COS 2016: Speech by Minister Lawrence Wong "Building a Better Home Together"

Apr 11, 2016

Madam Chair, I thank members for their many comments and suggestions on MND issues.

When I came to MND last year, many people told me I was going to a hot seat and wished me good luck.

Indeed, housing has always been a hot-button issue, and as I was preparing for this COS, which is my first COS for MND, I went back to the Hansard to look at the records of previous years’ debate. Indeed, from the start of our housing programme – going back to 1960, there has been lively debate on the MND budget, and housing issues. It is no different this year – if you look at the number of COS cuts we received.

In fact, sentiments on housing have improved considerably after 2011. We ramped up BTO supply and cleared the first-timer backlog. We have made new flats more affordable, and we managed a soft landing in the property market and HDB resale prices

Here, I’d like to acknowledge the work of the MND team, especially the HDB officials who’ve worked very hard to ramp up our building programme over the past few years. I also want to recognise all who have partnered us in this effort – our consultants, contractors, construction workers, as well as the many members of public who participated in our focus groups to give us feedback and helped shaped our policies.

I think this demonstrates the importance of partnerships in the work we do and it applies not just to public housing and HDB, but also to the rest of our MND work, including our other statutory boards: AVA, BCA, CEA, NParks and URA.

Now there is a common thread across all that we do in MND – about building a better home in partnership with Singaporeans, and for all Singaporeans. As Mr Alex Yam said, it ultimately is about building communities and it is our people who shape our sense of community and our sense of home. That’s why over the past years, we’ve stepped up our engagement with Singaporeans, – to “inform early, consult early, discuss widely”, as suggested by Mr Yam. We did this with “Our Singapore Conversation” in 2013; continued with engagements on public housing over the past 2 years, and we started our SGFuture dialogues this year to shape our next phase of development

So today, I will share some of the key priorities we’ve identified for MND based on these engagements. First, we will strengthen our home ownership programme to meet the needs of Singaporeans, especially the more vulnerable groups. Second, we will transform our urban landscape, to invest in new infrastructure for our future economy, and to build a future city that we will be proud of. Third, we will create a quality living environment for all to enjoy, and make Singapore a more car-lite and people-friendly city. Let me elaborate on each of these in turn.

Strengthen Home Ownership

Firstly, in terms of strengthening our home ownership programme. Now this has always been the hallmark of our public housing system and we must and will continue to strengthen this key pillar of our social compact. Our focus is to help young couples own their first flat. Our pledge to young Singaporean couples is that we will always keep new BTO prices stable and affordable for them. That’s why we enhanced our housing grants last year. Since then, many home-buyers have benefitted.

One such couple is Mr See Cheng Long and his fiancée Miss Felicia Poh. They booked a 3-room flat in Bukit Batok in the BTO exercise last November. They were eligible for $60,000 in housing grants, so they were able to buy the flat for less than $140,000. This meant that the mortgage loan will be completely paid for using their CPF. There is no need for any cash outlay, and so they end up having more savings. I hope this gives them the confidence to plan for the next step – to get married and hopefully start a family soon!

Our housing subsidies are rightly focused on the lower- and middle-income households; but we’ve not neglected those in the higher-income groups as well. Last year, we also increased the income ceiling to enable more households at the higher-end to buy a subsidised flat.

Mr Gan Thiam Poh suggested that we do away with the income ceiling altogether. I appreciate his intent to allow all Singaporeans to buy an HDB flat, and that is something we would like to do so as well. So we want to move in this direction, and that is why the income ceiling has been progressively moved up over time. But we have to calibrate these moves.

Firstly, there are fiscal constraints to manage; and secondly, having just made a move last year, we will need time for the increased new demand to flow through the system without adversely affecting the interests of the rest who are already in the queue.

At the same time, I would like to assure Mr Gan that we will continue to take steps to ensure that Executive Condominiums (ECs) remain affordable. We already do so through various measures and that’s why ECs today are more affordable than comparable private properties. Indeed, if you look back over the past few quarters, EC prices have remained relatively stable and so we will continue to monitor and take necessary action if needed

Besides housing grants, we’ve also shortened the queues considerably for first-timers. One measure of this is the application rate of first-timer families for new BTO flats in non-mature estates – it’s an indicator which we monitor very carefully. This has remained stable at about 1.6 last year. In practical terms, it means that most will be able to select their new BTO flat within their first or second application, and definitely on their third try.

