Chitchat Not in Singapore’s interest to reveal size of reserves: DPM Heng

[Hypocrite-The]

Indranee Rajah to Jamus Lim: No need for independent fiscal council


Singapore has robust measures to scrutinise spending and debate Budget issues, she says
Indranee Rajah, Jamus Lim. Photos from Facebook



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AUTHOR
Anna Maria Romero
DATE
March 1, 2021

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Singapore—One of the proposals made by Workers’ Party (WP) Member of Parliament Jamus Lim (Sengkang GRC) last week in Parliament was for the country to set up an independent fiscal council.
Dr Lim, an Associate Professor in Economics, said such a council would improve all major policy proposals for budgetary and macro purposes.
He said on Friday (Feb 26) that establishing a fiscal council now would be especially timely, given the uncertain economic environment as well as the Budget deficit.

“FISCAL COUNCILS CAN IMPROVE FISCAL PERFORMANCE, ESPECIALLY WHEN SUCH COUNCILS ENJOY LEGAL AND OPERATIONAL INDEPENDENCE, ARE TASKED WITH MONITORING FISCAL RULES, AND WHEN SUPPORTED BY ROBUST MEDIA PRESENCE.

He added that advanced economies, such as the Netherlands, the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom, have fiscal councils.

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“I propose that the Ministry of Finance consider the formation of an independent fiscal council, the Parliamentary Budget Office of Singapore, seeded with an initial S$20 million, and tasked with the mandate to score all major policy proposals formally advanced by Members of Parliament, for budgetary and macro implications,” said Dr Lim.
Ms Indranee Rajah, the Second Minister for Finance, took issue with him. She said such councils, which she referred to as Independent Fiscal Institutions (IFIs), were established after the global financial crisis in 2008 and 2009 for avoiding financial crises in the future.
But that was not the situation in Singapore, she added.
“The context in Singapore is very different. The ills which led to the need for IFIs in other systems are not present in our system and we continue to keep a very strict eye on our fiscal prudence.”
The country’s financial standing is strong, she added, citing Singapore’s AAA credit rating and balanced budgets in each term of Government as examples.
Additionally, the country has robust measures to “scrutinise spending and debate budgetary matters, without incurring the costs of setting up additional fiscal monitoring institutions.”
Ms Indranee also said that other countries’ IFIs are not faultless either. The Office of Budget Responsibility in the UK has come under criticism for “overly optimistic forecasts and has had to downgrade its forecasts several times since it was set up”, she added.
/TISG
Read also: Independent Budget office a “wasteful duplication” of functions: DPM Heng

 

[steffychun]

Indranee Rajah to Jamus Lim: No need for independent fiscal council


Singapore has robust measures to scrutinise spending and debate Budget issues, she says
Indranee Rajah, Jamus Lim. Photos from Facebook



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AUTHOR
Anna Maria Romero
DATE
March 1, 2021

- Advertisement -
Singapore—One of the proposals made by Workers’ Party (WP) Member of Parliament Jamus Lim (Sengkang GRC) last week in Parliament was for the country to set up an independent fiscal council.
Dr Lim, an Associate Professor in Economics, said such a council would improve all major policy proposals for budgetary and macro purposes.
He said on Friday (Feb 26) that establishing a fiscal council now would be especially timely, given the uncertain economic environment as well as the Budget deficit.

He added that advanced economies, such as the Netherlands, the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom, have fiscal councils.

- Advertisement -
“I propose that the Ministry of Finance consider the formation of an independent fiscal council, the Parliamentary Budget Office of Singapore, seeded with an initial S$20 million, and tasked with the mandate to score all major policy proposals formally advanced by Members of Parliament, for budgetary and macro implications,” said Dr Lim.
Ms Indranee Rajah, the Second Minister for Finance, took issue with him. She said such councils, which she referred to as Independent Fiscal Institutions (IFIs), were established after the global financial crisis in 2008 and 2009 for avoiding financial crises in the future.
But that was not the situation in Singapore, she added.
“The context in Singapore is very different. The ills which led to the need for IFIs in other systems are not present in our system and we continue to keep a very strict eye on our fiscal prudence.”
The country’s financial standing is strong, she added, citing Singapore’s AAA credit rating and balanced budgets in each term of Government as examples.
Additionally, the country has robust measures to “scrutinise spending and debate budgetary matters, without incurring the costs of setting up additional fiscal monitoring institutions.”
Ms Indranee also said that other countries’ IFIs are not faultless either. The Office of Budget Responsibility in the UK has come under criticism for “overly optimistic forecasts and has had to downgrade its forecasts several times since it was set up”, she added.
/TISG
Read also: Independent Budget office a “wasteful duplication” of functions: DPM Heng

Not in Singapore's interest for her to serve.

