S’pore’s integrity-based political system ‘rare and precious’: Indranee

SINGAPORE - Rules and processes are important to Singapore’s parliamentary democracy, but even more important is that elected representatives have the competence, commitment and conscience to fulfil their duties, Leader of the House Indranee Rajah said on March 6.

If political leaders have these qualities, fewer rules are needed as they can be trusted to do the right thing.

“If they don’t, we can impose and improve as many laws and rules as we like, but democracy and politics will still go wrong,” said Ms Indranee in a speech that closed nine days of debate on the Government’s and ministries’ budgets.

This principle, which has served Singapore well, applies to governments as much as it does to oppositions and governments-in-waiting, she added.

Ms Indranee, who is also Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office, recapped what then Deputy Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong said following the 1988 Hendrickson affair, when a US embassy official cultivated disaffected lawyers here to run for election against the PAP.

The diplomat, E. Mason “Hank” Hendrickson, was later expelled from Singapore.

During the May 1988 parliamentary debate on the controversy, Mr Goh outlined three different political models.

The first was the American system of checks and balances, whose underlying premise is fundamentally one of distrust, with each branch of government constantly checking the others.

The second was the British system, where the prime minister and Cabinet are given a wider range of discretionary powers, with an unwritten expectation that those in power can be relied on to always act honourably.

Singapore’s system, like the British model, entrusts the executive branch with a wide range of discretionary powers. But Singaporeans have gone further and superimposed on this constitutional framework the ideal of a political leader who is upright, morally beyond reproach, and trustworthy.

“Singaporeans expect their prime minister, and indeed any minister, any MP, to be a superior man, a man of ability and integrity who can set things right and ensure good government,” said Mr Goh. “He must be a ‘jun zi’, a Confucian gentleman.”

The world has changed greatly since that speech, but Mr Goh’s observations remain just as relevant today, said Ms Indranee.

Singapore’s model of democracy is unique, and it is this uniqueness that has enabled the Government to continue delivering Budgets that improve Singaporeans’ lives and take the country forward, said Ms Indranee. It must remain the city-state’s anchor, she added.

“It is by no means perfect, and we must and will continue to find ways to improve our system, but we have something rare and precious,” she said. “To safeguard it, we must have the right laws, the right principles, and the right people.”

In his round-up speech, Speaker of Parliament Seah Kian Peng said the House works best when MPs come to it with sound arguments and good intentions, and strive to propose solutions without pandering to the public.

As Speaker, Mr Seah said, he listened to the nine days of speeches and could “distinguish between form and substance”. While some MPs gave crisp responses and asked succinct clarifications, others were “a bit cheong hei”, he said, using the Cantonese term for long-winded.

“As Speaker, here is my advice: Parliamentary speeches are not an exercise in word count. It is not how many words you use or how fast you speak, but clarity and importance of your main message,” he said.

This principle is even more critical for political office-holders, he added, as they must use their time to share their ministries’ plans and the rationale behind policies, while also telling Singaporeans how their lives will be improved and the trade-offs needed.

“(Tell us) what the country is requiring of us – tell us the hard truths,” he said.

The true meaning of debate is not when MPs agree, but that disagreements are not merely along partisan lines but about ideas, and Mr Seah said he saw this “within the same party, as well as across party lines” at the just-concluded debate.

“This, for me, is a mark of the sanctity and the legitimacy of the agreements we come to and the laws we make, as well as the trust we have in each other.”

He called for MPs to leave the world in no doubt of their commitment to do what is best for Singapore. “Only then, can we secure our future together in a changed world,” he said.