EMERGENCY (AMENDMENT No. 2) REGULATIONS, 1955 (RE-INTRODUCTION OF CURFEW)

[Mr Speaker in the Chair]

The Chief Secretary (Mr W. A. C. Goode): Mr Speaker, Sir, this is a sad and an anxious occasion. It is barely three weeks since this new Assembly, mainly composed of elected representatives of the people of Singapore, was formally opened and the Government of the majority party stated its programme for the coming year. We had then many fine speeches and keen cut and thrust in debate.

Now, less than three weeks later, it has been the unfortunate duty of the Government to call this second sitting as an emergency sitting in order that this House may have a chance of considering matters of the most grievous importance to the future of Singapore. So it is, Sir, with sadness and anxiety that I rise to move the motion standing in my name on the Order Paper today,

That this Assembly, in accordance with subsection (4) of section 4 of the Emergency Regulations Ordinance, 1948 (No. 17 of 1948), as amended by the Emergency Regulations (Amendment) Ordinance, 1948 (No. 39 of 1948) and the Emergency Regulations (Amendment) Ordinance, 1951 (No. 9 of 1951) resolves that the Emergency (Amendment No. 2) Regulations, 1955, made on the 13th day of May, 1955, and published as Notification No. S 143 in the Gazette Supplement No. 38 of 13th May, 1955, as contained in Sessional Paper No. S.L. 10 of 1955, shall continue in force until the expiration or revocation of any Proclamation extending the period of the Proclamation of Emergency published as Notification No. S 219 in the Gazette Supplement No. 50 of 26th July, 1948.

That motion seeks the approval of this Assembly to the Emergency Regulation restoring to the Commissioner of Police power to impose a curfew in such areas and at such times as he thinks necessary. It is only three weeks, Sir, since that Regulation was revoked at a time when we, on this side of the House, hoped that the situation in Singapore and the development of responsible leadership was such that we could, without harm to the safety of Singapore, consider relaxing and repealing the Emergency Regulations.

Since then we have had a night of terror in the streets of Singapore - a night of rioting and bloodshed and killing by wild mobs - a night which demanded that the power to impose an immediate curfew to clear the streets should be restored. The Government the following day by administrative order gave back this power to the Commissioner of Police, and now this morning we seek the full and wholehearted support of this House in taking that additional emergency power and in supporting us in every measure which we may have to take in order to keep the peace in Singapore.

The events of the last few days have shown the horror and the hatred that can be created by irresponsible political leaders working on crowds of normally decent law-abiding workers. We have suffered disgrace to the reputation of Singapore throughout the world, and particularly in that great and friendly democracy which has always shown its full sympathy to peoples moving towards independence - one of whose citizens has been savagely beaten to death by a mob of Singapore people.

We have had a ghastly setback to Singapore's claim to responsibility and maturity, to the claim that the people of Singapore and the political leaders of Singapore are ready and capable of managing their own affairs. We are met together today at the second sitting of this newly-elected Assembly that has had to be called urgently to consider maintaining law and order in Singapore.

The events of these terrible days have been fully reported in the Press, though I am sorry to have to say that certain Chinese newspapers have still failed to give any support to the side of law and order. I hope and I appeal to them to see their duty as responsible citizens. I think, Sir, that hon. Members of this House will wish me to give a clear and an accurate account of the events leading up to the disorders and of the terrible events on the night of Thursday, May 12. I think, too, Sir, that it is important that such a statement should be accurate and correct as to timings of the various events. I have, therefore, had prepared a report of the security situation and how the trouble developed, and with your indulgence, Sir, and that of the House, I should like to read that report to the House so that we may all be well aware of the facts.

On the mornings of the 25th and 26th April, 1955, strikers of the Hock Lee Amalgamated Bus Company at Alexandra Road attempted to stop the buses from leaving the Depot by sitting on the ground completely blocking the main gate with a human barrier with arms and legs interlocked. The management of the Company appealed to the Police to obtain their right of free passage in and out of the Depot. On both these mornings, the arrival of strong Police formations persuaded the strikers to give up their attempt to stop the buses, and no force was necessary.

