Lynn Lee, Straits Times 12 Jan 08;
THE man sheepishly picked his cigarette butt off the floor. He then refused to get into the same lift, saying he would take the stairs.
Bukit Purmei resident Walter Lim recalls this encounter as he describes how he reproached his neighbour for littering at the lift landing.
'Since that day, the lift lobby seems cleaner,' says the 37-year-old corporate communications director, who believes there is no harm in gently ticking off litterbugs.
Indeed, he thinks more Singaporeans could take his lead to 'police' those who treat common spaces like their rubbish bin.
Many years of anti-littering campaigns and a host of penalties do not seem to have quashed litterbugs here.
Last year, the National Environment Agency recorded a whopping 21,269 littering offences after it stepped up checks. It was a three-fold rise over the previous year.
Recalcitrant litterbugs were among them, with 533 Corrective Work Orders issued - a more than four-fold increase over 122 from the year before.
Common excuses they give include 'forgetting to throw their litter, having the wind blow it away, or simply missing their 'target' - the litter bin', recounts Senior Parliamentary Secretary (Environment and Water Resources) Amy Khor.
At least, that is what she hears from constituents who appeal to her against their littering fines.
What will make litterbugs turn over a new leaf? Will harsher penalties work, or perhaps the use of security cameras to catch culprits in action?
Insight digs up the dirt on this filthy habit.
Why littering is so hard to sweep away
Straits Times 12 Jan 08;
They have been fined. They have been forced to pick up rubbish in public. But Singapore's litterbugs are unrepentant, with a record number caught last year. Time for more draconian measures? LYNN LEE and PEH SHING HUEI scour for some answers
LAST week, while she was sweeping the foot of a block of flats in Hougang, a cigarette butt plopped onto cleaner Thanapackiam Somoo's head.
Unperturbed, she flicked it off. She is used to it and it is not the worst type of trash hurled from high-rise flats or chucked in stairwells, the 50-year-old tells Insight.
She has come across old mattresses, clothes, textbooks, broken appliances, kitchen scraps, soiled sanitary pads and - get this - used condoms.
With an abashed grin, she says: 'So pai seh lah, but I have to pick it up.'
Her tale barely skims the surface of Singapore's dirty little secret: Litterbugs are lording over us.
The National Environment Agency recorded 21,269 littering offences last year after it stepped up its checks. This was up from 7,027 in 2006 and 3,819 the year before.
Festive days are when litterbugs strike. On New Year's Day for instance, the trash toll from bins and the street can snowball to six tonnes.
Cigarette butts are the top trash item - they make up over a third of all litter.
The lack of social responsibility is disappointing, given how keeping Singapore litter-free has been at the forefront of the national consciousness for decades.
Early efforts began 40 years ago in 1968, when then-Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew launched the Keep Singapore Clean campaign.
He said then: 'No other hallmark of success will be more distinctive than that of achieving our position as the cleanest and greenest city in South-east Asia.'
Singapore has attained that position. Tourists gawk at its clean streets while international rankings trumpet it as the best place to live for Asian expatriates and the top Asian city to live, work and play in.
But beneath the shiny surface lies the scruffy truth - that being litter-free still does not come naturally to people.
Forty years on, even Mr Lee concedes that he will not see a gracious Singapore in his lifetime. 'It will take time, but I hope it will come with cultivated living over a long period of time,' he said at a dialogue on Monday.
Have penalties to deter people from littering failed? Will more draconian measures be the only way to get them to put their trash where it belongs - in the bin?
A 'cleaned' city
WHERE'S the litter, one might ask, surveying the city landscape early one morning.
The answer: The cleaners have already cleaned it up.
It led MP Masagos Zulkifli (Tampines GRC) to lament: 'We are a cleaned city, rather than a clean city.'
Indeed, a whole army of cleaners is hired by the agencies in charge of Singapore's public spaces.
The star of the clean-up show is the National Environment Agency (NEA), responsible for areas like roads and underpasses.
Its cleaning bill came to $34 million last year. On its payroll: 1,200 men and women, who ensure 7,000km of roads and 4,500km of pavements, among other areas, look good.
Areas like parks, state land and industrial space come under different agencies.
In the heartland, the job of keeping the surroundings spick and span falls on the 16 town councils, of which 14 are run by the People's Action Party (PAP).
It is a job taken seriously.
One cleaner is hired for every 170 to 200 flats. That translates to around 6,000 cleaners across the PAP town councils.
From dawn till mid-day, they sweep common corridors, clear piles of junk mail strewn around the letter-box areas, and empty common trash bins in the void decks.
