DIGGING into past reserves to pay for part of this year's Budget is not tantamount to breaking the piggy bank, said Senior Minister Goh Chok Tong.
'To break the piggy bank is to allow all notes and coins to spill out, with no controls over how much is spent,' he said.
'We are not doing that. Our reserves must continue to be protected.'
He made this clear on Sunday when he recounted how he swiftly set right a former ambassador to Singapore who had teased him that the country was 'finally breaking the piggy bank'.
'I promptly corrected him,' Mr Goh recalled at a Chinese New Year lunch at his Marine Parade constituency.
His assurance about protecting the reserves comes amid some concerns raised by Singaporeans over the historic move to draw on past reserves to fund aggressive pain relief measures in this year's $20.5 billion Budget.
The Government had sought the President who had given his in-principle approval to draw $4.9 billion from past reserves.
It will help fund two temporary measures - the $4.5 billion Jobs Credit Scheme to subsidise employers' wage bills to encourage them to keep workers on the payroll, and the $5.8 billion Special Risk-Sharing Initiative to help companies get access to credit.
Mr Goh took pains to point out that the reserves should be tapped only as a last resort and when there are compelling reasons.
'We must continue to exercise great discipline and not dip into our reserves at the first sign of trouble,' he said.
Hence, he is in favour of putting up three 'No' signs on the use of reserves even as Singapore is drawing on it during this recession.
One, 'No' to supporting social assistance programmes. The Government, as a general principle, must continue to fund such programmes out of revenues raised in the current term of government.
Two, 'No' to funding permanent programmes such as ComCare and Workfare Income Supplement. These programmes, 'no matter how meritorious', should be funded by current revenues and reserves.
Three, 'No' to drawing reserves except under 'dire circumstances'. It is when 'extraordinary measures are required to ward off catastrophe or prevent irreparable damage to the economy', he said.
[url]http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking%2BNews/Singapore/Story/STIStory_332986.html[/url]
smlj wor.
The other time MM Lee still made a statement "If this isn't considered a crisis, I don't know what is"
:roll:
Geee...
The idea is that we need to prevent a situation where Singaporeans will feel the pain for this one leh. Once Singaporeans feel the pain, they will stop spending... basically its a downward spiral from there, isnt it?
our version of bailout lol
It is interesting... why is there so much rigour (which is suppose to be a good thing) in applying Singapore's reserve to help Singaporeans when we just throw billions to help bail-out UBS and Merrill Lynch.
I don't know how much we lost in those two bail-outs but I am sure it is more then 4.9Billion.