By Benjamin Cheah Parliament moved to endorse the White Paper today with a vote of 77-13. Assistant Professor Eugene Tan abstained from voting. The vote brings to a close five days of intense debate in Parliament. Deputy Prime Minister Mr Teo Chee Hean said it was “[T]he longest debate in my memory on any single motion.”   Revisiting issues Prior to the vote, a few speakers brought up issues previously surf ...

Press Release from Workers' Party For the last one week, Parliament debated the motion to endorse the Government’s White Paper on Population entitled “A Sustainable Population for a Dynamic Singapore”. The Workers’ Party MPs voted against the Amended Motion in Parliament today. Although the Amended Motion captures some of the Workers’ Party concerns about the White Paper, fundamentally the White Paper still ...

By Gordon Lee   Recent days have seen much scaremongering by politicians, businesses and the mainstream media about perils of calling bluff on the Government’s Population White Paper. But with the best of efforts to assuage the growing sense of apprehension over the targeted 30% increase (unless the Government has completely no control over the population, population projections equates population targ ...

By Benjamin Cheah   The ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) adopted a reconciliatory tone today in Parliament, talking about points of agreement and consensus with the opposition Workers’ Party (WP) on the White Paper for Population. The WP, on the other hand, stood firm with its position. Indeed, the PAP’s position too, remained unchanged. The heart of the debate surrounds two core issues: the number o ...

By Benjamin Cheah Two differing worldviews surfaced today in Parliament, as Members of Parliament continued to debate the White Paper on Population—specifically, what happened if the opposing party’s policies came to pass. The ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) painted a picture of a Singapore in the grip of economic turmoil. The Workers’ Party previously argued that Singapore’s foreign labour force should ...

By Howard Lee You might think that it is a fast fact from the 70's, but it seems that one in 10 Singaporeans still cast their vote in fear that their ballots may be traced back to them by the authorities, who might then “punish” them for their choice. This was suggested in a position paper published by Singapore human rights group MARUAH yesterday, which indicated that such a climate of fear erodes Singapor ...

By Terry Xu Speaking at the parilament today, Mr Inderjit Singh, MP for Ang Mo Kio GRC spoke out against the white paper on population. The first PAP MP who is speaking against the proposed white paper which would set a guideline for Singapore to increase its population to 6.5 - 6.9 million in 2030. While he agreed with that there will be trade off for economic growth but he expressed that he would rather t ...

Taken from Mr Inderjit Singh's facebook status. Speech by Mr Inderjit Singh, MP for Ang Mo Kio GRC On the White Paper on Population Madam Speaker, thank you for allowing me to join the debate on the White Paper on Population. While the report has some compelling arguments for the 6.9m population figure projected, we all know it is based mainly on economic considerations. Had we focused on things like buildi ...

By Benjamin Cheah On Monday, the Workers’ Party outlined a series of proposals on population and economic growth, rejecting the Government’s White Paper on Population. The Government came to the White Paper’s defence, criticising the WP’s arguments while propping up the paper’s points. Dr Amy Khor, Minister of Manpower, warned that the WP’s proposals would exact punishing costs on local businesses and multi ...

By Sharon Ng The Population White Paper is an objective and balanced look at the different needs and concerns of the nation, and it forms the roadmap of our nation’s population that is needed to guide future polices of the government. Deputy Prime Minister Teo Chee Hean said on Monday in the opening debate on the Government’s Population White Paper that the White Paper is drawn up to provide flexibility and ...