I understand that members have shared concerns about newlywed couples who have repeatedly applied for an HDB flat without success and I’ve heard similar experiences during my Meet-the People sessions.

In fact, one couple told me at MPS they had applied more than 5 times. I asked for their details, I went back to HDB and asked for a check, and I found out that they were only interested in flats near the city centre, and so all their applications were for flats in mature estates around the city centre, for example, in Ang Mo Kio and in Toa Payoh.

I have already announced that HDB will offer more flats in mature estates this year, for example we have new projects in Bidadari and Tampines North. But there is a physical limit to how much more we can build in these already developed areas.

So I would encourage first-timer couples to consider applying for flats in non-mature estates. As I mentioned earlier, if you look at the application rate, there is a very high chance of them getting it within the first and second try, and definitely within their third try, and the flats in these estates are also more affordable

While waiting for the flats to be completed, you can consider renting a flat under the Parenthood Provisional Housing Scheme, or the PPHS.

I recognise that some want a flat more urgently, or would prefer specific locations for good and practical reasons, for example, to live near their parents. In the current market, they can consider buying a resale flat. Resale prices have moderated and they are more affordable now. For example, you can compare HDB resale prices against household income. At one time, prices were rising faster than income. But this is no longer the case. Between the last property market trough in 2009 and 2015, HDB resale prices increased by 35%; but median household income increased by a higher 44%. So housing affordability has improved and there are many attractive options available in the resale market.

In addition, we introduced the Proximity Housing Grant (PHG) which helps families who wish to live near or with their parents or married child to buy a resale flat. This means that a young couple can enjoy up to $90,000 in housing grants to buy their first home from the resale market: $30,000 through the CPF Housing Grant, up to $40,000 in Additional CPF Housing Grant, and $20,000 in the PHG.

Ms Cheryl Chan asked if we can do more to help young married couples to get their flats early and live nearer to parents. I share her desire to do so, and we will continue to study ways to help them further.

We’ve also managed to reduce the queue for second-timer families, and they too can benefit from the Proximity Grant. And here I would like to share the example of one couple - Mdm Nur Liza Binte Roslan and Mr Yulandi Bin Abu Bakar – they bought their first flat, a 4-room flat at Taman Jurong from HDB. Then as their family grew, Mdm Nur Liza wanted to move closer to her parents who are living in Bukit Batok, so that they can help look after her children. They looked at several housing options, and eventually they managed to find a 4-room resale flat in Bukit Batok, on the same floor, just down the corridor from her parents’ flat. With the PHG, they were able to buy the flat for about $324,000 – resale flat. This is in fact comparable to what they would have had to pay for a new 4-room flat from HDB as second-timers. So in fact, they are better off by going to the resale market. The amount they pay is about the same as BTO, after grants, and they get a flat closer to their parents and they get to move in earlier as well.

So for both first-timers and second-timers, the softening of the property market and the introduction of the new Proximity Grant – and enhancements of all the various grants that we had, means that there are many more attractive options to consider for purchasing a home.

Likewise, there are also more housing options for singles. In 2013, we made a significant policy shift to allow first-timer singles to buy a new 2-room flat from HDB. Er Dr Lee Bee Wah asked about this, and I would like to assure her that we have launched more 2R flats to meet this new demand from singles. We also increased the quota for singles from 30% to 50% last year. As a result, the BTO application rate among singles has been steadily improving. It started out very high, over 30 in 2013. It’s come down to 8.5 last year, and 7.7 in the most recent BTO exercise. I intend to bring down this application rate further. It will take time, but we will make it happen. The move to open new flats to singles is a significant one and has met with a strong demand surge. We will need some time to clear the bulk of this demand but we will bring down the application rate.

