J. B. Jeyaretnam
Singapore
“And even if he did not know, as the Court of Appeal said, he was wilfully blind to that fact. This cannot be a defence because you cannot prove knowledge on the part of the accused. But what the court can do is to look at all the circumstances of the case and then conclude that it is beyond reasonable doubt that he had that knowledge.”
“Sir, as I now understand it, the payment to Mr Olds was compensation or gratuity, and not salary for the year 2000. If it was gratuity or compensation, may I ask whether there was any term in the contract of employment with him for the payment of gratuity, how long was he employed for, and why did he leave?”
“Maybe there are other areas in which we can think of similar useful schemes so that those who are unable to upgrade themselves sufficiently can still have good employment. It is a complex problem. And I think all Ministries and economic agencies would have to think harder how to address this problem.”
“May I make it clear that I shall talk about the aspects of the case which should have been considered by the court. So, in that way, it might reflect on the court's decision. But I do want the Cabinet, when it comes to advising the President on the clemency petition that had been sent to him, to take these points into consideration.”
“Mr Deputy Speaker, Sir, with respect, I do not quite understand your restriction because, as I understand it, all court proceedings are now over. So there are no pending proceedings in court. The court is now functus officio. Mr Deputy Speaker: You did not listen to me carefully.”
“Mr Noris Ong Chin Guan asked the Minister for Manpower, given the current economic climate, will his Ministry consider encouraging local employers to give priority to employing Singaporeans who can perform equivalent jobs, including our healthy elderly, rather than to resort to engaging foreign employees too readily.”
The complete record
Every one of 4,058 lines we hold for J. B. Jeyaretnam, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 29 of 82.
“I certainly object to that because the imputation is that I was engaged in fabrication of this. This matter has been referred to the Committee of Privileges. Will the Minister withdraw that - that I was engaged in fabrication?”
“I think sometime in July actually it was handed to me. But Percy had given me this statement before I mentioned it in Parliament. He had told me orally about this man's detention, and it was after the correspondence with the Minister of State that I said, "The Ministry and the Police are saying there was no such thing. Would you let me have your signed statement?" And then he sent it to me.”
“As I said, this would appear to be an interrogation, but I have no worries. That statement, I think Percy has made a mistake - about the end of March. It was handed to me later.”
“I do not know what he is referring to about. Mr Jeffrey Chan - what is the misleading part of it? That I did not say that there was an appeal? How is that material? Does the Minister deny that the man was transferred about four or five months later?”
“Mr Speaker, Sir, what does the Minister want to do? He wants to move another motion, does he? Is that what he wants to do? This matter has been referred to the Committee of Privileges. You want to know why I did not bring that confession from Lim Poh Huat. I have told you. I said that the address had been given to me. The Police should go and ask him. I do not know whether even his confession may be true or not true. It is for the Police to go and investigate. You go and investigate. I have given you that.”
“Let's hear him, let's hear him. Yes, the whole matter is before the Committee of Privileges. I came here to give you the information and I said, "You can go and interview him now and get everything from him yourself." That is the only reason.”
“Yes, that is true, on the morning of 30th.”
“I thought the Minister said that as the matter has been referred to the Committee of Pri- vileges he was not going to start investigation in this very Chamber. But I am not averse to answering. What statement are you referring to - Lim Poh Huat's statement made to Mr Percy Seneviratne or his signed statement to me?”
“I know somebody says, "Precisely". The question is, are we going to shut out criticisms, judgments, value assessments, apart from just seeing an item of news? We cannot, as it were, try and live alone from the rest of the world. The Minister seems to have conceded that - we cannot insulate ourselves. But this is what you are trying to do, trying to insulate Singaporeans from the rest of the world, and that adds to their frustration. They are annoyed. They go abroad and they read and when they come back they cannot get the same thing to read here. Why do we have to do this to our people? Are you frightened of our people, I ask? Are you frightened that they might make a judgment which might unseat you? Is that what you are frightened of? I was referring to this speech made by the Minister on the 22nd January at some function, I think it was a dinner, and it was reported, probably the whole text was given, in the Straits Times on the 22nd January. My Party issued a press release on this on the 25th January. 4.30 pm”
“Members of the House, the world is getting smaller and smaller. You cannot try and isolate or insulate one place from the rest of the world. In this age of satellite information, anything happening in one part of the world is immediately transmitted to the other part of the world, and people can see it. An hon. Member: Precisely.”
