By Andrea Ong
Singapolitics
Saturday, Feb 23, 2013
A fortnight after its MPs offered alternatives to the Government's population policies in Parliament, the Workers' Party (WP) published a paper to give a fuller picture of its proposals and to stimulate more debate.
In the 38-page policy paper titled "A Dynamic Population for a Sustainable Singapore" released on Saturday, the opposition party elaborated on ideas such as freezing foreign worker growth while focusing on growing the resident labour force through tapping women and the elderly.
It also disagreed with the current strategy of topping up the low birth rate with immigrants, and emphasised its key goal of focusing on Singaporean families and coming up with measures and workplace environments to help citizens start families and procreate.
The party also presented three scenarios which project that the population in 2030 would range from 5.6 to 5.8 million, "significantly lower" than the worst-case scenario of 6.9 million presented in the Government's Population White Paper unveiled last month.
The scenarios ranged from the ideal where the total fertility rate (TFR) rises to 1.75 and the labour force participation rate rises to 78.7 per cent, to the non-ideal where the figures stagnate around current levels of 1.29 and 66.6 per cent.
Its maximum population projection of 5.8 million is half a million more than today's and 1.1 million less than 6.9 million, the WP highlighted. The trade-off is 0.5 per cent less annual GDP growth than the projections in the White Paper, it added.
The WP also made counter-proposals to the Government's Land Use Plan released last month, which involve building new towns, reclaiming land, and consolidating military activites on Pulau Tekong to support the growing population.
This would result in Singapore becoming overly dense and losing its natural and historical heritage, the WP said.
Among its proposals is using less land for defence purposes. The party is also concerned that only four per cent of the land will be retained as reserves by 2030, compared to 14 per cent now.
All nine WP parliamentarians spoke during the five-day debate on the White Paper, and were among the 13 who opposed an amended motion to pass the document. Some, like party chief Low Thia Khiang and chairman Sylvia Lim, had emphasised the need to retain a strong Singaporean core.
Noting that national values, identity and worldviews are formed over time and through institutions like schools, family and national service, the WP said in its document that a strong Singaporean core is made up of Singaporeans who grow up in and with Singapore.
It added: "Being a Singaporean citizen should not only be based on a conviction, it should reflect a life-long commitment to defending Singapore as our homeland."
In a statement accompanying his party's policy document, Mr Low noted that the population road-map "is by far the most widely debated White Paper in Singapore politics - not only in Parliament, but also by the people of Singapore".
The WP decided to publish the policy paper because of the subject's importance and complexity, and the "fundamental differences between WP and the Government on the approach to tackle the population challenges ahead", said Mr Low.
The Aljunied GRC MP also criticised the Government's lapses in letting population growth run ahead of its planning parameters and infrastructure.
The statement and policy paper can be downloaded from http://wp.sg/wp-population-policy-paper/
Singapolitics
Saturday, Feb 23, 2013
A fortnight after its MPs offered alternatives to the Government's population policies in Parliament, the Workers' Party (WP) published a paper to give a fuller picture of its proposals and to stimulate more debate.
In the 38-page policy paper titled "A Dynamic Population for a Sustainable Singapore" released on Saturday, the opposition party elaborated on ideas such as freezing foreign worker growth while focusing on growing the resident labour force through tapping women and the elderly.
It also disagreed with the current strategy of topping up the low birth rate with immigrants, and emphasised its key goal of focusing on Singaporean families and coming up with measures and workplace environments to help citizens start families and procreate.
The party also presented three scenarios which project that the population in 2030 would range from 5.6 to 5.8 million, "significantly lower" than the worst-case scenario of 6.9 million presented in the Government's Population White Paper unveiled last month.
The scenarios ranged from the ideal where the total fertility rate (TFR) rises to 1.75 and the labour force participation rate rises to 78.7 per cent, to the non-ideal where the figures stagnate around current levels of 1.29 and 66.6 per cent.
Its maximum population projection of 5.8 million is half a million more than today's and 1.1 million less than 6.9 million, the WP highlighted. The trade-off is 0.5 per cent less annual GDP growth than the projections in the White Paper, it added.
The WP also made counter-proposals to the Government's Land Use Plan released last month, which involve building new towns, reclaiming land, and consolidating military activites on Pulau Tekong to support the growing population.
This would result in Singapore becoming overly dense and losing its natural and historical heritage, the WP said.
Among its proposals is using less land for defence purposes. The party is also concerned that only four per cent of the land will be retained as reserves by 2030, compared to 14 per cent now.
All nine WP parliamentarians spoke during the five-day debate on the White Paper, and were among the 13 who opposed an amended motion to pass the document. Some, like party chief Low Thia Khiang and chairman Sylvia Lim, had emphasised the need to retain a strong Singaporean core.
Noting that national values, identity and worldviews are formed over time and through institutions like schools, family and national service, the WP said in its document that a strong Singaporean core is made up of Singaporeans who grow up in and with Singapore.
It added: "Being a Singaporean citizen should not only be based on a conviction, it should reflect a life-long commitment to defending Singapore as our homeland."
In a statement accompanying his party's policy document, Mr Low noted that the population road-map "is by far the most widely debated White Paper in Singapore politics - not only in Parliament, but also by the people of Singapore".
The WP decided to publish the policy paper because of the subject's importance and complexity, and the "fundamental differences between WP and the Government on the approach to tackle the population challenges ahead", said Mr Low.
The Aljunied GRC MP also criticised the Government's lapses in letting population growth run ahead of its planning parameters and infrastructure.
The statement and policy paper can be downloaded from http://wp.sg/wp-population-policy-paper/