In considering their home options, home-buyers will have to do their homework, and they should evaluate carefully the different factors before making the purchase. Mr Chong Kee Hiong mentioned one concern about the lease of existing flats. He’s right that like all leasehold properties, the value of an HDB flat will decline as leases run down. So flat buyers, home-buyers have to take this into account in their financial planning. But for now, a large majority of flats have more than 60 years of lease remaining. They continue to be highly liveable, and the neighbourhoods will benefit from upgrading from time to time. So there’s still value in our resale flats. We will continue to find ways to help our elderly Singaporeans monetise the value of their flats in an orderly fashion, and we will also publicise the schemes for doing so, as Mr Alex Yam, Mr Faisal Manap and Mr Chen Show Mao have highlighted, and MOS Koh Poh Koon will elaborate on this later in his speech.

At the same time, whether buying a new BTO flat or a resale flat, there is a need to financially prudent. We have homes for every budget - 3R flat can vary from $180,000 for a BTO in Bukit Batok to $368,000 for a resale flat in Queenstown. My message to home-buyers is this: we will do whatever we can to support you in your home-ownership goals. But please choose a home that meets your needs and that is within your means. I understand the desire to buy a large flat or one with a central location, but this should not come at the expense of a huge debt burden overwhelming the entire family.

Having cleared the backlog for first-timers and made progress for singles and second-timers, we are now getting more requests for new flats to accommodate other buyer groups. For example, Mr Gan Thiam Poh suggested giving Singaporeans the chance to buy a 3rd BTO flat. I understand why people would like to buy a new flat from HDB, and that’s why we are allowing them to do so twice.

We also have short-lease 2R Flexi flats for seniors to buy a 3rd flat from HDB. But I don’t think we can go beyond that. To allow a “third bite of the housing cherry” for all is not sustainable. We have to be realistic. Our land is limited; our financial resources are finite. We must therefore prioritise amongst various home-buyers. It’s easy to give in to the demands and accommodate all the immediate requests and build as much as we can today and not think about tomorrow. But this would not be a responsible thing to do. We must consider the impact of our actions today on the next generation. We must always be mindful of the implications of over-building and consider how a glut of flats will have a negative impact on the value of homes, for all Singaporeans.

So we need to strike a balance, and that balance includes looking at resale and new flats. This year we are building 18,000 new flats. This is more than the previous year, and we have done so to accommodate the increased demand from recent policy changes. But we cannot continue at this rate perpetually. We intend to gradually taper down our building programme to achieve a more sustainable level over the medium-term.

Likewise, we are monitoring the property market very closely. Several members spoke about this, and called for a lifting of the cooling measures. Mr Christopher DeSouza mentioned this earlier in the Budget Debate; I think Mr Alex Yam and Mr Chong kee Hiong suggested this earlier as well.

Madam, our cooling measures have been effective in stabilising the property market. But it’s too early to declare victory and unwind the measures. Any relaxation of the measures may risk a premature market rebound and I’m sure that’s an outcome that we all want to avoid. Nonetheless, we recognise that the property market is affected by the broader economy and global events, and we are also very mindful that the property market in turn will have broader impacts on the other sectors of the broader economy, and we are keeping a close watch, and will be prepared to respond where needed.

While we have made progress in housing, we know there are some families who may not be able to afford a home. Many members spoke about this, including Mr Muhamad Faisal Abdul Manap and Er Dr Lee Bee Wah asked about how we can help these lower-income and vulnerable families. We will exercise flexibility and compassion, and do all we can to help the families in need. For those in need of housing, we have ramped up our rental flat supply to ensure that they have a roof over their heads and we will continue to build more rental flats to accommodate this demand, and MOS Koh Poh Koon will share more about this later.

Besides providing rental flats, we want to do more to help second-timers in public rental housing buy a home. For many of them, 2nd-timer families with rental flats, they are no longer eligible for housing grants. They are probably unable to get a bank loan, and so they face greater difficulties in moving out of their rental situation to have a home of their own.