“All right. Then if I am quoting him incorrectly, I am sorry. But I thought that is what he was trying to say. Loyalty to Singapore cannot be equated to loyalty to the Government or loyalty to a single party. The country is bigger than that. The country is bigger than the Government. The people are bigger than the Government, bigger than the party. And so, what we have got to try and decide is, whose interests matter, whose future are we trying to serve? The people? Or the PAP? Or the Government? Are we to try and direct all our efforts and energy to keeping the PAP in power? Is that what the Government aims at, regardless of what the people want? Is that the motive? Because that is what you are trying to do by this Bill. You are saying, "We do not want you to read anything that may be critical of the Government." I know, Members are shaking their heads and saying, "No, no, that is not what we are trying to do." But that is what you are doing. That is how the public sees it. You are shutting out information from them. The Minister said, I think in a speech, that the Bill had nothing to do with the criticism that had come from the foreign press on the economic recession. There was quite a lot of criticism and there was indeed very strong criticism about the closing down of that Stock Exchange for three days. As I have said, was it the Financial Times which said, it indicated a lack of confidence and competence on the part of the administrators. Is that what has hurt the Government? But we do not need the Financial Times of London to say that. Our people themselves knew that. So is that why we want to pass this Bill, so that our citizens may not read the criticisms that may be made overseas about anything that happens in Singapore?”
“There is another thing that I have noticed and which is disturbing for the society. I come across from time to time officials of the Government being so frightened of exercising any discretion. They say, "Mr Jeyaretnam, those are the rules we must follow." I say, "Look, they are the rules, I know. I am not asking you. But there are some cases you must be able to exercise your discretion." They say, "No, I must refer it to my superior." And so it goes right up, I suppose, to the Permanent Secretary. Can you see what a waste it is? And all this because we are fettering our people. We are tying them up in the one aspect where we need their contribution, and that is here [pointing to the brain]. And unless we can release that, unlock it for them, we are not going to reach the City of Excellence. We are not going to have a society with a free flow of information, hi-tech information that the PAP talked about before the 1984 elections. By no way are we going to get that. All we will have are people who know only what the PAP press put out. Yesterday, listening to the Member for Whampoa, he was talking what I thought the PAP were talking some years ago and I do not see very much of it now - that if you are anti-PAP then you are anti-Singaporean. That is a lot of nonsense. That is the biggest nonsense that I have ever heard.”
“I said, "You should stay here." They said, "No, we can't see any future for us in this place." I said, "Don't be silly. You stay." But they said they were making their plans to leave. And it is not just them. The people who leave here are not just the ordinary workers. They cannot leave. The people who leave are those who have some sort of skill, training, who are able to use their skills outside. So that is robbing this country of the talent that we could have. If only we could try and understand why they are leaving this place. I am not trying to spin a yarn. As I said, the Prime Minister was worried about the brain drain. I do not think anyone will deny that there is a brain drain. I know other countries also have this problem. But we need it so vitally, because again, Members, we are reminded, times without number, that our only resources are our people. We cannot dig up something from under the ground to sell to foreigners. We cannot tap the rubber from our trees to sell them. All we can sell is here [pointing to the brain] in our citizens, their ideas, their technology that they can invent. And people will buy them. But we are trying to kill that. Can you not see it? We are trying to kill the only resources that this country possesses. And we are trying to kill it by refusing to let our citizens widen their knowledge by reading material elsewhere than just in the Straits Times and the Chinese, Malay papers that the Government puts out. If they are to be left with just these papers, I am afraid you will find that the supply of this brain power will diminish as time goes on. It must because it will get warped by just one information from one pipeline being fed into it all the time, and they would not be able to think for themselves.”