On the morning of the 27th April, about 150 strikers again formed their human barrier in front of the main gate and, despite exhortations to move by the Police, and despite repeated warnings that they were offending against the law by physically preventing freedom of movement to the buses, they stubbornly refused to move. The Police first attempted to move them by using divisional Police to pull them away. The strikers resisted strongly, and the Police efforts to move them in this manner proved unavailing.

A squad of Police from the reserve unit, who are specially trained in unarmed combat to deal with this type of incident, was then instructed to move the strikers away from the gate. This they succeeded in doing quickly and efficiently without any undue force being used, and the buses were able to move out unmolested. Stones were thrown at the Police during this operation.

Many of the strikers who had been manhandled away from the gate feigned injury, and two of them lay on the ground near the gate, being tended by friends, complaining that they were seriously hurt. An ambulance was immediately called, whereupon the injured men made themselves scarce and could not be found when the ambulance arrived.

Throughout the rest of the day there were large congregations of strikers, sympathisers and students outside the Bus Company Depot; fiery speeches were made through loud-speakers inciting the strikers to further opposition to the Police, and condemning the so-called Police brutality. The action taken by the Police was grossly exaggerated by the agitators and their student sympathisers. Fifteen strikers were reported to have been brutally assaulted, whereas, in fact, no single striker suffered anything more serious than superficial bruises, although they had to be forcibly separated from each other and resisted stubbornly.

These indignation meetings, supported by large groups of students and addressed continuously by agitators through loud-speakers, continued for several days, deliberately designed to whip up hatred and hostility towards the Police Force as a whole. Throughout this period of growing tension, the Police did everything in their power to prevent any incident occurring which might provoke a clash, and thereby nullify the great efforts being made by the Chief Minister and the Minister for Labour to reach a settlement by negotiation. The forces of evil, through agitation, false allegations, intimidation, and deliberate rabble-rousing methods continued to fan the flames of hatred against the Police, who stood by with admirable calm and suffered abuse and jeers from crowds of up to five and seven thousand workers, sympathisers and students,

After nearly two weeks of constant efforts to obtain a settlement, the negotiations broke down, and the Police were ordered by the Government to take such action as was necessary to ensure the right of passage of buses which the Company was prepared to operate. On the morning of Tuesday, 10th May, 1955 the strikers again resorted to their manoeuvre of forming a human barrier in front the gate. The Commissioner of Police himself, accompanied by two Magistrates, exhausted all means of peacefully persuading them to move. The Magistrates ordered the Police to disperse them as they were an unlawful assembly within the meaning of the Penal Code. The Commissioner of Police dispersed them by means of hoses from trailer pumps. The buses were then able to resume service to the public. Ten persons complained of injuries in this Police operation, and eight were carried into ambulances on stretchers. On arrival at the General Hospital these eight stretcher cases were treated, and it is of interest that the medical report received two hours later stated: Except for one man who was suffering from mild concussion, the remainder had minor abrasions or contusions and were treated as out-patients. One had no apparent injuries whatsoever. So much for the stretcher cases carried into ambulances and taken to the General Hospital, alleged to be severely injured by the brutal Police, to which so much publicity was given by the extremists, and which has been used as a weapon to fan further hatred against the Police.

On Wednesday, 11th May, although the strikers got into position again to block the gate, they changed their minds when the Police arrived on the scene, and the buses were able to come out. A further twenty-four hours of more meetings outside the Depot, addressed by agitators condemning the Police and threatening concerted action by all labour if the Police should again interfere, succeeded in stiffening the morale of the strikers who again attempted to stop the buses coming out on the morning of Thursday, 12th May. Once again, the efforts of senior Police officers and Magistrates failed to persuade them to obey the law; once more the Police were ordered by the Magistrates to disperse them by force. They were again dispersed with water, but on this occasion the crowd gathered round and bricks and stones were hurled at the Police. One officer was injured in the face, and others received minor injuries. The buses came out, but three of them were damaged by stones hurled by the crowd and had to return. Throughout the morning of the 12th, there was widespread propaganda against the Police by agitators addressing students and workers, and efforts were made to call out other labour unions to strike in sympathy with the men of the Hock Lee Bus Company who had been so brutally treated by the Police.