 

[SalahParking]

Heng the nerdy jack-in-office decides nothing. His Familee masters say no to revealing size of reserves, so he obeys their will.

Your beloved Lee said this


Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong spoke on Friday 27 March about the impact which the COVID-19 pandemic has and is likely to have on the economy. PM Lee said that the economic downturn "is going to last quite a long time. It is not a V-shaped down dip, it is not a U-shaped dip." - meaning that he did not see a rebound in the near future. He highlighted in particular that parts of the economy will have difficulty just staying in existence.
At the time of writing this article, the head of the International Monetary Fund announced that it is clear that the global economy has now entered a recession that could be as bad or worse than the 2009 recession.

 

[steffychun]

Your beloved Lee said this


Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong spoke on Friday 27 March about the impact which the COVID-19 pandemic has and is likely to have on the economy. PM Lee said that the economic downturn "is going to last quite a long time. It is not a V-shaped down dip, it is not a U-shaped dip." - meaning that he did not see a rebound in the near future. He highlighted in particular that parts of the economy will have difficulty just staying in existence.
At the time of writing this article, the head of the International Monetary Fund announced that it is clear that the global economy has now entered a recession that could be as bad or worse than the 2009 recession.

Very horny

 

[Hypocrite-The]

PAP MP shares commentary post on S'pore national reserves made by foreign commentator - The Online Citizen Asia
People’s Action Party (PAP) Member of Parliament (MP) for Tampines GRC Baey Yam Keng took to his Facebook last Wednesday (3 Mar) to share a commentary on Singapore national reserves made by a foreign commentator.
In his Facebook post, Mr Baey, who is also the Senior Parliamentary Secretary for Transport, shared a post, titled ‘Debunking the myths about Singapore’s national reserves‘, by Critical Spectator, a commentary blog which is run by a Polish national named Michael Petraeus.
Mr Petraeus gained national recognition sometime in late 2018 and 2019 due to his series of posts that were somewhat deemed as pro-Government.
While his early posts discussed issues like Brexit, China’s work culture, and US politics, he later on became critical of Malaysia’s former Prime Minister, Dr Mahathir Mohamad. His commentaries also painted Singapore in a positive manner, causing many to question his motivation.
In the recent post that Mr Baey shared, the Polish national discussed which element of the national reserves that the Government has kept as a secret, justifications on why such is done, as well as Workers’ Party (WP) MP Jamus Lim’s points on currency speculation.
Legislative levers may be needed to address the threat of foreign interference: Josephine Teo
Interestingly, just two days before Mr Baey shared the commentary by Mr Petraeus, Second Minister for Home Affairs Josephine Teo said in Parliament that legislative “levers” may be needed in Singapore in order to respond better to “hostile information campaign”, as part of efforts to fight against foreign interference in the country’s politics.
Mrs Teo explained that these levers will permit the Government to get necessary information to investigate hostile information campaigns to determine if they are of foreign provenance or artificial.
Additionally, they would also allow authorities to “break the virality” of such campaigns if they are indeed conducted by foreign actors to subvert Singapore’s politics, and to push for counter-messaging to warn the people of Singapore of these campaigns, she noted.
“Singapore needs to be open to the world to make a living. But our diversity and openness also present opportunities for foreign actors,” said Mrs Teo during the Ministry of Home Affairs’ (MHA) Committee of Supply debate on 1 March.
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[bobby]

The budget of a small little country of 3.8m citizens in 720 sq km...how hard is it to manage ?

Most other world cities are even larger than this.

 

[Hypocrite-The]

Theindependent
Sense And Nonsense by Tan Bah Bah


Image credits: Heng Swee Keat/Facebook
Author

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The ruling People’s Action Party is weaponising knowledge of the exact amount of Singapore’s national reserves as a way of helping it stay in power. That’s unacceptable. It does not have such an in perpetuity right. One of the debates in Parliament during the week seems focused on why we should not reveal how much we have – because letting others know is like leaking a national secret. Fair enough. It, however, avoids the highly discussable issue of whether it is wise to let only a very small handful of persons know what is going on at the three agencies handling the reserves, in particular, the GIC the amount of which it is holding is kept confidential.