“Why is all this necessary in today's society in Singapore? Are we or are we not a free society? The Government pays lip-service to this concept of a free society, some free society we have in Singapore, where everything is controlled, every thought would appear to be controlled. The Prime Minister, speaking sometime ago, talked about the brain drain. Why do you think people are leaving Singapore? Not everyone, Members of the House, leave for greener pastures. It is not the lure of money that takes them abroad. Because they find Singapore stifling. They find the atmosphere in Singapore unbearable. Let me tell you, Members. Only last night I met somebody and he said, "We are migrating." I said. "Don't be silly. Why are you migrating?" An hon. Member: Another story.”
“How is he going to do it if he is only supplied with just one pipeline of information coming through the Government media, day in and day out? And not just the press, we have got the television. We have got the Government-controlled radio. As the Member for Potong Pasir said yesterday, not content with showing the proceedings in the Commission of Inquiry once, they had to have a re-run,twice, three times. What is the Government afraid of? Because that is what it suggests - that the Government is mortally afraid that our citizens may be able to form their own judgments, may be able to make their own valid assessments. Is that what the Government is afraid of? Why is this Government so paranoid, that it is frightened of its people? I cannot find any other explanation than that for this policy of the Government. It is not as though we are in the midst of a war. Let us get rid of this siege mentality. Some lecturer way back wrote about Singapore's siege mentality. It would appear that we are still besieged by this siege mentality. Let us relax. Let us enjoy life and you will enjoy if you have information available, if the citizens are able to read whatever they wish to read, within certain limits, of course, which the ordinary law will take care of. And they are able to see what they wish to see. Take the stupid case of trying to make it difficult for Singaporeans to watch any programmes over TV 3 from Malaysia, the HDB refusing to modify the antenna. It is a stupid thing. The only thing it did was to annoy a lot of our elderly senior citizens. Because I was told that they could get sometimes the Cantonese programmes or Hokkien programmes on that channel. There you are. You have it. It is not the information. You are even denying enjoyment to a section of our community.”
“And on Sunday, the Sunday Times carries an editorial and it says, concerning me, "What must be done must be done." And if one looked at that editorial, one could have guessed perhaps or thought that it might have been written by a Government Minister or by a Government Member. There was no attempt made to try and intelligently study the Report and to see whether the conclusions were well founded or whether there was any cause for criticism. No, it was a sheepish acceptance. Because the Government says this, we say "Aye". Mr Speaker, Sir, in other countries, if a commission were to present a report, there would be a critical study of the report, not just the editorial but they would invite articles and there would be a critical study of the report. And it would be taken paragraph by paragraph or conclusion by conclusion, so that it may be explained to the people and to see whether the report could stand up. That is the sort of thing we do not get in Singapore. The people in Singapore are just fed with just one view, one opinion, and they are not allowed to have any other view or opinion. If that is what the Minister says is a responsible press, then I am afraid I must disagree. So is the Minister proud of his press here? I for one, may I say, I am ashamed of the press that we have in Singapore. Not so long ago, I think the President of the Law Society said he did not read the Straits Times except maybe the sports or some feature of it. So if you want creative minds - and we are all striving for creativity, are we not - then you have got to feed the mind, not with just one pipeline of information. You have got to feed it with other information, going in to help the mind to critically analyze and make a valid judgment.”
“What is his criteria of a responsible press? Perhaps he could spell that out. What is the criteria of a responsible press? Is a press responsible when it churns out day after day Government propaganda, fills its pages with speeches ad nauseam from Ministers and who have you? Not a day passes, if you look at the front page of the Straits Times, without it saying, "The Minister said this ..." and they carry their own report on it. And then you find, as though that is not enough, "full text of the Minister's speech, page 6." Then you turn to page 6 and you find the whole page taken up. Is it because they have nothing else to write about? Then you have the reporting of Government functions. Ministers going there, MPs taking a stroll through their constituencies, walking up that alleyway, this alleyway, and so the press reports it. That is a very responsible press because it brings the Government to the people. It shows up the Government in beautiful light, "Look at our Ministers. They can make wonderful speeches. Look at our Government MPs. They are walking up and down the roads everyday looking after our citizens." What about the duty that the press owes to the people of Singapore? Does the press owe no duty to the people of Singapore? There is no investigative journalism in Singapore. There is no comprehension in Singapore if you read Singapore's papers of the ability to grasp the essentials. All we get is platitudes, generalities and the like on any report. Let me give you an example. The Sunday Times, not the Sunday just gone past but the Sunday the week before that, carried an editorial. The Saturday before that, the papers were full of the Report of the Commission.”
