Month: December 2012

Random Discourse – Town Councils & Action Information Management

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” For procurements where only a single bid is received, the Ministry of Finance (MOF) will require officers responsible to provide additional justifications to the approving authority within each agency.

The officers must set out why they consider the single bid competitive or reflective of market prices, before a decision is made to award such a contract. “

– Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam (in Parliament), 13 Aug 2012

Some time in June this year, it was revealed that the National Parks Board [NParks] placed a tender for 26 Brompton foldable bicycles which cost a total of S$57,200. The cost of each bicycle (S$2,200) naturally upset many, who felt that they are too expensive and a waste of public funds. The Ministry of National Development [MND] subsequently conducted a probe and in the end an officer from NParks was suspended from duty. An internal audit also uncovered some discrepancies which suggested “the possibility of bias in the procurement”, although the discrepancies were inconclusive by themselves. I won’t go into too much details over this matter, since my objective of bringing up this matter was to serve as a reminder that the government went on to tighten rules on its tender processes and Deputy Prime Minister [DPM] Tharman Shanmugaratnam spoke in Parliament on this matter. I would like to draw your attention in particular to what the DPM said about single bids in a public tender (see inset).

The reason I brought this up is because the so-called co-ordinating chairman of the 14 PAP town councils finally crawled out of his hole to answer to the matter about a contract between the town councils and a company (owned by Peoples’ Action Party [PAP] members) over the sale and leaseback of computer systems. Teo reviewed that there was an advertisement placed on the Straits Times on June 30th 2011, and subsequently five companies collected the tender documents, the only bidder was the PAP-owned Action Information Management [AIM].

To avoid accusations of nitpicking, I would let the matter of whether that one single advertisement for just one day would have garnered enough attention pass. However, even though town councils aren’t under the purview of the Ministry of Finance, what the DPM said about single bids makes a lot of sense. As such, can Teo actually find out and tell us why in the absence of competition was the tender awarded to AIM? How exactly did whoever made the decision to award the contract, consider AIM’s single bid competitive or reflective of market prices? How can we be assured that there has been no “possibility of bias” in the decision? I am sure even if it meant each of us paid only 5-cents into the development of this software, everyone still have a right to know. I would expect Teo Ho Pin to answer these regardless whether he is involved in the decision making to award this contract or not. Teo Ho Pin certainly has a responsibility to clear all the doubts since it was his own party who demands that everything be above board and white-than-white. He should answer all these questions to the people’s satisfaction and not dodge them!

Frankly, I would have expected no contracts to be award to a single bid after merely one tender exercise. Even my employer would have asked for 3-bids to ensure that it got the best pricing for some items it is purchasing, even when some of them don’t even cost more than a few hundred dollars. That’s not forgetting that the National Environment Agency [NEA] will only award a stall with only a single bid after two tender exercises. Why is a tender for such contracts involving large sums of money not subjected to the same stringent requirements?

That aside, AIM was said to have offered to buy the software for S$140,000 and manage the system at a monthly fee of S$785 per town council, for an initial term ending on Oct 31, 2011. No one could have miss the blatantly obvious fact that 14 PAP town councils would have paid AIM S$131,800 (S$785 per month per town council) within a year. In short, AIM practically got the Town Council’s software for a song (if not for free) because it would have technically recovered 94% of its cost in a year. For a $2-company which we know very little about – for e.g. the number of staff and the terms of the software maintenance contract, this is ‘arguably be the best business tender deal of the century’ as Mr Leong Tze Hian mentioned in his post. Perhaps even Temasek Holdings should learn a thing or two from AIM to not only stop its recent bleeding, and make even better returns than the average of 17% a year.

Jokes aside, I doubt it was that lucrative. And that brings up another question. As an IT person, I am not interested in whether AIM disputed (or refuted) Aljunied-Hougang Town Council’s [AHTC] claims that it had to fight for a service extension to continue using the existing town council management system. What I am more interested is the details on how a relatively unknown $2-company like AIM service the contract it has gotten from the town councils. The company seems rather secretive too, because even a search in Yellow Pages website turned up nothing and on the Green Book website I gave up after 10 pages of search results.

