DPM Heng Swee Keat at the Book Launch of Collected Readings on Community Development in Singapore and Community Development Arenas in Singapore

Dr S Vasoo

Associate Professor Bilveer Singh

Book contributors,

Community development practitioners,

Friends

Good afternoon. I am delighted to join you today to launch the two books by Dr S. Vasoo and Prof Bilveer Singh.

I am very glad that Dr Vasoo and Prof Singh are making the effort to publish on this subject, especially in our Bicentennial year.

We are looking deep into Singapore’s history to understand how we got here, and to draw insights and inspiration to take us forward.

Dr Vasoo shared with me that there is not much local literature or research on community development in Singapore.

This effort by him, Prof Singh and their partners to capture the history of our community development will help our community grow as we confront the challenges ahead.

Dr Vasoo is one of the most qualified persons to do this.

His considerable academic achievements are well known.

And, of course, I have known him from his work in the community, as a Member of Parliament for almost 20 years.

Before he entered politics, he was already walking the ground for his social work projects.

And even after retiring from politics, he has continued to help out actively, and to mentor others.

Dr Vasoo has an understanding of the community that comes only from rolling up his sleeves and getting deep into ground work.

On the other hand, Prof Singh brings an interesting political science and international relations perspective to the understanding of community development here. As Prof Singh mentioned earlier, Singapore is an accidental nation. We have nowhere to go, and we have to make this place work. It is the same as I mentioned to many engineering students here in architecture schools about reinventing the city. If you are in America and the car industry in Detroit goes down, you can go to Palo Alto to start something interesting. Even if New York goes down, you will probably have somewhere else to go, like Chicago or somewhere else. But in Singapore, you cannot go from Changi to Pulau Ubin – there is not much space for us to go.

I would like to thank both Vasoo and Bilveer for leading this work. To crystallise the lessons learnt, both from their own decades of experience, and from gathering the experiences of their colleagues, who have also dedicated themselves to this field.

These books are worth reading, so I hope all of you will do so. To give a short preview, I will just share one key lesson I took away from the books.

The major lesson for me is this: We are at our best, and have achieved remarkable things, when we come together as one, harnessing our diverse strengths for a common goal.

Indeed, it is in our DNA to work in a spirit of partnership. This spirit can be found across the essays collected in the books.

You will see examples of how the community has come together over the years to help those in need, across different groups and across multiple needs.

Take for example the “STARdy Kaki”, a tuition programme started by two teenage students. This is a youth-adult partnership at work.

Both students noticed that some young children living in their neighbourhood rental blocks had little adult supervision, and were not doing well in school.

So they started a tuition programme for these children, with the support of the local RC. When they were ready to scale the programme further, they partnered Fei Yue Family Services to better design the programme.

Within two years, “STARdy Kaki” grew and reached out to more children in the community.

Another example is the Inter-Ministry Committee on Youth Crime, which brings together different agencies to tackle drug addiction in youths.

The Committee was expanded to include self-help groups when it evolved into the National Committee on Youth Guidance and Rehabilitation. This expansion enabled agencies to work more collaboratively with community leaders, social services agencies (SSAs), and other partners to tackle the complex social challenge.

Besides these examples, we often see this spirit of working together in how we overcome crises and challenges.

Many of you will be familiar with some of the episodes in our more recent history.

For example, the Asian Financial Crisis, SARS, and the Global Financial Crisis.

Each time, our people worked with the Government and community organisations to overcome the challenges together, keeping our home safe, and our society strong and united.

This spirit of partnership will continue to serve us well.

As each generation of Singaporeans develops its own responses to the challenges of the day, we must keep this spirit of partnership at the centre.

This will be all the more important as we enter into a future of disruptive changes, and as our society becomes more diverse in needs and views.

Many of you in the social space would be familiar with a recent example of this – the Community Networks for Seniors.

This brings together government agencies, SSAs and volunteers to involve our seniors in community activities, and give them support and care.

By doing so, we combine our various strengths and serve our seniors better. Over time, bonds of support, care and trust in the community are strengthened.

We piloted this in a few constituencies. The feedback has been encouraging. We are now going island-wide with this initiative.

On the part of the Government, we are committed to partnering Singaporeans in new ways to take Singapore forward.

Several months ago, I launched the Singapore Together movement.

Our way forward cannot be one where the Government just work for you; it has one where we work with you, for you.

We are committed to harnessing the diverse strengths of Singaporeans, and partnering our people in new ways to take Singapore forward.

We will partner Singaporeans to design and implement policies together, and to create a shared future where every Singaporean will have a part to play.

We welcome all groups and individuals to join us in this effort.

Many of you in the audience today are active in the community. I encourage you to sustain this spirit of partnership in your community efforts.

Explore new partnerships, and look for, bring on board, and groom more volunteers.

So long as we keep the interest of Singapore at heart, we can work together and harness our diverse strengths.

I believe our future Singapore must be one where every individual takes action to make a difference for the better of our country.

In these books, Vasoo paints both a pessimistic scenario, and an optimistic scenario, on where our society could be headed.

In the gloomier scenario, people are at loggerheads over resources, and no one will cooperate to serve the community.

In the happier picture, we have a lively, dynamic and vibrant environment, with people looking beyond themselves, sharing and caring within supportive networks to benefit others.

Looking at societies around the world today, both scenarios are possible.

We see the fracturing of societal interests in many societies, marked by the disenchantment of young people, and by the rise of populist and nationalist movements. Differences in societies have been exploited to stoke fears, break trust and divide communities.

But I am confident that, in Singapore, we are on the optimistic path.

We have stayed united as a society, and trust between the different parts of our society remains strong.

We can chart our future together, expand our common spaces, and journey towards a better future.

We need only to look at our own history to be confident of this.

The authors and contributors have put together many examples of success that we can build on. We can draw inspiration from these to go forward, and understand the pitfalls to avoid.

We are also fortunate to have many from whom we can learn.

In particular, allow me to acknowledge some other champions of community development who are here with us today: Mr Ong Pang Boon, Dr Ahmad Mattar, Mr Ch’ng Jit Koon, Mr Tang See Chim, Mr Ng Kah Ting, Mr Chandra Das, Mr Yeo Toon Chia, and Mr Lau Ping Sum. I understand a few others were planning to join us too, but could not make it.

Together, these elders have a bicentennial under their belts – having spent more than a combined 200 years in elected office.

They have served the people by running programmes to develop the community, raising important issues in the House, and supporting good, sometimes tough, policies – keeping the long-term interests of Singapore and Singaporeans at heart.

I am honoured to be with all of you here. I encourage our audience to make the most of this opportunity to learn from their experiences.

To conclude, congratulations once again to our authors and contributors, as well as your partners. Many exciting chapters lie ahead. I look forward to hearing more about the further good work you will do.

Thank you.

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