“We agree but we are not going to give you that information now." Then we have the Official Secrets Act, now extended to statutory boards, which prevents information, even of the most innocuous kind, nothing to do with sensitive material, coming to the knowledge of our citizens. I could go on and on. The intention of the Government, whilst it talks about opening our citizens' minds to knowledge and information, would appear to be just the reverse. It is to close the minds of our citizens. It is to lock them up with the knowledge or with the information that is only provided by the Government and its own media. The Minister spoke about a responsible press. Of course, I am the first to say that the press must be a responsible press. Is the Minister seriously holding up the Government press here in Singapore as a responsible press? Is he seriously asserting that the Straits Times, the Zaobao, Wanbao, the Shin Min, the Berita Harian, are all responsible press in Singapore? Some hon. Members: Yes.”
“However the Minister may try to make it out, this Bill does not really try to penalize or to hurt the pockets of those who run the foreign press, foreign newspapers, so much as to inflict this ridicule on our citizens. Mr Speaker, Sir, the PAP Government before the last general elections was holding up to our people the concept of a City of Elite, City of Excellence, City of Information (hi-tech information) where everyone will be allowed access to information, where everyone will get the information when he needs it. And, of course, the society of the future is vitally dependent on getting information, correct information, and to be able to, as it were, sift the various pieces of information that come to it, and to be able to make judgment and separate the wheat from the chaff. Having proclaimed this gospel of free information available for our citizens and flowing, what does the Government do in practice? In practice, information is shut out from all our citizens, information that is important and necessary for them to know if they are to actively participate in running the affairs of this country. Let us take just the example of the question that I tried to ask about the arms that are supplied to other countries. The Singapore Government thinks our citizens should not be told. But other countries know about it. That is the sort of thing we have got to put up with. We cannot get the information from the Government which other countries seem to be able to know and to put out concerning Singapore. I mentioned - was it yesterday or the day before - about writing to the Registrar of the Subordinate Courts for some information. I had to point out to them that it was a matter of public record. The Registrar concedes, "Well, you say it is a matter of public record.”
“Mr Speaker, Sir, why must this Government, I ask, ridicule and humiliate our citizens? Why must this Government hold up our citizens to the rest of the world as a people who are immature, as a people who are unable to make up their own minds, as a people who are unable to form any independent judgment but must be guided by the Government in every opinion that they hold, and must be controlled in their reading? That is to ridicule and to humiliate our citizens. And this Bill tries to achieve precisely that. We are already, Mr Speaker, Sir, held up to ridicule and contempt by a number of other countries in the things that our society has been forced to accept. The controlled trade unions where there is no independence of the trade union movement, where the Chief Executive Officer of the trade union movement is also a member of the Cabinet and, as the Prime Minister has openly admitted, whose only duty, task, is to see that he carries the trade unions with the Government. That cannot but hold up the workers in Singapore to ridicule and contempt. That they can put up with such state of affairs where they cannot elect their own leaders but that the Government must elect their Chief Executive and that the Government must direct what they do in the matter of their trade union activities. There is, of course, the other institution which is a scandal, and that is the press, our local press. Mr Speaker, Sir, I shall be dealing with the local press when I try to reply to the Minister on his statement about the responsible press, that is, I think, in his words were "crucial to a society" (I may not have his exact words). So I ask again, why does this Government do this?”
“Yes, there is nothing wrong. We must all say, "Baa, baa, black sheep."”
“Sir, if you will hear me. Standing Order 71, I see, it is the procedure in Committee of the whole House.”
“Standing Order 31, Mr Speaker, Sir. 'Unless Standing Orders otherwise direct, notice shall be given of any motion which it is proposed to move with the exception of the following:- (b) A motion in Committee.' This House is sitting as a Committee of the whole House considering a Bill and my experience, if I am not wrong, was that sometime ago, in the last Parliament, I moved an amendment in the Committee stage without any prior notice.”
“But may I refer you to another Standing Order?”
“Mr Speaker, Sir, may I be heard on your ruling?”