It was said that this company didn’t even have its own office and shared the address with a whole lot of others. Assuming that it is all legitimate and not just a shell-company, where does AIM station all its staff? How much manpower does it actually employed? Just for this contract alone, is there any real people actually dedicated to software patching, to deal with bugs in the system, and also to update it? How often is any form of servicing done? In fact, I am even more curious knowing that the town councils maintained the hardware which would suggest either another company or the town councils’ own in-house IT does backups and ensure operational continuity. I know how often infrastructure (be it networks, servers or even desktop support) clashes with developers, programmers and application support. As such, where is the line drawn here? If the case is whereby the infrastructure side took on much of the support burden of this management system, then it would suggest that AIM got a fat contract without needing to do much.

I can think of a few other possibly more capable local SMEs besides AIM, because it appears to be a practically unknown company. The main stream media such as the Straits Times should have done more to inform us about this company by now. Unfortunately, it never seem to have the journalistic instinct to follow up on a lead to keep its readers informed but often spend more time beating up on alternative media…

Short Takes (Dec 10th ~ Dec 15th, 2012)

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It has been a rather exciting week, and in fact, an exciting December when it is usually a quiet month because most people are away on vacation and pretty much nothing happens. So here’s a (not so) short take on what’s transpired in the last few days.

Let me be clear. The purpose of fare increases is not to boost the short term profits of PTOs. It is also not just to improve salaries of bus drivers but to improve service to commuters while keeping public transport operations commercially viable. This is why we must work with the PTOs to ensure that when granted any fare increase, they would re-invest part of this revenue to improve the PT system to benefit commuters. This can be in “hardware”, like more buses and trains and upgrading the signalling systems. It can be in “software”, like better terms and salaries for staff. That includes bus drivers and train operators, as well as the maintenance and service personnel who work tirelessly day and night to deliver a safe and reliable public transport service.

– Lui Tuck Yew on Facebook, 13 Dec 2012

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“The costs of improving the reliability of the train network will not be passed on to commuters, Transport Minister Lui Tuck Yew promised yesterday, as he addressed MPs’ concerns over this issue.”

– Lui Tuck Yewk, 11 Jul 2012

Transport Fares – Revisited

Lui Tuck Yew should simply just shut up and sit down. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to insist that commuters should face endless fare increments when the Public Transport Operators [PTO] have already received S$1.1 billion (that’s S$1,100,000,000 for those who loved to see the zeros) in handouts, have been making healthy profits all these years with not only no visible improvements so far but having suffered several moderate to major breakdowns over the past few years. All the more so, when he insists on that in the wake of the SMRT’s own failure to handle its own human resource problems.

There is no such thing as the costs being is paid for by the commuters, taxpayers in the form of government subsidies or PTOs. The government likes to make everything look like a 3-party relationship to portray the image of perfection when none of that really ever exists. Be it commuters or taxpayers, they are still the people. In other words it’s either paid by the PTO or the people. When the people has paid so much and has always been paying either in the form of the Bus Services Enhancement Program [BSEP] and never ending fare increments, it is high time for the operators to take up some of that slack!

Can the minister really tell us that the operators have not been commercially viable in view of their ever increasing profits? Don’t tell me that the cost to operate or fuel prices whatever have gone up 30% while fares did not catch up as much. It is clear in spite of that PTOs are clearly not only capable in managing those costs, but even turn a profit. Can the minister really say service have improved after the previous fare increments? If service has really improved at all, why had it turned into a hot issue during the 2011 General Elections and as a result the BSEP has to be introduced? As for reinvesting part of their profits, the question would be why haven’t they done so after the previous fare increments? Why did the PRC drivers go on strike if the terms and salaries for staff have been constantly improving? It would appear to me that this matter didn’t just boil over in a short period, but that the grievances of those drivers haven’t been addressed for a long time.

What exactly happened to all those profits accumulated in the past? Since Lui actually mentioned signalling systems, the fact of the matter is, SMRT has mentioned that this was why train frequencies cannot be increased even before the major breakdown in December 2011. What the hell took the SMRT so long to decide to upgrade it? By the way, isn’t upgrading the signalling systems part of improving the reliability of the train network? If so, did the minister forget that he said a few months ago that it will not be passed to commuters? Or did we again misunderstand the minister as we all too often misunderstood his other colleagues as well?

