<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR>$360 dole: Only 1 in 5 has 'marginal savings'
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<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"--><!-- more than 4 paragraphs -->MP SAM Tan (Tanjong Pagar GRC) wanted the dole raised from $360 to $400 a month because a survey he did shows that most who receive it have nothing to spare for savings.
Only one in five could squirrel away 'marginal savings' each month for a rainy day and funeral expenses, he said.
Some spent as much as $450 a month on groceries, rent, transport and utilities, among other things.
His findings were based on a survey of 100 people in his ward who are on the Public Assistance (PA) scheme.
Mr Tan shared his findings with the House yesterday when he made a plea for more help for PA recipients.
He recounted the story of an 85-year-old resident who told him he had not had a plate of chicken rice in five years. 'All of us who heard this felt very sad. So, we gave him a meal coupon a day so he could eat anything that was available at the hawker centre,' he said.
'I know that even the poorest in Singapore have a living standard far better than those living in many other countries. I know that our PA recipients' one-room flats have running water and electricity. I know that they have food, clothes and medical care. But is this enough to count as a reasonably good quality of life?'
Mr Tan also challenged the Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports' contention last year that a person can live on $90 of groceries a month.
'If we ourselves are not doing it for even one month, then I think it will be quite hard for us to expect our fellow men to follow all their lives on such a budget.'
But he was quick to add that he was not suggesting Hong Kong's approach. Its Comprehensive Social Security Assistance scheme gives the poor 80per cent of the median wage.
This, Mr Tan said, was 'too generous' but he wondered if Singapore had 'veered to the other extreme'.
=> What CB logic is this? BEST PAID govt in the world which has no problem blowing away $260B in reserves, but cannot outperform HK?
Noting that Singapore has a 'very, very small' number of 2,900 people on PA, Mr Tan urged the ministry to re-look the criteria or relax some of them.
=> This shows that Peesai's PA is a BIG WAYANG!
'I feel we should not, for the sake of preserving low spending on welfare, exclude those who genuinely need the PA scheme by creating artificially high barriers,' he said. BEN NADARAJAN
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<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"--><!-- more than 4 paragraphs -->MP SAM Tan (Tanjong Pagar GRC) wanted the dole raised from $360 to $400 a month because a survey he did shows that most who receive it have nothing to spare for savings.
Only one in five could squirrel away 'marginal savings' each month for a rainy day and funeral expenses, he said.
Some spent as much as $450 a month on groceries, rent, transport and utilities, among other things.
His findings were based on a survey of 100 people in his ward who are on the Public Assistance (PA) scheme.
Mr Tan shared his findings with the House yesterday when he made a plea for more help for PA recipients.
He recounted the story of an 85-year-old resident who told him he had not had a plate of chicken rice in five years. 'All of us who heard this felt very sad. So, we gave him a meal coupon a day so he could eat anything that was available at the hawker centre,' he said.
'I know that even the poorest in Singapore have a living standard far better than those living in many other countries. I know that our PA recipients' one-room flats have running water and electricity. I know that they have food, clothes and medical care. But is this enough to count as a reasonably good quality of life?'
Mr Tan also challenged the Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports' contention last year that a person can live on $90 of groceries a month.
'If we ourselves are not doing it for even one month, then I think it will be quite hard for us to expect our fellow men to follow all their lives on such a budget.'
But he was quick to add that he was not suggesting Hong Kong's approach. Its Comprehensive Social Security Assistance scheme gives the poor 80per cent of the median wage.
This, Mr Tan said, was 'too generous' but he wondered if Singapore had 'veered to the other extreme'.
=> What CB logic is this? BEST PAID govt in the world which has no problem blowing away $260B in reserves, but cannot outperform HK?
Noting that Singapore has a 'very, very small' number of 2,900 people on PA, Mr Tan urged the ministry to re-look the criteria or relax some of them.
=> This shows that Peesai's PA is a BIG WAYANG!
'I feel we should not, for the sake of preserving low spending on welfare, exclude those who genuinely need the PA scheme by creating artificially high barriers,' he said. BEN NADARAJAN