“I think we should have a division on this. It is very important. Several Members of the Government party have spoken, Mr Speaker. Let us have a Division, and let us see whether they stand up.”
“On a point of clarification. What I mentioned was that they might have a perfect defence to the claim by the Government to try and recover that money. Are you going to defeat their defence?”
“I know what the law is. Section 48, I know it is compulsory acquisition.”
“On a point of clarification. I never said "forfeit".”
“He can't. Mr Teh Cheang Wan: Mr Speaker, Sir, we cancel his application to purchase an HDB flat. In other words, he is not allowed to buy an HDB flat. He is not allowed to become an owner. But we offer him a rental flat which is much smaller and on the ground floor so that he will not continue to pose a danger to the residents in the estate. Most probably, we will offer him accommodation either in Jurong, Woodlands, or in some distant area where the chances for him to hit people would be much less.”
“Why do you not say so? Mr Teh Cheang Wan: The rate HDB is going to charge is very much lower. There are people who are habitually in arrears. The HDB has various types of tenants, almost 20,000 shop tenants, ie, tenants of shops and industrial premises and their rental is quite a substantial sum. A fair number of them are in the habit of not paying the rent to HDB but keep on delaying and delaying. The HDB has to serve them notice and sometimes have to serve them with summonses to bring them to court. This is a very costly affair to HDB. After passing this law, the HDB will come out with the scale of fees. This means that in the beginning when we serve notice, we are asking for a few dollars as the cost of serving the notice. If HDB comes across a difficult tenant who does not bother about paying a few dollars, then HDB may have to decide to increase the charges.”
“Imposed by the Board on the lessee or owner of an HDB flat for late payment of rent.”
“At the Committee stage I will move it if he says it is not necessary.”
“On a point of clarification. Would the Minister answer my question whether he proposes that any such order made under clause 5 will be presented to Parliament to lie on the Table for 30 days or not?”
“But not in doing something different. That is why I want Parliament to approve it.”
“It is not your problem. It is Immigration Department's, the Minister for Home Affairs.”
“I will ask the Minister to withdraw that. What does he mean by saying that we have a vested interest and we want illegal immigrants here? This is quite serious, Mr Speaker, Sir. I think Ministers are getting away with too much in this place.”
“But they don't come to me. HDB won't touch me!”
“Thank you, Mr Speaker, Sir, if you say I have. 12.43 pm”
“He said, "In my country they have, so that their views are put forward and discussed." Here, it would appear they have no such rights. And this is delegated power to the Minister. And unless this delegated power is strictly circumscribed and spelt out by Parliament, it will amount to an exercise of arbitrary power. Again may I assure the Minister that it does not do any good for him to tell us with his hand on his heart, "Trust me. I am not going to do any evil thing like this." That is not the issue, whether one Minister or another Minister will exercise these powers. The question is: is it right that you should cut down on the citizen's rights and his remedies? I am very upset at the continuous erosion in this country of the citizen's rights. Finally, Mr Speaker, Sir, clause 10 seeks to repeal the present section 48E and substitute another section numbered likewise, 48E. This would appear to enlarge the Board's powers again. That is the trouble. The Board gets a little bit. Then it continually seeks to enlarge its powers. It is like the camel and the Arab in his tent. The camel first puts its neck in and then little by little, it goes in and drives the poor man out. Previously, the section only caught any statements which were actually contained in the application to the Board. Now, it would appear that it will catch any statement made, whether it is contained in the application or not. Because it seems so wide to me. It says: 'Any person who, in relation to the purchase by such person of a flat, house or other living accommodation, makes any statement to the Board which is false, ...' So that it does not have to be in the application that he submits.”