That’s why we are introducing the Fresh Start Housing Scheme, and it is aimed at parents with school-going children, so that their children can grow up in a stable home environment. Let me share the key features of the scheme. First, the families who qualify will be able to buy a new 2R Flexi flat. The flat will come with shorter leases, ranging from 45 to 65 years, to keep the price affordable. It will also come with a longer Minimum Occupation Period – I think Mr Gan has also suggested this just now. The longer MOP will be 20 years, to ensure a stable home for the children.

Second, we will give them another HDB concessionary loan, regardless of the number of HDB loans they have taken before. So they may have taken two loans before, but we will give these families another concessionary loan. They will be able to use their CPF for the down-payment, and also for the mortgage payments. Third, we will help them with a Fresh Start Housing Grant of up to $35,000. The amount of grant will be pro-rated according to the lease of the flat they buy. Together, I believe these measures provide significant help for second-timer families in rental flats to own their own home again.

The scheme is not just about buying a new flat, but also about integrating financial assistance with personal responsibility and social support. So to qualify for the scheme and receive the full grant, families will have to show commitment to remain in stable employment, to manage their finances well, and to ensure their children are attending school regularly. These are conditions that we’ve worked out through consultations, and they’re also highlighted by several members, including Mr Alex Yam earlier. In line with the efforts they make, the grant will correspondingly be disbursed in tranches over time: $20,000 will be given when they collect their keys, and the remainder will be disbursed annually over the next five years.

Mr Saktiandi expressed some concerns about the conditions attached to the grants, and I’m very mindful that these conditions should not be onerous. But at the same time, we are making a major move for these families by giving them another grant. So I think it’s fair they must be able to show a certain level of commitment towards home ownership. I want to assure members that our approach is one where we will hand-hold the families closely and walk this journey with them.

We will be working with MSF on this, so MSF officers will check in with the families regularly to ensure that they are doing well, and they will link them up with partners for social support where needed. If along the way, some families encounter difficulties, the social agencies will be there to help them, and we will consider their individual circumstances and the effort they are making to meet the conditions. In doing so, we will not rely on just a single matrix or criteria because we will exercise discretion and judgment and look at it case-by-case. We hope this approach will keep the families motivated, so that they can make the most of this opportunity to get a fresh start and own their own homes again.

How will the Fresh Start Scheme help a rental family? Mdm, may I have your permission to show a worked example for illustration? On the slide, Mr and Mrs Tan have a son and are now staying in a rental flat paying rental of $240 a month. With Fresh Start, they will be able to buy a new 2-room flat with a 60-year lease. They will have a monthly instalment of about $300. It’s slightly more than their monthly rental, but the key is this, they can now pay for this largely through their CPF. So if you look at the illustration, the bulk of it will be paid through CPF, with cash outlay which is $10 a month, and ultimately this will be their flat and not a rented flat. They will own this place.

We plan to implement the scheme by the end of this year. If you look at the profile of those living in rental flats today – those who are 2nd-timers, with school-going children, based on the demographic profiles we are aiming for, and who do not have excessive rental arrears with HDB presently – the estimate is that this group is about 1000. Not all of them may choose to take up the scheme, it will depend on their individual finances and circumstances.

The numbers may not be big, but I believe the scheme can and will have a meaningful impact on the families we are reaching out to. That’s our first priority on home ownership and the different ways we are strengthening home ownership.

Transform our Urban Landscape

Our next priority is to transform our urban landscape and build our city for the future. Over the last 50 years, we’ve succeeded in making Singapore a modern global city, and this did not happen by chance. We had bold and innovative plans for urban renewal, and we did it through systematic implementation over many terms of government. Now, we must consider how we want to build our future city over the next 50 years. In some ways, it will be a more difficult journey because we are starting from a higher base with more biting resource constraints.

Competition is also becoming more intense. We are in a new era of city competition. There are more than 400 cities in the world each with 1 million people. Among them are many emerging global cities, all vying for talents and investments. There is intense competition; we are starting from a higher base, but we cannot afford to stand still.

I think we should take comfort that we are moving forward from a position of strength. Despite our limitations of size, we are still far from saturation. There are still many possibilities for urban development and transformation.

