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| We are Listening |
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| Featured
in this issue of Challenge are just a few of the
suggestions and responses that have sbeen contributed
by members of the public. Visit www.cutwaste.mof.gov.sg
for more suggestions and to give your ideas on how
public agencies can save costs and cut wastage. |
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 On
minimising travel expenditure
Suggestion: All officers, regardless of
rank, should fly Economy Class. Furthermore, there
is no need for officers to have individual rooms.
Shared rooms where available should be used. Five-star
accommodation at the venue may also be unnecessary
if suitable accommodation is available within reasonable
distances.
Reply: Generally, all public officers
travel by Economy Class. A small group of senior
civil servants and statutory board employees is
eligible for Business Class travel, while only a
handful of very senior officers are eligible for
First Class travel. This is similar to the class
of travel accorded to senior employees in big private
sector organisations.
During this period, all government agencies have
been asked to have their officers travel by a lower
fare class, especially on regional flights. This
in effect would mean that almost all civil servants
would travel by Economy Class especially on regional
flights.
Some agencies have adopted a more stringent approach
and decided that for study trips, all officers regardless
of seniority will travel by Economy Class.
We have asked all agencies to consider having their
officers share rooms whenever possible, especially
for study trips. Some agencies are already practising
this. Please continue to send in your suggestions
to help the Government trim its costs. |
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 On
reducing the number of compulsory training hours
Suggestion: Each civil servant is required
to attend 100 hours of training each year. As the
result, many officers are attending courses that
are not relevant to their work just to meet the
100-hour target. At the same time, other officers
are asked to perform overtime duties to cover their
duties, especially those at the front-line and shift
duties.
The Government has to pay for the courses that are
not relevant to the officer’s duties and pay
another officer to perform the overtime duties.
Reply: The 100 training hours that
each civil servant has per year serves as a guide
for our officers to go for continuous training and
upgrading of their skills.
Each agency sets its own training targets and closely
monitors the cost effectiveness of their training
programmes. Many of these agencies have already
adopted a people development framework which requires
them to ensure that training plans are aligned to
organisational goals, and the effectiveness of the
courses is evaluated after the officers have attended
the training programmes.
Officers and agencies know that the objective is
not to clock up 100 training hours per officer blindly,
but to have an effective training road map that
will result in an effective workforce to help their
organisations meet future challenges. If you know
of specific cases of organisations blindly clocking
up training hours and wasting the Government’s
money, please let us know and we will follow up
on this.
For your information, the training provided also
does not have to be structured. Informal sharing
sessions and organisational learning fora are typically
organised by organisations to develop their officers
and these cost the organisations very little. The
Civil Service values our people and believes that
every officer has talents and abilities that should
be developed to the fullest. We will continue to
improve the way this is carried out.
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On working alternate
Saturdays
Suggestion: Currently, most departments
are already on the alternate Saturday scheme.
Almost half the normal staff strength is in
the office every Saturday. However, most of
the time, the air-con, lighting, etc, are
still used at almost the same capacity as
that on a normal working day. To cut utility
costs, I suggest that you consider adopting
a five-day work week during the economic downturn,
and maybe public officers can work longer
hours on weekdays.
Reply: Deputy Prime Minister
Lee Hsien Loong has said that now is not the
time to switch to a five-day work week. Private
sector companies are now facing difficulties
arising from the SARS outbreak earlier this
year and the economic downturn. They need
to tide over this difficult period. Going
for a five-day work week should not be a top
priority for them or the Civil Service.
The public sector provides essential services
to the public, for example, health/medical
and security, and these services should be
made available round the clock. The fact is
that Singapore is living in a “24/7
economy” and with globalisation, even
the private sector has moved towards a 24/7
working mode to meet customers’ demands.
The Government’s approach is to give
ministries some flexibility in deciding on
their working hours, i.e. adjusting the working
hours within the overall framework of the
42-hour work week so long as their level of
services to the public and their productivity
are not adversely affected. There is no general
rule to switch to a five-day work week as
doing so would also send the wrong signal
that since the Government is now working fewer
days, we have now arrived and it is alright
for workers throughout the economy to shift
to a less intense pace.
Our government agencies will continue to look
at ways to reduce their utilities consumption.
For instance, many of our government buildings
have put in place energy saving devices in
the washrooms. And some of the lights in the
Treasury Building are switched off during
lunch hours. |
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On having
lucky draws for those who e-file their
tax returns |
Suggestion: I totally do
not see why IRAS should offer a lucky draw
year after year for those who e-file. Isn’t
filing our income tax returns a responsibility,
be it by e-filing or otherwise? The worse
thing is that the amount of prize money is
so substantial. At least S$150,000? And what
about the admin fees used for promoting this?
Isn’t that all taxpayers’ money?
Why should even a cent be spent this way?
I don’t think any other country resorts
to such tactics to induce their people to
pay taxes. Singapore is too much into having
lucky draws for every single thing!
Reply: Thank you for your
suggestion that IRAS should not conduct lucky
draws to encourage people to e-file.
You are absolutely right that IRAS, as a government
agency, should be prudent in the way we spend
our money and cost-effective in collecting
taxes, which goes towards nation-building.
Cost effectiveness is precisely why we put
in place incentives, including the e-filing
cash lucky draw, to encourage taxpayers to
e-file when e-filing was first implemented.
As a result, the number of e-filers increased
to more than 900,000 in 2003.
Do you know that each e-filed return saves
IRAS $2.70? We save on manpower for mail processing,
the screening of tax returns, data entry,
image preparation and records management,
as well as on postage.
Nonetheless, we will take your suggestion
into account when we review our programmes
and incentives for the next filing year. We
are heartened by your sense of social responsibility
in fulfilling your tax obligation. If the
incentive is not needed, we would be the first
to have the incentive removed. Our goal is
for every taxpayer to file and e-file his
tax return voluntarily and in the most cost-effective
way.
Thank you for sharing your views with us.
We look forward to continue being a partner
with you in nation-building!
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On having fewer
golf courses in Singapore
Suggestion: Singapore is one of the
countries with the highest percentage of land
allocated for golf courses. Aren’t we
supposed to be land scarce? Shouldn’t
we cut down on the number of licenses being
issued? I really feel we could put our land
to better use, for instance, by building more
water treatment plants.
Reply: In order to make Singapore
an attractive place to live, work and play,
we need to provide a wide array of recreational
and sporting activities at locations such
as green spaces, parks, sports stadiums and
golf courses for people to choose from.
Golf courses in Singapore are located within
constrained areas where the development potential
of the land is limited, e.g. water catchment
areas and the areas under flight paths. Hence,
most of the land used for existing golf courses
cannot be developed for other intensive uses
like residential or industrial development.
With regards to your suggestion to use such
land for water treatment plants, we would
like to assure you that there is already sufficient
land safeguarded for this purpose.
We would also like to clarify that golf courses
are not issued any licenses. Rather, golf
courses operate on sites which are given specific
lease periods for such use. This gives us
more flexibility to use the land for other
purposes when the leases run out, should there
be a need to do so. However, the leases for
existing golf courses have not run out yet
and we do not need to put the land to other
uses for now.
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Next: Smorgasbord
of ideas on waste cutting |