“" But I have pointed out to him more than once that in those circumstances there is only a very limited area in which the court can intervene. The court's powers are supervisory. It is quite a different thing altogether from the person taking something to court and asking the court to investigate the merits. This, I have complained again more than once, is iniquitous, thoroughly bad one, because it deprives the citizen of his proper legal remedies and rights. A citizen may lose his property, may lose a property on which he has spent all his life's savings because the Board exercises its powers under section 48. And what remedy do you give him? The remedy you give him is, "My dear chap, all you can do is to appeal to the Minister who is in charge of the HDB and that's all." Why should he not be allowed to challenge the power of the HDB in the court, the original decision of the HDB? If you think the court is not the right forum, then should there not be a tribunal set up to hear these cases so that arguments may be presented for both sides openly, where the public may hear the arguments, and not decided by the Minister in his air-conditioned room without anyone knowing what has been presented? I have said before that I think it is time that we set up a tribunal and take all these powers away from the HDB and make the HDB apply to the tribunal, if they wish to exercise any power. That is what is done in a democratic country, in a country where the rights of the citizens are respected, in a country where the rights of the citizens are honoured, but not in Singapore. I mentioned sometime ago about, I think a Swedish journalist who expressed surprise that the tenants or lessees of HDB apartments did not have a seat on the Board.”
“They will show that we do not conform to civilized standards that are accepted in other countries, that what we follow is a code from ancient times perhaps, as mention has been made, not a civilized code of behaviour. So I ask the Minister to think very seriously whether he does need to get Parliament to pass this Bill which will bring only discredit to Singapore and to Singaporeans. I have so far been speaking about these provisions under which persons may be evicted if they are convicted in a Court. But there is one other provision, of course, in this Bill, ie, paragraph (l) in clause 9 and paragraph (c) in clause 7, and this relates to the purchase price or loan taken by the buyer for the purchase of the apartment. This provision proposes to punish him if he "fails to return the money to the Government when he is required to do so under the terms of the grant." So the HDB is being used as a lever to help the Government get its money back. What if the man has a defence to the claim against the Government for the return of the money? The Government may feel that it cannot go to court to recover the money. Is that why this is being introduced, to circumvent the procedure under which persons should go to Court and recover monies that are due to them? The whole thing is against all accepted codes. Subsection (5) in clause 9, Mr Speaker, Sir, of course, refers to the remedy that any person who is aggrieved by the order of the HDB in divesting him of his flat may have. And the Act gives him, which is now becoming commonplace in all legislations in this country, the great remedy of appealing to the Minister. I am sure the Minister - he must have said this - will say, "Of course, he can go to the court.”
“So it introduces a principle which is unknown to criminal law and which is completely repugnant. In the same vein, Mr Speaker, Sir, is this principle of collective punishment. I was going to mention this but I see that reference was made by the Member for Rochore to the Templer era in the Malayan Emergency days when a whole village was punished if one or two members of the village had in some way or other given any help or supplied food to the Communists. That was condemned by a number of countries outside as being completely uncivilized and barbaric - to seek to punish an entire community, a village, for the acts of one or two persons inside that village. But at least the government in those days could have pleaded the Emergency. The government could have said, "Well, we agree in normal peacetime this is thoroughly bad. But we are fighting a war with the Communists, and national interest, national security demands this." So that was pleaded. But is the HDB saying that this country is fighting for its life, that national security demands that HDB should have the power to punish collectively an entire family? If an authorized occupier who may not even be a member of the family, he may just be a lodger, should be so foolish as to throw something out which results in somebody being injured, is the HDB going to say that the entire family should be punished? Mr Speaker, Sir, for all these reasons, these provisions are thoroughly bad. There is nothing else I can say about them. They flout all recognized principles of law and civilized behaviour and, may I say, if we do have these provisions they will only bring disgrace to Singapore.”
“That is thoroughly discriminatory, and it offends the Constitution which says that all persons are equal before the law and shall be entitled to the same treatment and rights under the law as anyone else. That itself, I should have thought, is bad enough. The other reason is, of course, in regard to the throwing of the litter and to the harbouring of illegal immigrants, the retrospective nature of the provisions. Times without number the Courts have said that any law which seeks to punish persons for acts committed by them when, at the time they committed the acts there was no such law, is reprehensible and is against all accepted principles of law. There should be a law that punishes an act at the time it is committed before a person can be punished for that act. You cannot seek to backdate sanctions when at the time of the commission of the act there were no sanctions. So it is thoroughly undesirable. Then we come to the principle of vicarious liability and the collective punishment. Both are more or less the same, as a variant, one of the other. In criminal law there is no principle of vicarious liability. In other words, under criminal law no one can be punished for the act of somebody else, whether it be his employer, his son, his wife or his friend unless, of course, he aided and abetted the commission of that act, that is, he participated in it. So there is no principle of vicarious liability. Only, the doer of the offence, the person who commits the offence, can be punished. If anyone else is to be punished, he must be shown to have participated in that offence. What does this clause do? These provisions say that if the owner, his spouse or any authorized occupier above the age of 14 has been convicted, then the owner loses his protection.”