At about 1.45 p.m. a Hock Lee bus was attacked by a gang of hooligans, and the Commissioner of Police immediately ordered a full stand-by of all Police in the island, as he rightly feared that this incident might develop into general rioting. During the next three hours there were two further attacks on buses which had stones thrown at them, and the drivers sought Police protection. By 3 p.m. the remaining drivers of the buses were intimidated into stopping the service and large crowds of workers, strikers and students converged in growing numbers in the area in which the Hock Lee Bus Company is located.

At 3 o'clock it was clear to the Commissioner that very large numbers of workers and students were being organised throughout the island and were converging on the Alexandra Road area by bus and by lorry. A comprehensive system of Police road-blocks was immediately established throughout Singapore, and wherever lorries or buses were encountered carrying students or workers, they were stopped by the Police and ordered back. Some refused to obey, and in such cases the vehicles were immobilised by the Police removing the rotor-arms in the distributors.

Meanwhile a tight Police cordon of road-blocks was thrown round the danger area bounded by Gillman Circus, Alexandra Circus, Tanglin Road junction of Jervois Road, Delta Road junction of Jervois Road, River Valley Road, junction of Kim Seng Road and Havelock Road, right down to Outram Road.

These road-blocks were designed to make it virtually impossible for any person to enter the danger area by road without being stopped. They also stopped organised bodies of students and workers in lorries from swelling the hostile crowds, but there were large numbers of students and others who infiltrated on foot through the surrounding open country, particularly after dark. From 5 o'clock onwards Radio Malaya and Rediffusion, at the request of the Police, interrupted programmes to give frequent warnings to law-abiding citizens that the area described above was dangerous and asking motorists and others to avoid entering it.

The Police plan to protect life and property was to prevent reinforcements from arriving to swell the crowds, by these methods to cordon the area where trouble was likely to occur, to prevent law-abiding citizens from going into danger unwittingly, to maintain a powerful Police guard round the main target of the rioters, which was the Hock Lee Bus Depot in Alexandra Road, and to use mobile Police squads within the danger area to deal with individual attacks on property. At this time the General Officer Commanding was alerted to put troops in readiness to come to the aid of the Police if required.

Between 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. there were incidents of stones and bottles being thrown at Police on duty in the danger area; and on three occasions hostile mobs of up to 1,000 people attacking the Police were dispersed by tear smoke. Some arrests were made, but as was expected, it was not until after dark that the mobs made determined efforts to attack Police posts, road-blocks, individual policemen and Radio Patrol cars. By this time the Police had completely sealed off the area by road-blocks, had stopped lorry-loads of students and workers from reinforcing, and had strong guards in the Bus Depot and mobile Police reserves within the danger area.

The Police were hampered by the darkness and the nature of the terrain from effecting arrests, and throughout the night up to 3 a.m. on the 13th, repeated hit-and-run attacks were made on Police, while the liberal use of tear smoke by mobile Police patrols succeeded in keeping the mobs on the move and prevented them from concentrating in any organised attempt to overwhelm the Police by weight of numbers. The greatest restraint was shown by all Police personnel on duty, including the Volunteer Police who worked side by side with the regulars in a manner which deserved the highest praise and thanks of the public. Throughout this night of confused fighting, hit-and-run attacks on the Police, attacks on road-blocks, setting up of street barricades by the mobs to prevent Police mobility, there was only one occasion on which a Police officer was forced to use his revolver, and on one occasion the commander of the reserve unit troop fired a round of buckshot. The case of the Police officer who used his revolver to save his life is typical of the high morale and determination of every man not to cause more damage than was absolutely necessary. About 10.35 p.m. a Police Radio Patrol car "Peter One-One" was cornered in Prince Philip Avenue by a large mob carrying poles and sticks and hurling stones and bottles. "Peter One-One" with Police Lieutenant Harris and three constables, one of whom was a volunteer, radioed to Control for urgent assistance. The nearest unengaged troop of the reserve unit was immediately warned to race to the help of "Peter One-One". It was hindered by large bricks and rocks strewn on the roadway to prevent its progress. Meanwhile "Peter One-One" was systematically being smashed up and the mobs were advancing closer and closer on Police Lieutenant Harris and his three men who were reporting calmly back to Control that their Radio car was smashed up, that they were about to be overrun, that they had used up all their tear smoke and as they put it to Control over the air, "It looks as if we have had it." Meanwhile the reserve unit was forcing its way through to their rescue. The last message received from Radio car "Peter One-One" was "They are on us. I fired four shots from my revolver, but not at the mob." At that moment the reserve unit arrived at the scene, the mob scattered and disappeared in all directions.