Members will know that we are consolidating our port at Tuas, and this will free up more land for redevelopment at the Greater Southern waterfront. How much land will it free up? The parcel there is about three times the size of Marina Bay. I am not saying that we are going to build three Marina Bays there, but it is to give a context that it is three times the size of Marina Bay.

We are expanding Changi Air Hub with a new Terminal 5 and relocating Paya Lebar over at Changi – this will free up 800ha of prime land for mixed-use development. What does that mean? Again, in comparison, that’s equivalent to half a Jurong Industrial estate, one Ang Mo Kio Town, and two Tampines Regional Centres. This is the perspective of what kind of scale we have. The mix of uses can vary as we have to plan.

Over the next 10 to 20 years, we will be building up several regional nodes. We have a 2nd CBD at Jurong Lake District, which will also be the site for the HSR terminus to KL. We have a new Creative Cluster at Punggol, together with the new SIT campus. We have a new Northern Growth corridor at Woodlands and Sembawang, with many opportunities to transform the waterfront for new jobs and homes.

We are also looking at new and innovative infrastructure solutions, e.g. exploring autonomous vehicles, the infrastructure require for driverless cars, smart power grids and underground options for electrical substations and drainage reservoir systems. There’s a lot to do, there’s a lot of potential for us to move forward, and we’ll be studying all of these ideas in the Committee on Future Economy, in particular in the sub-committee on the Future City which I co-chair.

We are also planning ahead for our HDB towns and estates. In the early years, priority was just to get the blocks of HDB flats completed. Over the years, much more attention has been paid into planning the entire town. The amenities and facilities that come with it, as well as ensuring that there is access to greenery and public spaces.

Planning work is not easy. We are trying very hard to have a range of facilities and shops in our housing estates ready when residents move in. HDB will ensure that there will always be some shops built in tandem with new flats, so that residents will always have access to some facilities, greenery and public spaces.

But development plans that are based on assumptions, may not always pan out, or the assumptions may not always pan out or they may take time to be staged. It’s easy to criticise our civil servants for “poor town planning” as Mr Dennis Tan said earlier in the Budget Debate, but I think that’s not being fair to them, and the work that they do. At the end of the day, what is important is the ability to continually update our urban plans to keep pace with the needs of society. That is the approach we take in our HDB estates. For existing towns, we are continually upgrading and rejuvenating them through various upgrading programmes. SMS Desmond Lee will elaborate later on them later.

For new housing areas, we learn from our past experience, and we are developing HDB estates and towns with distinctive character. We pay attention to the history and heritage of the place. We provide for beautiful greenery and beautiful blue spaces, and neighbourhood amenities. We can see all these in our new projects, be it in Bidadari, Punggol or Tampines North.

Soon, we will be opening up a new HDB town, Tengah, that is next to the Jurong Innovation District. You have seen the slides and video on the Jurong Innovation District that Mr Heng Swee Keat showed. The Tengah town will be just next to it. It is an area surrounded by greenery. We will plan this as a “Forest Town”.

It will be integrated with nature and also the nearby Jurong Innovation District. I am not going to do an extensive sales pitch here in the Parliament on what Tengah can be. This is only one picture, I have seen many more – plans, pictures and visualisations of what our planners are doing, I think it will be a very exciting place to live, work and play. HDB will release more details in due course.

Build a Car-Lite and People-Friendly City

Finally, a key priority for us is to make Singapore a more car-lite and people-friendly city. Cities are centres of economic activity; but they are first and foremost places where people meet, interact and connect with one another, and that’s even more important for us in Singapore, where we only have one city, which is our country and our home. As we transform our city, we must make this place more sustainable, more beautiful, and more invigorating to the human spirit.

That’s why we emphasized clean and green from the outset. Now we are making progress as a city in a garden. In our next phase, we must focus on our public spaces – our streets, our squares and our footpaths. We must make sure these public spaces are well-designed – they relate to the human scale; are well-connected and conducive for walking and cycling.

