Gerald Giam on reviewing public finances to help Singaporeans

In Parliament on Wednesday (Feb 7), MP Gerald Giam urged a review of the Government’s stance on the secrecy of Singapore’s reserves. He said “the spectre of extreme scenarios cannot be a carte blanche” for maintaining such secrecy and questioned if this was also to avoid questions from MPs and the public on why the reserves are not being invested more in Singaporeans. Mr Giam said if the Government wishes to maintain strategic ambiguity regarding the full size of the reserves, the figures could be shared confidentially with MPs or with the cross-party standing select finance committee that looks into the health of the reserves and Government finances. This committee would then be able to properly consider specific funding needs vis-à-vis threats that Singapore must prepare for and make recommendations to the Government on how those needs could be funded.