The cleaning bill accounts for between 16 and 20 per cent of PAP town councils' operating expenditure.
At Aljunied Town Council, for instance, the bill came to around $4.2 million last year.
Says MP Teo Ho Pin (Bukit Panjang), coordinating chairman of the PAP town councils: 'We pay great attention to cleanliness, as that's one of the first things residents notice.'
A persistent pest
IF SINGAPOREANS are so concerned with cleanliness, why is littering still a problem?
Past street polls by The Straits Times had people saying that it was 'too inconvenient' or they were 'too lazy' to dispose of their trash properly.
An NEA survey last year of more than 3,000 people, half of whom are litterbugs, revealed several common characteristics among those prone to littering.
Litterbugs tend to be men aged below 30, not very highly educated, and smokers.
Some Singaporeans want to add foreigners and new citizens - especially those from developing countries - to the list. But Senior Parliamentary Secretary (Environment and Water Resources) Amy Khor says it is a misperception.
What is more worrying, she says, is the growing trend - especially among youngsters - to think it is all right to litter because someone will pick up the trash.
'I hope it is not because the maid-assisted lifestyles at home of many have led them to think that there is always someone to clean up after them,' she adds.
Cleaner Buhari Hussain, 61, agrees. He has been keeping three HDB blocks in Lorong Ah Soo clean for the past three years.
'People always throw things next to the lift - like boxes, plastic bags and food. More when it's around Chinese New Year,' he says.
'When I tell them to take it to the rubbish dump nearby, they scold me and say, 'But I'm paying money to the town council to hire cleaners'.'
The residents are referring to the conservancy charges that households pay. The amount, depending on the size of their flat, ranges from under $20 to over $80 a month after rebates.
Bring on Big Brother
THE attitude that cleaning up is the job of those paid to do so, likely explains why littering is rampant here.
In other places, plain indifference to the state of public cleanliness is another cause of why chewing gum and cigarette butts stick on sidewalks in the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia.
Penalties are in place - Australia has 'on the spot' fines that can run into the hundreds of dollars - but what stands out are community efforts to keep littering at bay.
In the American city of Pittsburgh, volunteers have formed the group Citizens Against Litter, while local British companies have 'adopted' beaches, which they clean up several times a year.
In Singapore, schools and town councils have launched extensive campaigns urging residents to keep the estates litter-free.
Fines have gone up, from $25 in 1965 to $200 for first-time offenders today.
Public shaming has been in place for 16 years, with recalcitrants given Corrective Work Orders (CWO) to spend up to three hours cleaning public areas like the East Coast Park, while wearing a brightly coloured vest.
Despite a total of 4,792 CWOs meted out since 1992, there was a more than four-fold jump last year from 2006, with 533 tickets issued, up from 122.
Is it time for more draconian measures to combat this stubborn scourge?
Straits Times reader Jonathan Toh, who wrote to the Forum page last week, says yes.
He is suggesting a blacklist of repeat offenders so they have lower priority when applying for government jobs, university and polytechnic places and vehicle COEs.
'Also, give them zero chance of National Day Parade tickets, Safra and NTUC membership,' he adds.
MP Charles Chong (Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC), who heads the Government Parliamentary Committee for National Development and Environment, suggests more closed-circuit cameras.
'CCTVs are a big deterrent. When we had a lot of break-ins in a precinct in the past, we increased the patrols by the police. It didn't work.
'Once we installed the CCTVs, the break-ins disappeared. They knew that Big Brother was watching.'
But most MPs prefer a continuation of current efforts of education and enforcement.
MP Dr Teo says residents can inform the town councils about the litterbugs in their estates so they can be 'educated'.
Residents can also speak up, says Mr Wilson Ang, the head of environmentalist group Eco Singapore. He himself has no qualms telling people that they have 'dropped their stuff' accidentally.
'People are quite receptive and they feel bad doing so and they would pick it up and discard it. This is because they know it is wrong.'
Blogger Lam Chun See, who blogs frequently against littering, even suggests, half in jest, that a Litter Zone be set up for the litterbugs to throw stuff to their hearts' content.
But a look back at past efforts shows that litterbugs do respond to a harsh blitz.
After the law allowed flat owners to be evicted for throwing killer litter, the number of such offenders dipped from 36 in 1984 to 14 a year later and further down to four in 1986.
Who knows, the spectre of tough laws could loom large in the litterbug's consciousness the next time he feels like 'dropping his stuff'.
While a police state-like stance against littering will not bode well for the image and reputation of this First World nation, it may be necessary until courtesy comes naturally.
And it may not be a bad thing if it means that Singapore becomes a cleaner - not cleaners' - city.
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