PSP Secretary-General Hazel Poa Koon Koon had the following remarks to make following the National Day Rally on the 19th August 2024.
Tonight, I attended the Prime Minister’s first National Day Rally, where he made many announcements related to jobs, families, housing, and education.
PSP welcomes the benefits for the involuntarily unemployed that the PM announced tonight. As I said during my Budget speech in February 2024, retrenchments are becoming increasingly common and temporary financial support would be greatly beneficial to retrenched workers seeking a new job. We are glad that the Government is now ready to implement the scheme to aid the involuntarily unemployed. However, the PSP thinks that based on the current details available for the SkillsFuture Jobseeker Support Scheme, more can be done for lower and middle income workers. We look forward to debating this in Parliament.
We are heartened that the new PM continues to place great emphasis on uplifting our nation’s low Total Fertility Rate. His announcement that there will be 10 additional weeks of shared parental leave, paid for by the Government, is a much-needed change to promote the sharing of parental duties. During the debate on Singapore Women’s Development in Parliament in 2022, I had called for parental leave to be shared equally by default, with flexibility to reallocate parental leave between both parents based on mutual agreement. Today’s announcement is a welcome step in that direction. But we believe that more still needs to be done to encourage couples to have children.
We are disappointed that the Government has yet again failed to address the root problem of our public housing policies, which we believe require a fundamental rethink. Increasing CPF housing grants is simply more of the same. PSP again urges the Government to consider implementing the Affordable Homes Scheme and Millennial Apartments Scheme as an alternative, to ensure that public housing remains accessible to Singaporeans without jeopardising their retirement.
PSP will continue to engage the Government in Parliament to ensure that the Government continues to work in the best interest of Singaporeans, always.
Hazel Poa Koon Koon,
Secretary-General, Progress Singapore Party
