Channel NewsAsia 25 Feb 08;
SINGAPORE: The MP for Ang Mo Kio GRC, Inderjit Singh, kicked off the debate on the Budget Statement on Monday.
The entrepreneur listed cost increases in 18 areas, among them the levy for skilled foreign workers, electricity tariffs, healthcare services, university tuition fees and public transport fares. All these have led to an overheated economy.
Mr Inderjit Singh said such increases were either triggered or allowed by what he called the government's "grow-at-all-costs" policy.
He called for a review of this policy which he argued, has worsened the income divide.
Mr Inderjit Singh said: "I feel a significant part of the inflation has been caused by factors that we could have controlled, what I call controllable factors - factors which the government can manage and could have done something about.
"In the last two years, the government has contributed to inflation by allowing multiple cost increases, both directly or through policy changes that resulted in cost increases. The end result is an era of very high cost increases, high inflation not supported by enough wage increases, especially for the lower and lower middle income Singaporeans and companies."
Mr Inderjit Singh also singled out the 2 percentage point GST hike last July as a 'very significant cost increase'. This had triggered off other cost increases which were passed on to consumers.
The MP recounted how the Finance Minister had strongly defended the GST hike, citing reduction of government income from other sources and the need to generate enough money to fund Singapore's growth.
But the government was faced with a 'pleasantly embarrassing outcome', he said. Instead of projected deficit of $0.7b, it had a surplus of $6.4 billion.
"The government had been too quick to increase the GST last year. In light of the booming economy, which should have been visible by mid-2007, the government could have made the late decision to hold off the GST rise by a year or two," Mr Inderjit Singh said. - CNA/ir
