The list of promises was issued not by by the Government, but by it's official mouth piece. It remains to be seen how many will be broken, contorted or simply swept under the carpet - thanks to the short term memory capacity of the 60.1 percent.
More flats coming up - affordability not addressed
Better chances for second-timers - another tweak of the malleable HDB rules
Fate of DBSS projects - suspended but no final decision
Re-employment of older workers - at discounted wages and benefits, so called "reasonable adjustments"
Parent-care for civil servants - private sectors not encouraged to breed, presumably because they tend to support alternative political parties
Tighter Employment Pass requirements - to level playing field for Singaporeans competing with foreigners, but processing time for latter as citizens may be expedited (as in the "within days" case of Fooled Me Hah!)
More university places - intake to be pushed beyond 30 percent only from 2015, nice figure to keep in mind for 2016 GE
Report on ministerial salary review - supposed backdated to May 2011, a litmus test of the white-and-white sincerity - just don't set your hopes up too highly
Lower taxes - as in chargeable income, but watch out for the squeeze from from GST, COE, ERP, utility tariffs, town council charges, tertiary education fees, etc, etc
More protection for investors - obviously these guys have yet to watch "Margin Call"
More train stations - more good years for (still) CEO Saw, since reliability and accountability are not expressly stipulated
Safer rides for school children - just another excuse to hike school bus charges
Subsidised health care for more people - it's true, medical products are cheaper across the causeway - which makes you wonder how subsidy is defined
More savings for health care - which is official euphemism for jacking up your Medisave balance requirement from $27,000 to $32,000 - more reason for those above 55 to take out as much of their CPF as possible so that can't move your numbers around without your permission
Lemon law to protect consumers - if life gives you lemons, be prepared to make lemonade. Anybody got a painless refund from SMRT yet?
No more surprises from telcos - ISPs must measure and publish typical download speeds, but not mandated to deliver what they promised in their sales pitch
Better flood protection - this has to be comic relief, the expensive flood barriers failed miserably on Black Friday 23rd December.
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Yes !
ReplyDeleteThe cynical me agree totally.
Let us see what our elected leaders can really do in 2012.
I like them to heed CNBC's Suzy Orman's motto of " People First, then Money" in whatever policies they may care to revise / introduce for us lesser martals.
Talking about Medisave, it is jus one of the bloodysucking schemes our greedy rulers have created to crank off our cpf contibutions and then setting all sorts of restrictions, all designed to disqualify or limit or even discourage u from utilising these schemes. Take Medisave for eg, how many will realise the use is so severely restricted until u have to use it. First, u can only use it for some types of illnesses and even if your illness qualify, u might find some tests/procedures/medicines for the treatment of your illness also restricted. As if this is not bad enuf ,u are also capped by a low limit to pay for the allowable items. And to top it all, do u know u also have to pay a $30 fee to CPF Board per every application to withdraw your Medisave and mind u, this fee has to be paid in CASH but also have been increased fee silently over the years. I jus discovered to my shock, it is now $30.
ReplyDeleteAs for CPF Medishied or whatever shield schemes, dont even talk about it for u are not allowed to claim if u have sufficient CPF money in your Medisave to pay. We are truly sucked by LEEches.
re niz's piece on medishield - omigod....
ReplyDeletei feel even more depressed now.
Looking at the performance of our new lots of ministers so far, I am not confident that they can solve any of the problems raised by Tattler. Somehow they do not measured up to the older generations. I see a marked deterioration in quality.
ReplyDelete