Seriously, the Prime Minister should consider sending some of these ministers to communication skills classes. Alternatively, try to explain and talk about things in a way that even a Primary 5 student can understand. That way it leaves no room for misunderstanding.

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Equal remuneration for all in the same jobs?

Can you imagine that this Lim Swee Say person is actually ministerial material and considered to the some of the most capable people in this country? The way he put it is wrong in at least two levels. First of all, going by his logic any employer can now “justifiably” pay a single, unmarried Singaporean whose parents have passed away less than his peers because he has no family to support. Next, since there is currently no minimum wage implemented in Singapore, it further allows employers to discriminate against a person from Bangladesh (for example) by paying him even less for a road sweeping or dish collector job compared to the most down and out of luck Singaporean who is already paid dirt for that job. (Note: I am not trying to advocate for minimum wages here.)

In the wake of the illegal strike last month by some SMRT bus drivers from China, calls have emerged for equal remuneration for all in the same jobs, but National Trades Union Congress (NTUC) chief Lim Swee Say said that this is “not the way to go”, calling the issue a “complicated” and “sensitive” one.

Equal remuneration will “disadvantage” local workers and their families as they have to bear the cost of living here, while the bulk of the money foreign workers earned here is sent back to their home countries, said Mr Lim at a media conference to address migrant workers issues yesterday.

So what is the context and basis behind the call for “equal remuneration for all in the same jobs” [Chinese: 同工同酬]?

It arose because of the recent PRC drivers’ strike, but it is obvious no one is actually asking for a pay increment for every single foreign worker to bring their pay on par with Singaporeans unless he is utterly insane. All the more improbable that many Singaporeans would give a damn about foreign workers since they were recently often accused of xenophobia. Anyway, it has always been clear to any sane and logical person that it is stupid and unfair to insist on absolute “equal pay” for every job, in particular jobs such as research, programming, performers etc. It is also illogical to insist on paying the same for jobs where efficiency is concerned, not to mention that there is a difference in each person’s capabilities and experience. I believe nobody would require any further elaboration here.

Back to the matter of the mainland China [PRC] drivers. When one look beyond their personal resentment against the so-called ‘Ah Tiongs’ (a less than flattering local term for the PRC Chinese), we would understand that part of their grievances was that they were discriminated against in terms of remuneration simply because of nationality. The question here is, since everyone is driving the same bus along the same routes with the same basic skills, why then are PRC drivers paid the least?

So let us consider whether there are any merits of the PRC drivers’ perception of pay discrimination. In my opinion, it is not entirely true because we understood that Singaporean and Malaysian drivers often come with their own value add by default. That comes either in the form of familiarity with the local traffic rules and regulations, or having a language advantage in certain cases. Above which, we also understand that the PRC drivers were given lodging benefits whereby Singaporean or Malaysian drivers would have to fend for themselves in that aspect. But no one can deny that the living conditions of the lodgings provided for the PRC drivers have much room for improvements, as even Singapore’s lapdog media and SMRT’s top management admitted as much. However, it is hard to argue that the recent pay increment was not unfair, if not discriminative when it was given out to increase the pay of drivers overall to attract more new blood to take up the job, and also to discourage existing drivers from quitting. Individual performance or merits was never part of the consideration here.

Thus, the call for “equal pay” for PRC drivers is a more of call for pay equality in essence. In any case, the entry level pay should be the same though an individual may be paid more based on his value add and experience at the employer’s discretion. Increments should then be based on an individual’s capabilities and performance, regardless whether the drivers are contracted or otherwise employed, and not their nationality. Simply put, those who are reckless and drive dangerously, will get less increments or even terminated while those who are commended or praised by commuters will get more.

It seems the NTUC deliberately translated the Chinese words “同工同酬” literally into “equal remuneration for same jobs” and created a straw man argument, because Lim Swee Say said the same thing about pay equality (picture on right) which I just explained above. As far as I am concerned the NTUC’s response serves only one purpose: To turn public opinion against this call for pay equality in spite of its original good intentions! Then again it’s not unexpected considering my long standing opinion of our so-called trade unions.