By 3 o'clock on the morning of the 13th May the rioting died down and the mobs had dispersed, although large numbers were still lurking in groups of ten and twenty in the darkness of the surrounding grounds and buildings, throwing stones and bricks at the Police clearing the roads of obstruction and towing away damaged vehicles. By 6 o'clock in the morning it was found that in addition to the numerous Police officers who had suffered minor injuries from bottles, sticks and stones, and who refused to go to hospital for treatment, the casualty list included:

One policeman killed; one so seriously injured that he has since died in hospital; ten other Police officers injured of whom two are still on the dangerously ill list; and from the Police point of view, the most tragic death of all, an innocent civilian killed in the riots who was Mr Gene Symonds of the United Press. The cause of his death will be the subject of a Coroner's inquest, but it is quite clear that he was killed by the mob.

During the course of the evening the only revolver shots fired so far known by the Police were those fired by Police Lieutenant Harris, but the body of a young Chinese was brought to the General Hospital at 1.10 a.m. with a gunshot wound in the region of his heart.

Andrew Teo, a Volunteer Special Constable in uniform, was set upon by a mob at 8.50 p.m. on the 12th while driving along Alexandra Road. He was beaten to death by the mob and the car overturned and burnt. His companion, Volunteer Sergeant Kenneth Koh, was rescued by the arrival of the reserve unit and suffered head injuries only.

Detective Inspector Teoh and three Detective Police officers were set upon at the same time and place, and the car in which they were travelling was overturned and burnt. Detective Corporal Yuen was so badly injured and burnt that he has since died of his injuries. The arrival of the reserve unit saved the others. All were armed but they did not fire. A bystander picked up the revolver of the wounded Detective Corporal while the mob was being dispersed, and shortly afterwards handed it in to Tanjong Pagar Police Station.

Detective Corporal Ho on a motorcycle was intercepted by a mob at 9.20 p.m. in Leng Kee Road just behind the Thye Hone Factory and was beaten up by the crowd. His revolver was stolen and he was left unconscious. The reserve unit dispersed the mob and picked him up. He did not fire his revolver.

Volunteer Police Lance-Corporal Simon was on duty at Police road-blocks at Pulau Saigon at 9.45 p.m. with four other Volunteer policemen and two regulars. They were attacked and overrun by a screaming mob of over 200. They did not open fire. Lance-Corporal Simon was left unconscious with multiple head injuries and a dislocated shoulder.

The young Chinese who was shot was aged 16, a student living at 799-D Havelock Road. When he was brought to hospital at 1.10 a.m. on the 13th he was dead, suffering from a gunshot wound which was alleged to have been fired between 9.30 and 10.30 p.m. The young Chinese was not killed instantaneously but was carried around the town from Alexandra Road, and possibly as far as Middle Road, before being sent to hospital hours later when he was dead. The bullet had pierced the lung, and it is quite possible his life might have been saved if his body had not been used for propaganda purposes for hours.

It is possible that the shot which wounded this young Chinese was one of the four shots fired by Police Lieutenant Harris at 10.35 p.m. above the heads of the mob which attacked him, but this has not yet been established. In addition to the 16 Police officers killed or injured, there were two cases of civilians being injured. In one case a European lady and gentleman driving a car down Henderson Road at about 12.15 a.m. were set on by a mob of twenty Chinese, armed with sticks, stones and bottles. They managed to run into a nearby flat where they were harboured and later sent to hospital. The lady was unhurt but the gentleman was slightly injured. The other case concerned two Chinese who received pellet wounds from the reserve unit shotgun loaded with the smallest gauge of buckshot. Both were treated as out-patients.

