Not a good start to August month isn't it to had missed posting last night! Well, I was involved with the Asic Relay-At-Night event last night with 3 friends of mine where we each ran 10.5km to complete a full marathon of 42.195km. We DID it just within the qualifying mark and got our Medals and Completion e-Certificate. It was past 12 midnight when I was home. :-)
1. "Keeping the Singapore identity intact for the next 50 years will be a "big challenge", Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong -
SINGAPORE: It is the Government's duty to grapple with the "very difficult issue" of getting the inflow of foreign labour right - and at the same time maintaining the unique identity of the nation, said Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.
"It is an issue where honestly speaking, there are no easy choices. There are trade-offs," said Mr Lee, speaking on Friday (Jul 31) in a television interview with Ambassador-at-Large Chan Heng Chee, chairman of the Lee Kuan Yew Centre for Innovative Cities.
"I would like to keep this a Singapore-Singapore ... it has to maintain that Singapore character."
The programme, A Conversation with the PM: Our Future, Our People, was telecast on Sunday (Aug 2) on MediaCorp's Channel 5 and Channel NewsAsia. In the show, Mr Lee touched on concerns about the economy, anxiety over job competition with foreigners and a possible identity crisis in the future.
"PM Lee: We have made quite a number of measures over the last few years to do this. We have the Fair Employment (Consideration) Framework. We have the TAFEP (Tripartite Alliance for Fair Employment Practices), which is the committee to look at complaints in case there has not been fair employment. We have got schemes to help our PMETs specifically to upgrade themselves to master the skills, get into their jobs and I think that we also have schemes to help the PMETs who are displaced because if you are 40, 45 years-old, middle-aged, PMET, you lose your job, it is not so easy to find a similar job in another."
My Input: The older PMETs' feedback, or complaints as some would called it, were around pre-GE2011. The debate of FTs, the Real FTs and the Fake FTs, was one of my favourite topics to discuss and provide feedback to the REACH forum and some other online forums. I THEN moved on to discussing: How competitive are our Local Talents (LTs) within our own backyard IF FTs were NOT a problem from the government's perspective?
So obviously, the government COULD HAVE moved earlier on those measures mentioned by the PM here though they might had assessed the situation then as: 'a critical mass has not been reached and so they can hold off any measures for now!'.
The LT upgrading scheme REVEALED so 'short-sightedness' on a government that had been commended many times for being having 'superior foresight and advance planning capability cum good execution'?
"PM Lee: If we have no foreign workers, our economy suffers, our own lives suffer. (If) we have a lot of foreign workers, the economy will do well, (but) we have other social pressures, other problems with our society which are going to be very real and which we have to take very seriously and which we cannot accept."
My Input: The government has been giving the arguments that IF we don't allow foreign workers in, our economy suffers, (not sure about: "our own lives suffer" bit.) However, not everyone understand or are convinced judging by the continuous grouses on 'crowded public transportation system, some unruly FWs, FTs (especially the Fake FTs) taking over LTs' jobs, etc.
It is plain for ALL Singaporeans to see and ACCEPT that we need FWs in construction to build our infrastructure (road, rail transit, bridges, tunnels, etc, etc), clean and maintain our environment, and work in jobs that NO 1st world nation's citizens would aspire to DO. The CHALLENGE is in the displaced PMETs, especially the OLDER ones who had supposedly being one of the BEST trained and experienced lots having worked for many world top global companies in the last 20-30 years.
How DID all these folks SUDDENLY found themselves NO LONGER attractive to the Employers vs. the Fake FTs?
Costs issue? Uninterrupted services vs. Male Singaporean PMETs who have to serve NS liabilities? Lack of initiatives and resilience of the LTs? Entitlement mentality of the LTs? etc.
I am NOT SURE we had identified the ROOT CAUSES of why Fake FTs are preferred over LTs!