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Michael Palmer’s indiscretion & “Identifying” Laura Ong

Why am I not surprised that it is Lim Swee Say again in this dastardly deed? I can hardly agree with the reasons given in this case. It is like someone saying, “Since you will get shot sooner or later, let me give you a hand by pushing you out into the line of fire.”. That’s exactly how I felt about this so-called explanation. Thus, The word that should be used here is not ‘identify’, but expose.

The People’s Association (PA) deputy chairman Lim Swee Say said on Friday that the organisation deliberated at length on whether to identify Ms Laura Ong as the woman involved in the Michael Palmer affair but ultimately felt they could not keep it under wraps.

He said that although they did not want to “add to her pain” by identifying her, they recognised that the case had attracted much public attention.

I have often asked to see some gender equality in cases like these – for the woman to be named and shamed because all too often the men take the fall. But in this case I actually felt sorry for Laura Ong even though I might have called her a slut, a hussy or any horrible words I can think of a woman like her. Sadly, she alone took the fall this time, while the press sang the praises of “Saint Michael von Palmer”.

As far as I am concerned, exposing Laura Ong was a calculated move. It was clearly done to divert public attention onto the poor woman and her life while the PAP does damage control, or hope that the people will forget after reading the juicy details of her life. The press should have some decency and end their intrusion into her private life. She may have been in the wrong but enough is enough. Why the difference in handling the matter when the “limelight” is often in the past shone on the men to make them look like cads, if not monsters?

Frankly, I had originally considered it commendable for Palmer to come clean and resign even when a friend pointed out that he only did so after his “love emails and SMSes” were leaked to the press. This friend has a point since it is not unreasonable to believe that this affair might have continued had that not happened. Had the matter gone to public first, Palmer’s handling of the matter and the PAP’s reaction may not have been so well organised. We only need to compare the press’ handling of this case with that of Yaw Shin Leong to see the drastic difference, and remember how they dogged the Workers’ Party back then.

Laura Ong has been shamed enough already. We do not need to know all those other juicy details about her family, her life and her other indiscretions which I will not repeat here. There are bigger issues such as the relationship between the PAP and the People’s Association [PA] mentioned in this article. Michael Palmer is no more “honorable” than Yaw Shin Leong, or Ng Boon Gay. Both have betrayed the trust of their wives. It is utterly shameful for the press to singing praises to the PAP for its handling of this matter in light of what has been done to Laura Ong.

Random Discourse – Bus Fares and Driver Wages

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This was the headline on Friday’s Straits Times. Sometimes, it really makes me wonder who our elected government really stands for. Seriously, Tuck Yew should be giving the transport operators a dressing down, and his first concern should be demanding them to get their act together. Has the minister forgot that in less than a year, SMRT has gotten itself onto the headlines for all the wrong reasons – 2 major breakdowns of the North-South Line (15th & 17th December 2011), 1 moderate breakdown of the Circle Line (25th October 2012), and also the honor of getting embroiled in Singapore’s first strike in 25 years? All of these have caused commuters great pains but instead of addressing it, Mr Lui spent no time in giving the transport operators the green light to file for fare increments! Indeed, while the transport operators may have any reservations about possible backlash from the public if they filed for a fare increment, it is clear they are now free to do so.

The first thing that came to my mind was, why is the public transport operators’ profitability Mr Lui’s primarily concern when he made no apologies to commuters for the impact on them caused by this so-called “illegal strike”? Why is it that commuters are warned that they should be expected to foot the bill for what clearly is a failure of SMRT – a private company – in containing a internal human resource issue? Would it be too much for me to ask all of ours ministers to officially declare whether they own any shares in any of the transport operators, and those who do should never be appointed to the transport minsitry since there is an obvious conflict of interest here?

Did Mr Lui forget that the government recently gave the two operators a massive subsidy of $1.1 billion through the Bus Services Enhancement Fund [BSEF] to procure of 550 buses? I recalled that the it was explained that the S$1.1 billion will also cover the operating costs of those vehicles over 10 years which I understood to include salaries for drivers. Did the government fail to budget for it properly just like the Youth Olympics and is now scrambling to plug the hole?