Except, therefore, for the death of Mr Symonds and the Chinese student, the injuries caused to other civilians were slight both in numbers and severity.

The next day, May 13, was quieter. There were large numbers of strikers moving about in the city, their numbers greatly swollen by an almost complete strike of bus workers throughout the island. There was a minor incident in Penang Road; but, throughout the day, there was less organised violence. It is, perhaps, significant that on that day, Friday, there were no organised parties of Chinese students in the town. Individual Police were subjected to booing and stoning, and there were bands of young hooligans going round the town throwing stones and slashing motorcar tyres. In the evening two cars belonging to Europeans up toward Changi were set on fire.

The next day, Saturday, was again a day of tension and uncertainty. There was a clear possibility of a dangerous demonstration over the funeral of the young Chinese student, but thanks to tactful handling, this passed off without incident. That evening, as hon. Members know, my hon. Friend the Chief Minister succeeded in getting a settlement of the Hock Lee strike, and yesterday there was a marked lessening of tension, and transport returned to work. We are now left, I think, with only a comparatively small number of genuine industrial disputes. The tension has eased, but I want all Members of this House to realise clearly and to face the hard fact that we still have a potentially dangerous situation which at any time may require the firmest possible measures to support law and order.

I know that all Members of this House will wish me to express our deep regret that men should have been killed by a Singapore mob, and to express our full and sincere sympathy with the families of those killed, in their tragic loss. In particular, we grieve for the loss of those two Police officers and the journalist who were killed doing no more than their duty. I hope that others who were injured may have a speedy return to full strength and health.

I want also to pay tribute to the courage and discipline and training of our Police Force. Not once during that long night of hysterical burning and killing did their courage or their discipline falter. All the men were armed but you have heard that on only two occasions did they fire; and you have heard the price they paid for that discipline and that restraint. Two men killed; others still critically ill, and many more injured. These are the men, Sir, who saved Singapore from the devil on the night of May 12. It was they who restored order without doing damage - with only one death not known to have been caused by the mob.

Thursday, May 12, is a black day in Singapore's history, but it has, in some measure, been relieved by the behaviour, the gallantry and the competence of our Police Force of whom every one of us should be proud and to whom everyone of us owes an immeasurable debt of gratitude.

I am reminded, Sir, of words of comfort spoken last Saturday afternoon at the funeral of Volunteer Special Constable Andrew Teo. The words were spoken by Canon Adams, the Headmaster of his old school. Canon Adams told us so wisely that afternoon that we should temper our grief at a young life cruelly cut off by giving thanks to God, giving thanks to God that Singapore produced young men like Andrew Teo, and I do suggest, Sir, that we should all take hope and courage from the fact that, thank God, there are hundreds of men and, indeed, women in Singapore like Andrew Teo - men and women who do not seek wealth, who do not seek power, who do not seek fame - they only seek to serve, to do their duty to their fellow-citizens, to help to maintain all that is honourable and decent in our lives. Thank God we can find them. We find them as youngsters in the Boy Scouts and the Boys Brigade. We find them when they grow up in the Singapore Military Forces, in the Malayan Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, in the Malayan Auxiliary Air Force; and we find them - thank God - in our Police Force. It is these men - regulars and volunteers - in our Police Force who do their duty under training and discipline even if it means giving their lives for us. It is to them that we owe an immeasurable debt of gratitude. Yet it is these men who are still today being lyingly slandered; who are being maliciously attacked; who are being stoned in the streets; who are being booed at and jeered at by misguided students.

What are the main features of this grim story? First of all, on the Government side, we have been faced with many strikes - not all of them unreasonable, but they have been timed and fomented by irresponsible leaders in order that those leaders could demonstrate their power and could challenge the lawfully constituted Government. I do not intend, Sir, to dwell on the issues involved in these industrial disputes except to say that, given responsible leadership, I know of no reason why those disputes should not be settled fairly and justly without disorder.

