Daily Lessons from Life 12-13 April 2014 - NEA steps up enforcement against littering offenders

Missed last night update as I was on the mid-night flight to Incheon, Seoul, Korea. So, here is a 2-day catch up.

"NEA steps up enforcement against littering offenders - CNA 13 April 2014

SINGAPORE: Enforcement efforts against littering have been stepped up.

In the first quarter of this year, the National Environment Agency (NEA) has issued 4,255 tickets to littering offenders.
This is nearly half the number of tickets (9,346) issued last year.
On Saturday, NEA conducted its enforcement blitz at more than 30 littering hotspots islandwide, as plainclothes officers stood watch.
One university student was caught throwing his cigarette on the ground, and was fined S$300 on the spot.
Since April 1, fines for littering offenders have doubled.
The Environmental Public Health Act (EPHA) has been amended to deter those who continue to act irresponsibly.
Under the revised EPHA, the maximum court fines for littering offenders have been doubled since April 1 to $2,000 for a first conviction, $4,000 for a second conviction and $10,000 for third and subsequent convictions.
NEA said there are 92 littering hotspots in Singapore, mostly in town areas and near MRT stations.
Mr Derek Ho, director-general of Environmental Public Health Division at NEA, said: "We still tend to see more litter occurring in such congregated areas, maybe because when some people see that the place is littered, they think that it is okay to continue to add to the litter. So we tend to see that in places with a high congregation of people, (there is) a higher incidence of littering.""

This is WHAT really made me SKEPTICAL about all the claims that Singapore is ONE of the BEST countries in the world, and that Singaporeans, or now we have to be careful, people who are in Singapore, are No. 1 in this or that.

IF the citizens after listening to decades of 'Do not litter', 'Courtesy', etc campaigns STILL CANNOT have the self-discipline or DECENCY to NOT little, we can probably understand WHY those 'people who happened to be in Singapore' are NOT doing any better, most likely.

Lessons for me are:

1. 'Singapore is KEPT clean'. This is what I TELL my many foreign friends who visit Singapore whenever they said how clean Singapore is. While I, and my family members, can safely said that we have NOT littered in the last 20-30 years or more, we can stand by the claim;

2. this points to a few anomalies, why are young parents who were in the many years of 'Don't Litter' campaigns STILL littering. Some even embarrassed or chastened their very aware kids' for telling them NOT to litter!! When this happened, you can probably concluded that our world best education system is NOT getting through (with the kids' parents when they were students)! And with that 'university student' who threw away his cigarette buds? Notes: It is almost 'natural' for smokers to be 'litterer'!! Sad vicious cycle?;

3. now back to the MOST effective way to 'enforce' CHANGE in behaviours in Singapore. Catch them and FINE them! The 'public shaming' of performing 'public corrective order' of sweeping garbage with a tag prominently displayed on the chest (and back I think) of the offenders did not deter litterbugs. Maybe some of them will claim it as an addiction. A mental healthy issue rather than just being irresponsible! So, here were are with undercover plainclothes NEA officers catching people who littered.

For me, compliance is: doing the right thing when someone is watching. This is NOT good enough. We need to get to the commitment level where commitment is: doing the RIGHT THING when NO ONE is watching!!

Only then can I truly say that Singapore and Singaporeans are WORLD CLASS. In fact, if we can get to that stage for littering, I am VERY SURE we will be world class in MANY MORE positive areas!

Ready? GO GO GO!!