal health accounts produces better outcomes than ours for half the price.
Next year Singapore celebrates 50 years of independence, and today its president, Tony Tan Keng Yam, becomes the republic’s first leader to pay a state visit to the UK. He represents a country of just over five million people that is nothing short of a phenomenon – one viewed in the West with a mixture of awe, envy and a certain amount of suspicion. How is it possible to have such centralised direction, while retaining the liberties needed for a free market to flourish? The answer is that Singapore seems to be run less like a state and more like a corporation, one aware of the vulnerability its small size brings and able to adapt to changing circumstances.
Whatever its democratic deficiencies, Singapore’s model has – with no resources and limited land – produced a small state, efficient public services, a competitive economy and high per capita income. There must be something we can learn from that.