Instead of continuing to rake up the usual old chestnuts, a more productive debate should from now on be on how Singaporeans can be reassured that there are strong checks on the handling of the reserves and how non-establishment political leaders who are no less loyal and committed to the country can sooner or later be co-opted in to share responsibility for the reserves’ health and accountability.

The idea of having an elected executive president is supposed to provide a second key safeguard since his assent is needed for drawdowns from past reserves. For that function to be properly performed, it seems obvious that he should have access to the information. Up to, I think, the middle of last year, the public was generally not clear about this. DPM HengSwee Keat said in Parliament in June last year in reply to questions from NCMP Dennis Tan and Faisal Manap(Aljunied GRC) that President Halimah Yacob was aware of the size of our reserves. And the Finance Minister said he was surprised by the question because it was “public information” that she had access to the information.

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During this week’s debate, Heng reiterated that it was public knowledge. It has been enshrined in Section 22F of the Constitution. And it may be worthwhile to quote the section so that whoever the president may be, we do know he would not be stonewalled like the late Ong Teng Cheong:

“22F.—(1) In the exercise of his functions under this Constitution, the President shall be entitled, at his request, to any information concerning —

(a) the Government which is available to the Cabinet; and

(b) any statutory board or Government company to which Article 22A or 22C, as the case may be, applies which is available to the members of the statutory board or the directors of the Government company.

(2) The President may request —

(a) any Minister, or any senior officer of a Ministry or of a department of the Government; or

(b) the chief executive officer and any member of the governing board of any statutory board or the directors of any Government company to which Article 22A or 22C, as the case may be, applies, to furnish any information referred to in clause (1) concerning the reserves of the Government, the statutory board or Government company, as the case may be, and the Minister, member, officer or director concerned shall be under a duty to provide the information.”

Section 22A refers to the appointment of members of statutory boards and Section 22F refers to the directors of Government companies.

I’m spending some time over the president’s role because whether the present government likes it or not, the president is an elected one, whatever his former political background. And however much the establishment wants decisions to be harmonised, ground sentiment does change over time and whoever the president may be, he cannot be seen as out of touch with what most Singaporeans think. If there is disquiet over the way our reserves are being managed, he must rise up to the occasion to reflect that. He has this moral responsibility.

The government will say all presidents are periodically briefed on the finances of the country, as they should be. But seeing is believing. The public must know this for a fact. It would be reassuring if the president can be seen as less the Siamese twin of the ruling government and more like a separate entity who will be act as a real check on profligacy or straightforward incompetence or negligence.

No government is perfect. The assumption that the PAP government is the only one deserving of the privilege of handling our assets is flawed. The party does not have any such special right to be the eternal custodian of the reserves.

Stop this us and you thing.

This attitude has long been part of the PAP’s DNA in the early years. I recall sometime in the 1970s one of our New Nation reporters returning from a press conference chaired by the Health Minister Howe Yean Chong. She had asked some questions on the CPF and was told bluntly: “Why are you asking so many questions? The CPF is not your money.” She was shocked.

Similarly, the current PAP ought to move away from a self-declared or at least the wrong belief that the national reserves have a PAP chop. They are Singaporeans’ reserves, after all. It should start thinking about how to let Singaporeans know more about their national asset or how it is managed – at least in some general way without being over-specific. Let them have a sense of ownership – instead of regarding them as unentitled peasants.

Believe you me, these peasants have a habit of biting back at you.

Tan Bah Bah, consulting editor of TheIndependent.Sg, is a former senior leader writer with The Straits Times. He was also managing editor of a local magazine publishing company.

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[batman1]

Usually, a dictator will keep the candy jar to himself.He forgotten that it belong to the people.

 

[laksaboy]

It's a totalitarian shithole. Party (and bloodlines) bigger than country. The deal in exchange for 'stability'. Why is anyone upset only now?

That's why I look forward to an imminent regime change of China: much of the Leegime's ill-gotten wealth stashed in the Middle Kingdom will go up in a puff of smoke. Elsewhere, the Myanmar problem will also be solved. That will speed things up on this island.