Ditch the trishaw, let's aim to change at Ferrari pace 

source: Straits Times, 11 March 2004, commentary by Chua Mui Hoong

Members thumped their seat rests in approval when Deputy Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said the Government would grant citizenship by descent to children born overseas to female Singaporeans, a right now confined to children born overseas to wives of male Singaporeans.

For good measure, he said the Government was prepared to consider equalising medical benefits in the civil service, which are now granted to dependants of male - but not female - civil servants.

'In the spirit of leaving no stone unturned and never saying never, I will leave this to the working committee to consider,' he said, referring to the 10-men-one-woman committee looking at procreation issues. No promises were made, but he has paved the way - and raised the expectation - for change.

Listening to the news, I thought: 'Finally!' 

In 1993, then-finance minister Richard Hu faced down irate women MPs pressing for this with the now-infamous argument that the man was the head of the household and should take care of the family's needs, including their medical needs. He said: 'This is how our society is structured. It would be unwise to tamper with this structure.'

A year later, however, came a small change of heart, when the Government relaxed immigration rules to make it easier for foreign men married to Singaporean women to come to Singapore on dependant passes. In the past, the husbands could not enter as dependants - because immigration rules assumed that men could not be dependants, presumably because men who were not the breadwinners were not seen as desirable residents.

What caused that change? In a word, the global competition for talent, which compelled Singapore to liberalise its rules. It wasn't just about husbands being dependants. The word in the cocktail circuit then was that some foreigners lured to work here would move only if their girlfriends or boyfriends - some of the same sex - were given dependant passes. The unspoken part of the issue then was that relaxing immigration rules would give leeway to allow in some of these unorthodox relationships.

It was just last year that the one-third quota on places for female medical students - another bugbear of women's issues activists here - was lifted.

This time round, the change of heart on citizenship rights for babies emerges in the context of a national debate on falling birth rates. Every baby counts, whether born overseas or not.

The changes are welcome and long overdue.

Together, they add up to an admission by an all-male Cabinet that the world is changing, and they, too, must change alongside it.

Slowly, the patriarchal assumptions of the state are being dismantled. 'Baby minister' Lim Hng Kiang can redeem himself in women's eyes for his remark on women's hairdos, by supporting equalising medical benefits for women.

Assuming the measure is approved this year, it would have taken 28 years since the issue was raised in 1976 in the House by Kim Seng MP Ong Leong Boon, and at periodic intervals since.

When it comes to a value-laden issue like gender roles, the Government is slow to change. Not so when it comes to supporting enterprise.

DPM Lee, who is also Finance Minister, told two stories yesterday that had the House in stitches: of how a 10.30pm deadline for reverse bungee jumping was overturned, and how home-brewed beer got a reprieve from hefty beer licence fees.

One point to note is that these rules were changed in a period of months, not years, and certainly not decades.

When there are economic imperatives to do so, Singapore can rev up its engine with the speed of a Ferrari Scaglietti (0 to 100kmh in 4.2 seconds). When it comes to changing social mores, the country moves along at the pace of a sedate trishaw.

For decades, Singapore operated in dual time zones: a fast-moving, rapidly changing economic environment and a slow-changing society where conservative values held sway and the liberal minority are told not to spark a 'backlash'.

But what happens if that stodgy social climate becomes an impediment to success in the economic world? Talent flows to tolerant cities that embrace diverse value systems and lifestyles. They won't take kindly to Singapore's value-laden rules on who should wear the trousers in the house, its laws on whom one should have sex with and how, and its paternalistic stance on censorship.

As Singapore competes for global talent, and strives to keep its own homegrown ones within its shores, economic imperatives compel it to speed up the pace of social change from that of a trishaw to, if not a Ferrari, at least a Nissan Sunny.

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