Several members, including Ms Cheryl Chan, Mr Saktiandi Supaat, Mr Darryl David and Mr Louis Ng spoke about this, and I fully share their views. I am also glad that Mr Saktiandi shared the example of the Novena Health City. This is one area we have planned for a comprehensive coverage of underground pedestrian links, street-level walkways and elevated link-bridges. It is a good example of what we are striving to achieve, Indeed, we have similar plans for other areas too – in the CBD, in Jurong Lake District and in all our regional centres.

To further bolster these efforts, LTA and URA will be introducing a new requirement for developers. This new requirement will make sure developers incorporate the needs of pedestrians and cyclists upfront in their development plans. For example, developers will have to review the locations of the vehicular access points to minimise conflict with pedestrians and cyclists taking into account key pedestrian and cyclist access routes, and the location of bicycle parking facilities.

This is especially critical for developments with high footfall, like our schools, shopping malls, office buildings and business parks. Through these requirements, we will ensure that our built environment is more conducive for pedestrians and cyclists.

Besides new developments, I agree with Mr Ang Wei Neng that we need to do more for greater connectivity in existing buildings. I have shared earlier in this House that we are studying and reviewing legislation to allow us to mandate existing developments to receive new elevated and underground links. Once this is in place, we plan to get more pedestrian connections along Orchard Road and other areas as well.

What do we hope to achieve with all these changes? How can we be a better, more attractive city for walking and cycling? First, within every HDB estate, we will have more dedicated paths for active mobility, be it walking, jogging, cycling or the use of other personal mobility devices. This will enhance our first-mile/last-mile connectivity to MRT stations. Our newer housing areas such as Bidadari, Punggol and Tampines North are already designed with these paths. For existing towns, we will progressively improve the infrastructure through our upgrading programmes.

Here’s one example in Bedok Town where a comprehensive cycling and walking network of approximately 14km will be completed next year. This will allow better connectivity to MRT stations, major employment areas, parks, schools as well as the Neighbourhood Centres. So intra-HDB towns, new ones, we will do it up front, existing ones, we will do so through upgrading progressively, and we will have a very well-connected route of dedicated walking, cycling paths within each HDB town.

Next, we will also have active mobility routes that connect our residential towns to our city centre. This will enable people to get to their workplaces without having to drive. For a start, we are looking at towns that are within a 30-minute cycling distance to the city; so we have identified six possible routes to the city.

These cover connections from towns and estates in various regions: from the east like Geylang and Marine Parade; northeast like Hougang and Macpherson, towns and the west like Queenstown and Bukit Merah. These routes are largely already in place today – these are not new routes - through our Park Connectors. However if you actually travel through one of these routes or take a cycling ride through one of these routes, you will realise that they are not fully seamless and there are gaps along the way. We intend to plug these gaps, so that the routes can be seamless and they can better connect our HDB towns to the city centre.

I give an example of the Bishan to City route which runs along the Kallang River. Today, if you take that route as a cyclist or a jogger, you will have to traverse several pedestrian overhead bridges and underpasses, and the biggest obstacle is that you have to cross the PIE. So it’s very difficult if you want to cycle down that route to the city – you have to dismount, go up a pedestrian overhead bridge, underpass, and then you have to find some way to get round the PIE.

URA has initiated a consultancy study to look at possible solutions to bridge these gaps. So this is just one possibility of how something can be done to bridge the gap – a potential bridge across Serangoon road. If we are able to smoothen out these different kinks in the route say with potential links like this, then residents staying in Bishan, Bidadari, Toa Payoh would have a more direct and seamless travelling experience, whether it is through walking, cycling or any other mobility device, from their HDB towns to the city centre. So this is an example of conceptually what we are looking at – how we can enhance connections from HDB towns to the city centre.

Then, we will also look at active mobility routes within the city centre itself – here, we can have potential for wider pedestrian sidewalks and dedicated cycling and walking paths as well. These will connect to the major office developments. Some of these pathways in Marina Bay have already been implemented and we will continue to do more in other parts of the CBD. These are some of our ideas and plans to make Singapore a more attractive city for walking, cycling and active mobility.

URA will hold a major exhibition later this year, and they will seek the public’s views on these different active mobility routes and the types of enhancements that we want to make to make them useful.