“If the Board has been doing this over the past, I do not know for how many years, why does the Board now think it necessary to come to Parliament in respect of these new reasons? Of course, I am saying that what the Board has been doing is completely unconstitutional and illegal. Do we have a faint admission by the HDB that what they have so far been doing has been outside the law, and therefore they think now it is time they should come to Parliament and seek to legalize their powers, at the moment restricting it to these three clauses? Mr Speaker, Sir, if I may first deal with the provisions of the Bill which seek to debar and which seek to give HDB the power to divest persons of their homes: (1) if they should have been found guilty of throwing something out of their home and in that act injuring or maiming somebody outside; and (2), if anyone should have been found guilty of harbouring an illegal immigrant. I must take issue with the Member for Rochore to put him right, if I may, on his query as to whether he would be guilty if, without knowing that the person is an illegal immigrant, he offers him a drink. If I may tell him, he will not be guilty under the law. The prosecution will have to prove that he knew that the person was an illegal immigrant. My first objection to these is that the whole thing is discriminatory. As has been pointed out by the Member for Changkat, if persons living in private apartments throw anything out and in the result maimed somebody, they are not deprived of their home. It is only the poor HDB flat dwellers. So the law treats within its own community in different ways, categories of people, for the same act that they may have committed or might commit.”
“If a poor citizen should fall into misfortune and should find himself unable to pay the rents for his flat to the HDB and he is evicted, then under this category he cannot apply for HDB flats unless he has first paid his previous debts and, in some cases, it may be quite a big sum. Then we come to f) Foreign workers allocated rental flats under the Single Unskilled Workers' Scheme who cause nuisance to the public. I shall not spend very much time but I have heard complaints from our citizens that the HDB is taking away their homes and allocating them to foreign workers. g) Employers who fail to exercise control over their foreign workers who have been allocated rental flats under the Unskilled Workers' Scheme. This time the employers are to be punished if they fail to exercise control over their foreign workers. I shall be touching on all this when I come to deal with the new categories brought in by the Bill and I just wish to point out that there are all these other reasons. h) Persons who contravene the Government's work permit marriage restriction policy. I have said enough about this in this House about families being torn apart by this Government's policy. i) Lessees who sell their HDB flats to their own buyers after five years of occupation with no intention to reapply for HDB flats. Finally, j) Lessees who transfer their HDB flats to immediate blood relatives within five years of occupation, unless the transfer is to their parents and is due to the lessees' intending marriage. So you have there 10 causes for which persons may be debarred, and I take it that they are also the measures by which persons may be divested of their homes if they are already living in them.”
“4 for Written Answer, I asked the Minister for National Development to furnish us with all the reasons and causes for which persons may be debarred and I had this answer from him, and if I may set out the categories for which persons may be debarred. a) Persons who misuse the flats for illegal purposes, eg. gambling, drugs, prostitution, etc. b) Persons who assault HDB staff in the performance of duties and are convicted of such offences. So if a poor man who perhaps in anger should so much as raise his hand against an HDB inspector or housing officer and he should then go to Court and say, "I am sorry. I lost my temper" and the Court says, "All right, my man, you are convicted of it. We would not fine you but you are convicted and you may leave", the HDB can debar him forever from living either as "owner" or as a tenant in an HDB apartment. I hope the Minister sees the enormity of these powers. c) Vandals of HDB properties who are convicted of such offences. It should have really said "persons who are guilty of vandalism against HDB properties." But I would not quibble about the way it is spelt out "vandals of HDB properties". d) Tenants and lessees who have sublet their entire flats without HDB's permission. This is one of the two categories for which the Minister has given us some numbers, and he said so far 332 have been barred, I take it for life, from ever stepping into an HDB apartment. e) Ex-tenants of HDB flats who have not cleared their rental debts. Again, I hope the Minister can see the enormity of this.”