My hon. Friend the Minister for Labour has worked untiringly every day and a good part of every night since this House last met, using his skill and experience in industrial matters and his known sympathy for the cause of unions and workers in attempts to promote negotiations and to reach settlements. He has been constantly frustrated by individuals who clearly do not want grievances to be removed, but are out to maintain unrest and are out to exploit the genuine grievances of decent workers for their own evil ends. We have used, Sir, every possible endeavour to secure settlement through peaceful means. As soon as the gravity of the Hock Lee dispute became evident, my hon. Friend appointed a Committee of Inquiry to search out the facts and find a just solution, but these attempts have always been thwarted. It was our object and hope that we could prove to the workers that genuine grievances can be settled in the proper way by negotiation and arbitration and with the full assistance of the Ministry of Labour. We wanted to win these decent workers from those who were urging them into general strikes and violence and who were out to exploit them in ways which could do nothing but harm both to the unions and to the workers. The Police, while carrying out their essential task of maintaining law and order, did their utmost to avoid any serious clash or physical violence which would inflame tempers and add dangers to the situation, and how magnificently they carried out their task - despite incessant provocation, despite jeering and stone throwing, despite the abuse of schoolgirls, and despite the grim perils of being overrun!

What about the other side? On the other side, Sir, I maintain there was a deliberate and a successful attempt to prevent settlements and to provoke disorder. There has been a vicious campaign of calumny and hatred against the Police. There have been repeated attempts to incite a clash against them.

In their lust for their own power the People's Action Party and their covert Communist supporters and backseat drivers wanted violence and bloodshed and industrial unrest.

Mr Lee Kuan Yew (Tanjong Pagar): Rubbish!

The Chief Secretary: They saw that they would be discredited if the Government succeeded in settling these strikes without disorder. Then too late they realised what horror they had engineered, and some of them - still only some of them - hastened to deplore violence and to disclaim responsibility for what they had done. Four people have been killed - three of them by the brutality of a mob intoxicated by the speeches of those who would exploit workers and exploit the excitement of Chinese students. I hope that the Member for Tanjong Pagar (Mr Lee Kuan Yew) will explain his part in this business. He has already stated publicly that he prefers Communism to colonialism. I say to him, Sir, that he has no such easy choice. His choice, and the choice of all the people of Singapore, is not between Communism and colonialism. It is between Communism and democratic self-government. If the hon. Member believes in orderly progress to democratic self-government, then he must be against Communism; and if he is, let him say so loud and clear, with no quibble and no clever sophistry. He has deplored violence after hell was let loose and men were killed. I ask him: What did he do to prevent violence before it happened? What did he think was likely to happen when, at a May Day rally organised by his Party under the chairmanship of the hon. Member who sits behind him (Mr Lim Ching Siong), Mr Fong Swee Suan of the Singapore Bus Workers' Union, after speaking of the brutal force of the Police against the workers on April 27 - we heard the force used - went on to say, "All workers must unite and should not hesitate to organise themselves into trade unions to struggle for their own welfare. Workers must know that there is bound to be some bloodshed in the course of a revolution and they must rise and unite."

What did the Member for Tanjong Pagar think that would lead to? He was, as far as I know still is, the legal adviser to the Singapore Bus Workers' Union, or to the Hock Lee Bus strikers. What, I ask him, did he do on May 11 and May 12 to stop decent workers being turned into murderous rioters? Did he make any attempt to stop the extremists in his Party staging this night of horror? Is his conscience clear? Or did he lose control to the Member for Bukit Timah who sits behind him and drives the Party?