The infrastructure is important, but we must certainly go beyond infrastructure planning to embrace a car-lite mindset. Ms Cheryl Chan highlighted the need for more basic awareness and education. I fully agree with her, and MOT will be sharing more on this in its COS later. We also need strategies to better manage the use of cars. One way is to facilitate more car sharing schemes. This can be through Electric Vehicles as was suggested by Mr Ong Teng Koon. Agencies are studying this, as well as the charging infrastructure that may be needed to facilitate the take-up of electric vehicles.

Car park charges are another important lever that we can use. I know Mr Lim Biow Chuan has called for more free parking in car parks, but free parking is not really free – free parking is a subsidy to the motorist, paid for by non-motorists. In fact, our car park charges are generally lower than most other major cities. So we perhaps shouldn’t be thinking about lowering car park charges or making them free; but we may even have to look at raising car park charges if we want to move in the direction of a car-lite city.

But the specific concerns raised by Mr Lim is about availability of lots which are being used up by commercial vehicles today, or really about how we can provide for more lots for commercial vehicles in residential areas so that they don’t have to park next to his resident’s homeswill have to look at that more specifically and we will find other ways to address this issue.

Madam, I recognise that it will take time to bring about this mindset shift towards a car-lite Singapore, and that’s why we’ve started by pedestrianizing our vehicular roads where possible to create car-free zones, be it on weekends, or even on a permanent basis. It’s our attempt to show how car-free streets can become attractive public spaces for all to enjoy.

We’ve held our first Car-Free Sunday SG – in fact we have held two editions of it so far - we’ve had it at the Civic District and the CBD area, and there has been a tremendous response to this. We’re also expanding car-free zones to streets all over Singapore. Currently, if you look at our city centre, there are 18 streets are closed for pedestrians to use on a regular basis, such as during weekends, in addition to our Car-Free zone on Sunday.

With more support from the community, we can do more in other areas as well. Recently, additional roads have been closed for events on Jalan Pisang, Keong Saik, and Armenian Street. We want to do more not just in the city but also beyond the city, so that we can have more pedestrianized and car-free zones in our HDB estates as well.

How do we decide which roads to close or which streets to activate? It is not done centrally by URA. It’s really based on ground-up feedback and proposals. For example, I visited Kampong Glam recently on one of the car-free weekends. This is a completely ground up initiative by the business owners and stakeholders in the area. They decided to do it and URA supported them. The feedback has been very positive. The business owners reported increase in sales due to higher footfall, and the public also enjoyed the bustling street life.

We want to support more of such ground-up initiatives, not only to activate our streets, but also our public spaces in the city and in our HDB estates. So URA has an existing programme which it will enhance, and we will call it "Our Favourite Place" to invite Singaporeans to collaborate and play a greater role in shaping the use of our public spaces. Through this programme, we will support individuals or groups who have ideas and are keen on activating public spaces. We will assist to streamline regulatory approvals from Government agencies, and we will provide seed funding to get the ideas implemented on the ground.

I hope that in time a network of like-minded volunteers and civic partners will grow through this programme. This will help us catalyse a broader movement to get Singaporeans involved in shaping our streets and public spaces, and it will strengthen our sense of ownership, identity and emotional connection to home.

Conclusion

Madam Chair, we are all familiar with the song Home. One line in the lyrics says “There is comfort in the knowledge / That home’s about its people too.”

Indeed everything we do in MND, and the whole of Government, is about the well-being of Singaporeans. People are always at the centre of our policies – be it our housing programme, our urban transformation plans, or our initiatives for more vibrant public spaces. People are also a critical factor in the success of our policies, and that’s why we want Singaporeans to be actively involved in shaping these policies and in our future city.

Madam, I began by noting how housing has always been a hot-button issue, and that is to be expected because ours is a stakeholder citizenry with the highest home ownership rates in the world. Taking ownership of the spaces we live in is what makes a house a home. So as we take our first step towards SG100, let’s make this a journey of closer partnerships. Let us work together to build a better home with our families and a better community with our neighbours and fellow Singaporeans. Let us shape together our new residential and urban landscape, and build the best Singapore we know how for all Singaporeans.