Changes to Act troubling and premature, says WP

The Workers' Party (WP) yesterday opposed changes to a law that allows the Minister for Home Affairs to detain and supervise criminal suspects without trial, calling the move troubling and premature.

Aljunied GRC MPs Sylvia Lim and Pritam Singh and Non-Constituency MP Dennis Tan - all lawyers - voiced the party's dissent during a four-hour-long debate over the Bill to amend the Criminal Law (Temporary Provisions) Act (CLTPA).

They contended that the amendments would curtail judicial oversight, increase the minister's powers and expand the reach of the Act beyond its original intention of protecting Singapore's safety - contrary to Law and Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam's assertion that the changes would define and limit the minister's powers.

Ms Lim said: "During past renewals of this Act, the WP has accepted the uncomfortable compromise that this law entails on the constitutional right to freedom. We did not delight in taking this position, but did so with a heavy heart. This time, however, our view is that the Government has gone too far."

The party's five MPs and three NCMPs voted against the Bill. Mr Chen Show Mao (Aljunied GRC) was not present during the vote.

WP MPs took issue with a new clause stating that the minister's decision to detain or supervise a person - in the interest of public safety, peace and good order - is final. Mr Singh said this "finality clause" limits judicial review as it stops judges from probing into the facts of the case.

He added: "The evolution of the law on judicial review has required judges to make more, not less, inquiries on the facts and circumstances of a matter at hand... It would appear intuitively logical for judges to have maximum access to the minister's or executive's thought processes, even if they cannot replace it with their own."

Mr Tan said the clause removes the right of detainees to ask if the "minister was right" in deciding to associate them with the offences under the Act, and to detain or subject them to police supervision.

Ms Lim pointed out that no minister has sought a finality clause for the Act since its inception 60 years ago. "We find this very troubling," she said of the change in approach. During the debate, Mr Shanmugam reiterated multiple times that the clause does not "oust" judicial review.

Ms Lim also objected to the addition of a Fourth Schedule, which prescribed a list of offences under the Act's ambit to include those covered by the Organised Crime Act (OCA). She disagreed with Mr Shanmugam that the schedule limited the minister's powers, arguing that it achieves the opposite effect instead. The OCA covers offences such as fraud and illegal gambling, which should not require detention without trial, she noted.

As the OCA also includes offences committed overseas, she said the CLTPA would thus cover transnational crimes as well - which goes against the Act's intention to target offences that threaten public safety, peace and order within Singapore.

Ms Lim said: "In effect, the Bill makes the minister a global policeman, with no equal in the world. This is a position too arrogant for this House to support."

She also said it is "premature" to renew the CLTPA now, given that the previous two renewals in 2009 and 2014 were debated between one and eight months before their expiry dates. In the current five-year cycle, the Act expires in 20 months' time, in October 2019. "WP would have been prepared to support the renewal if not for these changes (to the Act)," Ms Lim said.