I hope, too, that the Member for Bukit Timah will declare his position openly before this House and the people of Singapore. He has great power over the Singapore Factory and Shop Workers' Union. He has great power over the Singapore Bus Workers' Union. Did he or did he not deliberately organise as many strikes as he could during the last few days? Is his concept of democracy - government by general strike and mob violence - or does he stand for peaceful and orderly democracy? I ask him to declare his stand in these fateful days for the future of Singapore. Is he for or against Communism? Is he for or against violence? And if he is against violence - and I hope he is - what did he do to stop those whom he controls from rioting? Did he go down to Alexandra Road on May 12 and stop this hell from breaking loose? He must have known that violence was building up. Did he try to stop it? If not, why not? As I have said, the Member for Bukit Timah is the Secretary of the Singapore Factory and Shop Workers' Union. I ask him whether, in his capacity as Secretary of that Union, he approved? Did he approve the publication in a manifesto of that Union on 1st May of the following verse? I read a translation, which of course may not be fully accurate. I give it for what it is worth, and if any Member wishes to see the original, he can do so. This verse is called "A Land of Hardship and Suffering". "Beloved fellow-workers, our Fatherland the Great Malaya, Has been invaded and occupied by the enemy for a very long time already! Look! Our brethren have been taken away by the enemy to serve as cannon fodder! Our sisters have been raped and ruined by the enemy! Now the bloody enemy even wants our very bodies! Look! The despotic acts of the enemy have been displayed! Our beloved striking fellow-workers have been dragged, pulled, squeezed, beaten up and kicked! Ah! The workers' bodies of steel are unafraid of the enemy's despotic acts! Just listen! In the midst of darkness the resonant voice is singing which re-echoes to the very sky! We are thus enabled to secure a unity even stronger than steel! Nevertheless, the enemy's bloody acts of violence have again started! Our fresh blood has flowed bespattering the ground which has turned crimson with our blood! The great struggle, the glorious sacrifice, our blood has turned Malaya into crimson! Our fresh crimson blood is turning Malaya into even more lurid crimson than before! Ah! The struggle banner, the blood-red banner, the victory banner fluttering in the Malayan sky!"

Did the Member for Bukit Timah approve and consent to putting that out to the workers on 1st May? And if he did, what did he think would happen? If he did not think before, at least let him now be a wiser and a sadder man. What is his attitude to the Police? Has he or has he not deliberately aroused the workers against the Police by accusing them of brutality and oppression? Sir, there has been a conscious calculated effort to stir up hatred against our Police Force so that the Police are booed and stoned and jeered at; so that the individual constable on traffic duty can be ringed around by hooligans jeering and throwing stones. This is an organised attempt to undermine the ability of the Police Force to keep peace in Singapore. And it is still going on. It was going on yesterday, and I expect it is going on today.

Does the Member for Bukit Timah support that campaign or will he condemn it in clear and decisive terms? Does he stand for riots and violence, or does he stand for peaceful orderly progress? Will he support the Police in maintaining law and order and peace in this island? Will he support the Police in enabling women and children to sleep quietly in their beds at night, and not to lie cowering from the terrifying noises of mobs surging up and down our streets?

What about the students in Chinese schools? As I have already stated, large numbers of students from the Chinese High School, the Chung Cheng School, the Chung Hwa Girls' School, the Nan-yang Girls' School, and the Nan Chiau Girls' School visited the Hock Lee strikers day after day. They have also been visiting other strikers. They arrived in lorries, regimented and organised. They have given large sums of money to workers. They have made speeches. They have danced, and they have sung inflammatory songs. And this has been happening day after day. Students from the Chinese High School and Chung Cheng School have stayed overnight with Hock Lee strikers.

On 1st May several hundred students drove up and down Alexandra Road in lorries for about an hour, shouting "Pom-pah, down with rascals! Pom-pah, down with cowards!" They shouted abuse at the Police, calling them "running dogs". They have been round - strikers and other crowds - demonstrating and inciting and singing Communist songs. I give you the words of some of their songs. They are not as horrific as that put forth by the Union controlled by the Member for Bukit Timah. These are the songs they have been singing: "I love my Malaya, Malaya is my country! Japanese time was not free! Recently we suffer more! After the dogs have gone, the monkeys come! Malaya is a hell! Brothers and my dear sisters, do not wait any more! After the dogs have gone, the monkeys come! We lose happiness! All the people must wake up to fight for freedom!" Another: "Ting, tong, ting; ting, tong, ting! Hock Lee employers are lunatics! They are maltreating the workers heartlessly! The students and workers are with one heart! They have turned the employers into lunatics! One, two, three; three, two, one! One, two, three, four, five, six, seven! We do not care! Seven by three makes twenty-one! The monkeys must leave us at once! Then we can have our independence!" Another one: "The mata-mata beating up the fellow-workers! Let all listen to me! The fellow-workers are suffering! On April 27 the mata-mata beat up the fellow workers! People say the workers are innocent! We, the fellow-workers, want rice to eat; we want jobs to do! We won't be oppressed by others!"

