SINGAPORE: A debate over minimum wage and policymaking took place in Parliament on Thursday , with a speech by Workers’ Party Member of Parliament Jamus Lim challenged by six MPs from the ruling People’s Action Party , including Senior Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam.
In response to a question about whether he had proposals to deal with youth unemployment, he said he did not have a specific policy in mind.In his speech, Dr Lim, who is an economics professor, said the country’s existing approach to policymaking, which leans towards efficiency instead of equity, “can benefit from a greater injection of compassion and thoughtfulness”.
Dr Lim said policies such as the social assistance scheme ComCare have “made substantive steps towards bolstering sense of opportunity and care for others in society”, and show that the Government is “capable of injecting compassion” into policies. “Yet until recently, we had deemed it unwise to make it universal and still dress the policy with so many additional conditions that employers use to retain workers on the lowest rung of wages,” he said.
“None of us have a monopoly over compassion and I say this is not to discredit anyone. In particular, I really respect where member Jamus Lim is coming from intellectually, emotionally and so on," he said, adding that speeches from MPs in recent days, including some from his own party, have made an impression on him.
The Government is doing so through many policies such as the progressive wage model, and it acknowledges that more has to be done. Many speeches delivered in Parliament over the last few days echoed the same sentiment, he added. “We really believe this. We've achieved significant progress in the last 10 years, and in the last five years, and we think we should go further."
"Instead, it is a continuum," he added."And I am arguing that we can move more in the direction of favoring equity over efficiency, and that was the entire point of the argument."Before Mr Tharman, Minister of State for Manpower and Education Gan Siow Huang was among the PAP MPs to seek clarifications.
He added that there is “no doubt that at this very moment, such a policy may not be ideal”. “But let us come together and agree that this is a principle that we want to roll out so that when we set these plans in place after the storm has passed, we can easily bring them to pass,” he said.Following up on that, MacPherson SMC MP Tin Pei Ling asked if Dr Lim recognises that implementing a minimum wage in the current climate will have unintended adverse economic consequences.
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