TR EMERITUS

Written by Our Correspondent Singaporeans are again blamed for the misguided policies of the ruling party which continues to turn a blind eye towards the problems it has created. Despite the obvious fact that the relentless influx of foreigners over the years has led to a sky-rocketing of HDB flat prices, PAP leaders are adamant that foreigners are not to be blamed. So who is responsible for supporting the HDB flat prices even in the midst of a recession? As expected, the fault lies with Singaporeans. According to Law Minister Mr Shanmugam's "hunch", Singaporeans are the likely culprits. He did not provide any evidence to substantiate his allegations. (and we are paying him SGD$2 million dollars a year for his "hunches", not much better than his mentor - the "forecaster extraordinarie") "The first misconception is that somehow there are five million people and that is putting pressure on all of us. It doesn't. Of the five million, 3.2million are citizens, and roughly 500,000 are permanent residents (PRs). The remaining 1.3million are here on temporary work permits, and they 'impose no burden' on the public housing system," said Mr Shanmugam. He was speaking during a dialogue session with Yew Tee residents in Hong Kah GRC. Asked by another Yew Tee resident about the high prices, he shot back: "'You say maybe foreigners are paying these high valuations. I think if you check, you'll find that the majority are Singaporeans. The foreigners who come here and look at HDB flats generally buy the lower value flats." Mr Shanmugam's stance on the matter is similar to his colleague National Development Minister Mah Bow Tan who told parliament lately that "PR households owning HDB flats is a small proportion of all HDB households". However, Mr Mohamad Ismail, the CEO of Propnex quoted a figure of 20 per cent when asked by The Straits Times a few weeks ago. Another real estate agency ERA claimed in a report in July last year that 40 per cent of the buyers of resale flats are PRs while C&H put the figure at 50 per cent. Below is a graph illustrating how the rise in the prices of resale flats coincides with the rise in the number of foreigners in Singapore between the years 2000 and 2008, courtesy of Kojakbt, the moderator of 3in1kopitiam: Due to the ruling party’s liberal immigration policy, foreigners now made up 36 per cent of Singapore’s population, up from 14 per cent in 1990. According to Home Affairs Minister Wong Kan Seng, there are over 20,000 new citizens and 90,000 PRs last year. Besides competing with Singaporeans for HDB flats, PRs sometimes also "spoil" the market by over-paying for them. An Indonesian PR forked out $653,000 for a four room resale flat in Queenstown in October 2009 when he could well afford a private condominium. As the prices of new BTO flats are pegged to that of resale flats in the vicinity, this may contribute indirectly to the astronomical prices of the Dawson project launched a few months later where 5-room flats fetches as high as $660,000. A Financial Consultant interviewed by Lianhe Wanbao advised Singaporeans not to buy these flats unless they earn more than $7,500 monthly. Mr Shanmugam also repeated Mr Mah's earlier assertion that HDB flats remain "affordable" to Singaporeans as "eight in 10 Singaporeans pay their HDB monthly mortgages completely with funds from their CPF savings and do not cough up any additional cash." Quoting the affordability benchmark of 30 per cent used frequently by HDB to show that HDB flats remain affordable to ordinary Singaporeans, Mr Mah said recently that a family with a monthly income of $3,000 can buy a flat worth up to $250,000 and spend only 30 per cent of their income every month on the mortgage. “Similarly, a family with a monthly income of $4,000 can afford to buy a new flat worth up to $333,000 without spending more than 30 per cent a month on the mortgage. This means they can comfortably buy any of the flats offered in the latest BTO projects this month,” he added. Both Mr Shanmugam and Mr Mah's public statements are quite "divorced of reality". Instead of acknowledging the problem and tackling it, they chose to blame Singaporeans for their mistakes in order to defend the foreigners whom they are so infatuated with.  Read More →

