Indranee to address Speaker Tan Chuan-Jin's 'unparliamentary language' in next House sitting

SINGAPORE: Leader of the House Indranee Rajah will be addressing Speaker of Parliament Tan Chuan-Jin's use of unparliamentary language in the next parliamentary sitting.

In response to queries from TODAY, Ms Indranee said on Thursday (Jul 13) night: “As this matter concerns parliamentary conduct, the Leader of the House will address it at the next parliamentary sitting.”

The date of the next sitting has not been announced yet, but it is expected to be in early August.

Ms Indranee's statement comes after Mr Tan issued an apology on his social media pages on Tuesday, following a video of him uttering “f****** populist".

The hot mic incident, where a remark was inadvertently picked up by a live microphone, occurred during a parliament sitting in April.

Mr Tan had muttered the vulgarity after a speech by Workers' Party Member of Parliament (MP) Jamus Lim of Sengkang Group Representation Constituency.

According to the Standing Orders of Parliament — to which MPs are required to adhere —  questions and speeches should not include unparliamentary language such as vulgarities.

Experts told TODAY that while these rules do apply to the Speaker, this hot mic incident is similar to that of Foreign Affairs Minister Vivian Balakrishnan's "illiterate" comment made in September 2021, and no action was taken then.

They add that while the matter could also be considered closed as Associate Professor Lim has accepted Mr Tan's apology, Mr Tan may regard it as appropriate for him to apologise to the House at its next sitting.

This article was originally published in TODAY.