Why I swear never to join Young PAP

Dr Dee wrote:

No information, how to table an alternative based on the current circumstances?

Your claim of “no information” is wrong. The selfsame Wikipedia article you mentioned, states the discussion was on fixed immovable assets, among others. It is a big leap from there to claim there is “no information”.

If there is “no information” (as you have written), then what are the figures in each annual Budget, if not information? Figures including a breakdown of tax revenue sources and the spending plans of individual Ministries.

Even if we accept your false claim that there is “no information”, one does not need exact numbers to state a philosophy on direct versus indirect taxation.

One does not need numbers to the last decimal place to formulate a Shadow Budget with positions on whether to have minimum wage, on the progressivity and distribution of CPF contributions, on the amount of welfare and criteria for its allocation, and how that welfare shall be funded.

Fact: Opposition parties in many countries draft Shadow / Alternative Budgets, without recourse to every detail the the incumbent Cabinet has available. (e.g. early 1990s UK Labour and even a small party like the UK Liberal Democrats can draft an Alternative Budget. We see the same with Canada and so on.)

I agree with you that external shocks can put any nation into choppy water. But your reasoning is like saying “I shall leave my door unlocked at night, because if an atom bomb lands on my home it won’t matter anyway.”

Francis wrote:

People vote for the opposition in Singapore not because they want an alternate or alternative governing power. Therefore this call for the opposition to come up with their own budgets or economic plans merely seeks to obscure the discussion.

I agree with you that each voter has their own unique perspective on why they have cast their vote.

But if an Opposition party came to power, would they reject their victorious outcome, on grounds that some of these votes were protest votes or a message not amounting to a call for government change?

I think not.

So a vote for an Opposition party is equivalent to a vote for an Opposition administration. The motivations may differ, but when government change occurs as a result, the outcome is the same.

And therefore it is crucial to judge participants by their acumen for governance — especially when multiple electoral wards are contested across the nation.

Dr Dee wrote:

First and foremost, do you see 82 opposition members marking 82 PAP candidates in parliament?

You do not need to mark all 82 PAP MPs, or even all of the Cabinet, to form a Shadow Administration.

The Lib Dems and Conservatives in the UK, by definition, do not outnumber Labour, which is the dominant party there. Yet they can come up with a Shadow Budget.

My question to you is that if we don’t know the dollars and cents values of the assets, even if we know that there are immovable assets, how are we going to manage it? How are you going to expect the opposition to table alternative plans? I will be worried if a fund manager manages his assets without knowing the dollars and cents!

This has never stopped First World oppositions from tabling alternative plans, or taking policy or viewpoints on major issues of the day, consistently and all year round.

My question to you is that does our parliamentary system allows the opposition to be the shadow cabinet?

Absolutely.

The Leader of the Opposition can shadow the PM — and the PM’s portfolio as Minister for Finance. An MP who ran against the Foreign Minister can start outlining a vision for Singapore’s foreign policy — both in Parliament and in public. We have bilateral relations with dozens of other countries, so this should provide plenty of material.

In fact you don’t even need all your Shadow Team to be MPs in office. Officially being part of an Opposition party’s Shadow Team could be a great prelude to a campaign — you can present your views on policy and current affairs and see if history proves them right.

I recognise some commenters here may think I am blindly pro-PAP. I am not a blind supporter — I just have high expectations of people who run the country, or who (depending on how the votes go) might be running the country.

Kwokheng:

“If you’ve paid for your right to an organ transplant, should you not receive priority if you subsequently need a transplant?”

Doesn’t the PAP purportedly work for all Singaporeans?

Yes.

Which is why (if I may repeat what has been said previously) Hougang residents do not get an extra toll, or extra utilities fees.

That’s why Hougang residents also still are covered by the SAF, have policing, have water supply, have buses and MRT.

Hougang residents got the Progress Package, and will get GST rebates in the same way as residents in other areas.

Or does all this not count? In fact not everybody in an HDB block may be in favour of upgrading, so why present it as an entitlement?

But returning to the question on organ donations: If nobody agrees to donate organs, there will be no prospect of a transplant even if you donate one.

The deeper theme behind the question is for all of us to ask ourselves: Are we happy to benefit from a system, while taking an action that might prevent that system from continuing to provide those benefits?

There is no right or wrong answer, but it is important to understand how one has come to a viewpoint.

Kwokheng:

I do not know what to make of your e-mail on scholarships. Will ponder about it — it is clearly heartfelt.

I do think the Civil Service can have more incoming recruitment from the private sector — and not just at junior levels. Some two-way flow is beneficial.

Francis:

The alternative you present is complete one-party dominance with all its potential pitfalls – temptations of abuse of power, entrenchment of the mediocrity, pursuit of privileges, dislocation from the wider public, intellectual inbreeding, ec, – that may be detrimental for the nation in the long-run.

(You wouldn’t be the legendary Francis C., would you?…)

I agree that single party rule without checks and balances can be a problem.

I do not, however, think that it is impossible for a high quality Opposition team to succeed.

While no party can claim a track record without being in power, many First World Oppositions do not wait to come into power before assembling their Shadow Cabinet and Shadow Team. This helps convince the electorate of their competency. Over time, their views on policy and current affairs can be judged — by the electorate and by history.

…you make extensive assumptions that presumes only a binary outcome, which is far from the reality of the state of politics in Singapore.

As mentioned earlier, when an Opposition candidate wins, he does not decline the result because some votes were protest votes.

In fact he welcomes any vote in his direction and sees it as a vote for himself, whatever the voter’s intention in the polling station.

If even Opposition candidates (not just in Singapore, but around the world) take this view of voting, why is it suddenly a travesty when an incumbent says the vote is about choosing MPs and choosing an administration?

Your statement also assumes that any success in Singapore is completely credited to the PAP. A completely arrogant view that downplays the contributions of members of the entire civil service – stat boards, govt agencies, public services, etc. – who are apolitical and contribute a tremendous share of the country’s social and economic progress.

Wrong.

There are many good men and women working in the civil service — I will be first to agree with you on this.

But the two go hand in hand. The best political administration will find its ideas stillborn without a good civil service.

And even the most competent civil service can be undone over time by a poor government.

Apologies for typo in earlier post:

But returning to the question on organ donations: If nobody agrees to donate organs, there will be no prospect of a transplant even if you donate one.

The phrase “even if you donate one” should read “even if you need one”.