Written by Our Correspondent Following our publication of two articles over the weekend on two Singapore companies putting up job advertisements recruiting foreigners only, we have received a deluge of emails from angry readers lambasting them for not giving priority to Singaporeans first. Some even called for a boycott of these companies. Actually this is not surprising at all - many companies including state-linked companies like SingPost, POSB and SingTel are employing foreigners either overtly or covertly. Some put up job advertisements blatantly overseas to recruit foreigners for Singapore-based positions. Others do it more discreetly by putting up a statement like "PRs and Malaysians welcomed" - an euphemism among HR circles for "Singaporeans need not apply." The mainstream media will never dare to publish the truth and now we know what they have been reporting all along about on Singaporeans being choosy about jobs, foreigners needed in sectors shunned by locals, companies tried hiring locals who decline their job offers blaa...blaa...blaa..are all hogwash! We Singaporeans have to stand together with our brethen to avoid being squeezed out of our own country by these foreigners. We cannot afford to be "bochap" anymore and care only about our own livelihoods. Just because we have a job now doesn't mean that we will have them forever. If we do not fight for the rights of fellow Singaporeans whose jobs are taken over by these foreigners, there will be nobody left to speak up for us when we end up like them one day. Unless you are a professional like a doctor, lawyer or architect, you have to be prepared to be retrenched or replaced by a cheaper foreign talent in your mid 30s and 40s and even they are not spared as the ruling party is opening Singapore to foreign doctors and lawyers to set up their practices here. We are calling for a social movement involving all Singaporeans to come together to identify the companies be it a SME or MNC putting up job ads for foreigners to fill vacancies which can otherwise be filled by locals and to boycott them! Since they are so concerned about cutting costs and boosting their profits, let us hurt them where it hurts most - their pockets. This is what you can do to help us: 1. Whenever you see a job ad either online or in real life outside seeking foreigners and PRs only, take a snapshot of it and email us at [email protected] 2. We will write a story on it and give some "free" publicity to these companies by putting up their job ads on our site on our right hand bar above the poll section. 3. Help us spread the message to everybody you know to boycott these companies - do not buy their products or engage their services. 4. At the same time, email the HRs of these companies to protest against their hiring policies and to inform them of your boycott. 5. We will keep adding to the list and harping on the matter again, again and again till the myth perpetuated by the mainstream media is completely shattered once and for all. The TRUTH is: 1. Foreigners are taking up jobs which Singaporeans will not shun, e.g. cashiers, laboratory assistants, account executives, clinic assistants,, administrators. 2. Companies are employing foreigners who are preferred to locals as they are cheaper, but not necessarily faster or better. 3. Singaporeans are forced to accept a lower pay because of the easy availability of cheap foreign workers in the labor market which puts employers in a position of advantage. 4. These companies will not close shop just because they employ a few more locals contrary to the ruling party's claims that they need foreign workers to stay afloat. 5. Singaporeans are suffering because of the pro-business and pro-foreigner policy of the ruling party. They must be held responsible for the mess they have created for Singaporeans! 6. As a result of the relentless influx of foreigners into Singapore, the median wages of Singaporeans have stagnated, the income gap between the rich and the poor has widened, labor productivity has dropped, cost of living has sky-rocketed especially that of public housing, social tensions are rising and the overall standard of living has decreased. We have on average 12,000 readers daily. If each of you were to spread our message to 10 people you know, we can reach out to more than 100,000 people in an instance. This campaign will continue indefinitely for as long as it takes. We are not xenophobic and neither are we against foreigners. Being a small country without any natural resources, Singapore needs foreign workers to keep its economy competitive, but we have to be extremely selective of those we allow to work and live here and more importantly, we must ensure our own citizens are well taken care of first before we accept more immigrants. This is a country, not a corporation for goodness sake! Singaporeans, please wake up and stand together as one united people now. Foreigners already make up 36 per cent of Singapore's population. Do you want to wait till we become a minority in Singapore before you take any action? If not for yourself, think about your children. They will need to compete with these foreigners for everything from jobs, housing to places in primary schools. The ruling party is not going to be concerned whether you live or die as long it remains in power and its leaders continue drawing their million-dollar salaries to talk cock sing song without knowing what is happening exactly on the ground. Remember what Lee Kuan Yew said if we Singaporeans are unable to compete with his new pets: “If native Singaporeans are falling behind because “the spurs are not stuck into the hide,” that is their problem.” We have to tackle the problem RIGHT NOW before it is too late. Singapore is for Singaporeans ONLY and not foreigners!  Read More →

I am a resident in Dover Road for over 30 years and am recently affected by the Enbloc/SERS upgrading and have to shift about 500m from my existing home to the new ones at Blocks 28A to D at Dover Crescent. I do not have any outstanding summons with the HDB nor do I own a vehicle. I love my home and the residents in the small area of Dover are a very closely knitted bunch. The HDB has inconvenienced and endangered residents, handicapped and pedestrians as well as other road users by using the Handicap Lots at Block 28C to dump sand and debris. This prevents the handicapped residents and members of the public from using the handicap lot. Residents in the process of moving and unloading do not have a proper space to park their vehicles to unload. The Loading and unloading Bay at Block 28C is fully blocked and taken up by the HDB contractor's Debris Container. Next, the service road for Emergency vehicles between Block 28A and 28B is partially blocked and used by HDB contractors to dump debris and waste as well. The rubbish bin centre right beside the present debris dump site is utilized. This is unsafe as it is right beside the NTUC supermarket and the Food Court. Besides posing as a potential danger to residents and pedestrians, it also prevents emergency vehicles from reaching the inner blocks should there be a need to. This has been going on for weeks. I have sent 3 emails to hdbcarparks, made 4 calls to the HDB Parking enforcement unit as well as 2 calls to the Clementi Branch Office yet no one bothered to reply me and the blockages continue to exist. I left my name, NRIC and phone number with every call. All this while, I have witnessed so many parking attendants in the area issuing summons to residents who parked their vehicles along the same service road to do their unloading. It's obvious that with the HDB contractors utilizing the unloading bays for their own purposes, other residents have no choice but to park as close to the unloading bay as possible to do their unloading. Sadly, this also means an immediate offence and summon issued. No grace limit is expected if one parks illegally along the service road. I do not even want to start with the allowance of HDB contractors' vehicles allowed to park overnight in the service Roads. Too much to say all at once. HDB has also made their official stance that all vehicles parked along the service road for emergency vehicles will be summoned immediately as it prevents emergency vehicles from entering if needed. Handicapped Lots are even used to hold sand. What kind of message is HDB sending to the residents? HDB is acting in an arrogant and high handed manner as they have totally ignored all my calls and emails without reverting back to me and continue to commit offences and break the very laws they enacted while causing inconvenience to the residents and at the same time continue to book other residents and motorist in the vicinity for committing the same offence as the HDB themselves. Who am I to refer the matter to if the HDB themselves break the laws the enacted and totally ignore my requests for them to behave responsibly and to rectify the situation? I asked a parking attendant why they do not issue a summons to the HDB contractors using the handicapped lots as well as they loading and unloading bays for their own storage and my reply was that they are not empowered to book them. As this is written, the booking of other vehicles continue while the HDB contractors carry on doing as they like. It is absurd and unreasonable to continue to book other residents for offences that the HDB themselves are guilty of committing. This reeks of discrimination and double standards. Who is going to fine the HDB? Photos are hosted here. http://www.flickr.com/photos/46029016@N07/   Lou Hsiao Wuen  Read More →