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Focus on helping those with varying needs: PM Lee

COLOMBO (Sri Lanka) – Given the different circumstances of those who may need social assistance, what is crucial is not how poverty is defined, but having in place various schemes to help those in need and for able people to assess cases for those who may fall through the cracks.

COLOMBO (Sri Lanka) – Given the different circumstances of those who may need social assistance, what is crucial is not how poverty is defined, but having in place various schemes to help those in need and for able people to assess cases for those who may fall through the cracks.

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong made these points yesterday (Nov 16), as he spoke to reporters from Singapore on the sidelines of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Colombo, Sri Lanka.

Mr Lee also revealed that the Parliament prologue, a mid-electoral point at which Parliament breaks to take stock and conduct a review, will take place most likely in April after the budget. Parliament will re-open in May.

In recent weeks, a contentious debate has emerged over how best to help the needy. Some have called for a poverty line to be set, with a report by the Singapore Management University’s Lien Centre for Social Innovation released on Monday calling for more ways to measure poverty other than a monetary indicator.

Mr Lee pointed out that Singapore has moved beyond the point of “extreme poverty”, defined by the United Nations as living with less than US$1.50 (S$1.90) a day. “We are not at that point. We are talking about a range of needs. Some are more urgent than others,” the Prime Minister said.

Thus, the question lies in how to help those with varying degrees of difficulty, such as having not enough income, being sick, or those whose families have broken up, he pointed out.

“The question is, how much should we help, which groups, and how should we arrange this help so that the most needy get the most help, and if you are just at the margins, you don’t find yourself with nothing,” said Mr Lee.

He added that he is in favour of the “kueh lapis” approach – a term coined by Social and Family Development Minister Chan Chun Sing last Friday during a media interview. It means that there are multiple lines of assistance to help Singaporeans across the spectrum, with help schemes that are layered and overlapping with one another.

Mr Lee said the key is to ensure that help “goes to those who need help”. A “formal, precise definition” could polarise those who fall just beyond the line, he added.

It is therefore more important to rely on people of “good sense and judgment who know the priorities, and to set different criteria for different schemes”, Mr Lee said.

“Inevitably, you have people who say, my case is unique, and you need good men and women to sit down with good sense to assess, say, ‘We give temporary support here’, or ‘No, I can’t do this one, you sort it out’. On that approach, we can help to address what we broadly call the problem of poverty, and we can make sure that we, in Singapore, if you are needy, in difficulty, you will get the right help. I think that is feasible,” he added

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