Oh by the way, whenever we talk about Foreigners, I like to add the Foreign Employers (FEs) category with 2 parts: Good FEs that set up businesses here and HIRE LTs vs. Bad FEs that set up businesses here and hire Fake FTs!
1. "Keeping the Singapore identity intact for the next 50 years will be a "big challenge", Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong -
SINGAPORE: It is the Government's duty to grapple with the "very difficult issue" of getting the inflow of foreign labour right - and at the same time maintaining the unique identity of the nation, said Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.
"It is an issue where honestly speaking, there are no easy choices. There are trade-offs," said Mr Lee, speaking on Friday (Jul 31) in a television interview with Ambassador-at-Large Chan Heng Chee, chairman of the Lee Kuan Yew Centre for Innovative Cities.
"I would like to keep this a Singapore-Singapore ... it has to maintain that Singapore character."
The programme, A Conversation with the PM: Our Future, Our People, was telecast on Sunday (Aug 2) on MediaCorp's Channel 5 and Channel NewsAsia. In the show, Mr Lee touched on concerns about the economy, anxiety over job competition with foreigners and a possible identity crisis in the future.
"PM Lee: We have made quite a number of measures over the last few years to do this. We have the Fair Employment (Consideration) Framework. We have the TAFEP (Tripartite Alliance for Fair Employment Practices), which is the committee to look at complaints in case there has not been fair employment. We have got schemes to help our PMETs specifically to upgrade themselves to master the skills, get into their jobs and I think that we also have schemes to help the PMETs who are displaced because if you are 40, 45 years-old, middle-aged, PMET, you lose your job, it is not so easy to find a similar job in another."
My Input: The older PMETs' feedback, or complaints as some would called it, were around pre-GE2011. The debate of FTs, the Real FTs and the Fake FTs, was one of my favourite topics to discuss and provide feedback to the REACH forum and some other online forums. I THEN moved on to discussing: How competitive are our Local Talents (LTs) within our own backyard IF FTs were NOT a problem from the government's perspective?
So obviously, the government COULD HAVE moved earlier on those measures mentioned by the PM here though they might had assessed the situation then as: 'a critical mass has not been reached and so they can hold off any measures for now!'.
The LT upgrading scheme REVEALED so 'short-sightedness' on a government that had been commended many times for being having 'superior foresight and advance planning capability cum good execution'?
"PM Lee: If we have no foreign workers, our economy suffers, our own lives suffer. (If) we have a lot of foreign workers, the economy will do well, (but) we have other social pressures, other problems with our society which are going to be very real and which we have to take very seriously and which we cannot accept."
My Input: The government has been giving the arguments that IF we don't allow foreign workers in, our economy suffers, (not sure about: "our own lives suffer" bit.) However, not everyone understand or are convinced judging by the continuous grouses on 'crowded public transportation system, some unruly FWs, FTs (especially the Fake FTs) taking over LTs' jobs, etc.
It is plain for ALL Singaporeans to see and ACCEPT that we need FWs in construction to build our infrastructure (road, rail transit, bridges, tunnels, etc, etc), clean and maintain our environment, and work in jobs that NO 1st world nation's citizens would aspire to DO. The CHALLENGE is in the displaced PMETs, especially the OLDER ones who had supposedly being one of the BEST trained and experienced lots having worked for many world top global companies in the last 20-30 years.
How DID all these folks SUDDENLY found themselves NO LONGER attractive to the Employers vs. the Fake FTs?
Costs issue? Uninterrupted services vs. Male Singaporean PMETs who have to serve NS liabilities? Lack of initiatives and resilience of the LTs? Entitlement mentality of the LTs? etc.
I am NOT SURE we had identified the ROOT CAUSES of why Fake FTs are preferred over LTs!
Oh by the way, whenever we talk about Foreigners, I like to add the Foreign Employers (FEs) category with 2 parts: Good FEs that set up businesses here and HIRE LTs vs. Bad FEs that set up businesses here and hire Fake FTs!
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