“But if we cannot raise bus fares, how will that impact your fellow workers? I am sure you will understand that it is not fair if they cannot get wage increases.”

– Lim Boon heng, July 2011

As far as I am concerned, the matter of wages is covered by the BSEF and that matter shouldn’t even be brought up for a really long time. And that’s not all, when the fares were revised not long after the May elections last year, the ex-PAP Chairman also said that the fare increments were meant to increase the wages of transport workers. But what about the rest of us? Who speaks out for our pay increment? I remembered this because when I did a search on Google, I was reminded that I wrote about it here. In other words, Singaporeans have already paid twice ostensibly to make the lives of bus drivers better. How many more times are we expected to pay for this? Mr Lui may have a short memory, and perhaps all of us would too if we made as much as him. To say that we are being fleeced is only being polite, because another f-word would have been more suitable.

Mr Cedric Foo, who chairs the Government Parliamentary Committee for Transport, said the pay hike ‘makes sense’ as the two companies are competing for the same talent pool.

When asked if the pay rise would mean increased fares, he said: “I don’t think there’s a direct correlation between drivers’ wages and bus fares.”

Even more interesting is that Cedric Foo has said that there is no direct link between drivers’ wages and bus fares. So at least for me, the well being of the transport workers is nothing more than a mere excuse. The truth is that fare increments are always justifiable because it keeps the transport operators profitable. And that’s not enough, their profits must increase every year. For e.g. SMRT’s profits increased from $89.5 million in FY2004 to $161 million in FY2011. This is an increase of 80% over 7 years, or an increase of 8.7% per annum. A friend said that investors will be footing the bill if commuters won’t. In my opinion investors can also invest elsewhere if they think the transport operators are not paying attractive enough dividends. After all, SMRT allegedly told some of its mainland Chinese [PRC] drivers they can go to SBS if they are unhappy with their pay. Anyway, SMRT and SBS Transit turned a profit of $119.9 million and $36.7 million respectively in the last financial year, I would find it hard to accept that the majority (the commuters) is expected to foot the bill so a minority (the shareholders / investors) can continue to make money. All the more so because nothing seems to be improving in spite of these obscene profits!

As the Workers’ Party has said, “Commuters should not be expected to pay higher fares, especially when service standards remain unsatisfactory, as they have been since the last fare hike.”. WP is being kind, because all of our MRT lines have suffered breakdowns within the past 18 months and that’s not only unsatisfactory but completely unacceptable! For the record, SBS Transits’ North-East Line (NEL) also suffered a major breakdown in March this year – exactly 4 months after SMRT’s first major breakdown. That must have been to SMRT’s relief had it not gone “one-up” against SBS Transit with a second breakdown of the Circle Line [CCL] about 2 months ago. (The first occurred back in 20th September 2011 – more than a year ago – due to “a faulty cable and tunnel leakage”.) For an almost brand new line, the CCL’s breakdown is simply unacceptable! That’s not forgetting the huge costs involved in replacing those cables and I ain’t surprised that commuters will be footing that bill as well!

The government said that is has “zero tolerance” for strikes. Yet, it is interesting that the government demonstrates great forbearance to all these failures, and even bend backwards to ensure the operators’ profitability. How about showing some “zero tolerance” for the breakdowns, and the deplorable service standards for a change? Surely, some problems in the SMRT did not just happen overnight. Shouldn’t we look into why a brand new line like the CCL is plagued by cable and leakage problems, when large parts of the old East-West and North-South lines are above ground and exposed to the elements? Wouldn’t investigations into the SMRT for possible criminal negligence and bringing those responsible to task be necessarily?

Frankly, the government should work on giving more concessions instead of raising fares. For e.g. The height limit for children getting free rides should be raised to 1.2m since children get better nutrition and grow tall faster these days. Polytechnic students should be given concession similar to their A level peers. The concessions senior citizens should also be increased even though they already enjoyed a concessionary rate for the full day. This is what the government should be doing for the people instead of worrying itself sick in ensuring the transport operators’ profitability.

Unfortunately, there’s a greater chance of the present government doing the right thing when I sleep earlier. But unfortunately, I would have to stay asleep.