“See the kind of spin-offs that you are going to get in society when they see that the HDB can do all this. Again, I say, why is the HDB exempt from the ordinary rules of law that apply to other citizens in this country? Why? Sub-section (3) of that section says "shall be published in the Gazette and shall take effect on such date as may be specified therein." I was looking at it this morning and I have not had the time to research this. Would the Minister say whether this order made by him would be laid before Parliament so that if it is laid before Parliament then a motion may be presented for revocation of that order because I have, Mr Speaker, Sir, given notice of an amendment at the Committee stage and I do not propose to say anything more now. I shall speak at the Committee stage on this - why I think if it is not going to be approved by Parliament under this clause, why it is absolutely essential that it should be laid before Parliament. So could the Minister clarify this and give me an assurance that it will be laid before Parliament the moment it is gazetted? Mr Speaker, Sir, may I move on to clause 7 and whilst I am dealing with clause 7, may I also deal with clause 9 because those two clauses overlap in the new powers that the Board seeks. Clause 7 of the Bill seeks to debar persons from applying for Board accommodation. They are not yet tenants or "owners" of HDB apartments but they propose to and clause 7 seeks to debar them upon the contingencies mentioned in this clause. Clause 9, of course, relates to those who are already in occupation and proposes to divest them of their home, their roof, if they should commit any of the acts contemplated by these new powers. As I said a little while ago, Mr Speaker, Sir, on 31st August, 1982, in Question No.”
“So I say, Mr Speaker, Sir, that part of this clause is thoroughly obnoxious. No private owner of property can go to the Court and say, "I want a penalty as well for late payment." He may be eligible for that if in the tenancy agreement the tenant agrees to pay a penalty. That is a different matter. But he cannot get it under the law. But HDB wants it for itself. Then we come to clause 5. Again reference has been made to this by the speaker before me, Mr Speaker, Sir, and this proposes to give the Board, of course with the approval of the Minister, power again to vary contracts entered into solemnly between the Board and tenants, lessees of the Board. If, in the private sector, somebody takes a lease of a property from the owner and the rent is fixed for that period of the lease, then the owner is stuck with that rent. There is nothing he can do even if rents go spiralling up because the lease governs the relationship between the owner and the lessee and equally the poor tenant is stuck with it if the rent should go down. He can perhaps seek relief from the Courts but this, as has been pointed out in sub-paragraph (2) of this clause: 'Notwithstanding anything contained in any tenancy or licence agreement ... the Board shall have the power to vary, with the approval of the Minister, the rent, licence fees or maintenance fees fixed under subsection (1).' In other words, what this subsection (2) is saying, and it is being presented as a piece of legislation, is: forget about contracts, forget about deeds. It does not really matter. Is that the sort of society that we want in Singapore that people should forget their written agreements? People should not honour what they have solemnly agreed to honour in a written agreement.”
“I do not wish to spend too much time on paragraph (a) of that clause. But that again is much too wide and the penalty of the fine is much too excessive. Of course, to the Government, to the statutory boards, everything must be calculated in terms of money. The more we can collect, the better it will be for us. That is the whole principle by which the Government and the statutory boards would appear to have conducted their affairs. But may I sound my warning that it is much too wide, and I would make a plea that if you are going to legislate rules you should spell them out with greater clarity so as to provide for certainty that the citizens may be guided by them. The second part of this clause, to which reference has already been made, introduces something which is unknown in the private sector. Mr Speaker, Sir, if in the private sector a tenant falls into arrears with payment of his rent, all that the landlord can do is to levy distress by applying to the Court for a writ of distress to sell the goods and recover the rent; and if he cannot recover enough he can bring an action for the recovery of the arrears of rent. And the Court may (I say "may" because the Court has a discretion), in awarding payment of any arrears, allow interest to be paid on the arrears of rent recovered. The HDB has those powers like any other landlord. But not content with that, the HDB says, "We must have something more. We must have power to levy a penalty on persons who for genuine reasons may find themselves unable to pay rents." Why should there be one law for the HDB and one law for other house owners, property owners? Why should there be? I have said before, the HDB is a law unto itself in this country. It is a veritable Leviathan.”