It is quite clear, Sir, that in certain Chinese schools the students have been highly organised to take part in these disputes and to incite violence. Lorries have been ordered to the schools and large numbers of students have been persuaded to go into them and have then been transported to the scenes of strikes and recently to riots.

On May 12, immediately before the situation became extremely dangerous, 17 lorry-loads of students arrived down Alexandra Road. They were stopped by the Police, but, nevertheless, one lorry attempted to drive through the Police round the block. It was stopped and the students were taken off the lorry; but, of course, we could not stop them flooding across the fields through the houses to join in the dispute, and it was at that time that hell began to be let loose down there.

It is, I say, Sir, the students of these Chinese schools who have done much to cause hatred and bloodshed in Singapore. Neither the school principals nor the school committees have done anything to put a stop to this subversion of the youth of Singapore. The principals are frightened. They are frightened that if they thwart the Malayan Communist Party they will be assassinated. And until the Police took the heart out of the Communist killer gangs, they had good reason to be frightened. That is Singapore. That is Chinese schools. The management committees refuse to take a strong line. They seem to be, if anything, frightened of the students, and their one endeavour is to hand the problem to the Government. The situation in these Chinese middle schools is the most serious problem that faces Singapore. Youth in those schools is being corrupted and perverted, through the skilful use of Chinese nationalism and propaganda, into a dangerous weapon for the Malayan Communist Party.

The present Government has been tolerant and sympathetic towards Chinese students. We offered to register their Middle School Union if they, on their side, would undertake to keep clear of politics. This offer was rejected with insolence. We did not - perhaps wrongly - prevent Chinese students moving about in lorries to public meetings and demonstrations and to strikes. This freedom had been abused until we were faced with large numbers of Chinese students inciting violence and themselves mixed up in rioting. Our duty, Sir, is clear. If no one else will stop these boys and girls from being worked up, intimidated and regimented at their schools by a fanatical few, loaded into lorries, taken down to industrial disputes, pitched into the middle of riots where men are being killed - if no one else will stop them, then the Government must. We have a paramount duty to the parents of these boys and girls to protect their children from corruption, from injury, and possibly from death. We have, therefore, as the House knows, had the Chinese High School and the Chung Cheng School closed down until further notice. I am glad to say this of the Chinese High School, that this order was obeyed in an orderly fashion. At the Chung Cheng High School, on the first morning, several hundred students were in open revolt against the school authorities closing the school. Drastic measures must be taken.

I attribute the rioting on Thursday night to irresponsible political leaders and to Chinese students. It was they who had deliberately provoked widespread industrial unrest and, by a vicious emotional campaign, aroused the workers against the Police. Thus they succeeded in creating an acute state of emergency - a state of emergency that was contained and ended only by the discipline and the steadiness of the Police. It was they who paid the price for saving Singapore from disaster. No doubt the enemies of the Government - both open and secret - are well content. What could be better calculated to prevent this Government, this newly-elected Government, carrying out its election programme - its programme for social and economic progress in Singapore - and thus consolidating its support from the people? There are those who do not want this Government to succeed. They want it to fail. They want to create chaos in Singapore, so that Communism may spring out of the ruins and establish its ruthless dictatorship. So they have exploited the workers, inflaming them against the Police and inciting them to violence. That is not the way to better things, to better working conditions, to a higher share in the country's wealth for the workers, better housing and health and schooling, to responsible self-government and independence. That is the way to chaos and ruin and Communism. I only hope that the awful events of these last few days have opened the eyes of the workers of Singapore that these leaders of the extreme Left are leading them not to better things, but to disaster and Communism.

We on this side of the House, Sir, believe that our ways are true ways, but we cannot go along it if there is no peace in the land, if Singapore is kept in a state of continued emergency. We hope that this House will unanimously support us in our determination to stop violence and disorder, and will give us such emergency powers as are or may be needed to keep peace and order - for keep the peace we must and will. If stern measures have to be taken, they will be taken; and those who persist in inciting peaceful citizens to become murderous rioters will be dealt with.

In approving this motion, I ask all Members of this House to declare themselves wholeheartedly behind us in our task to proving that democracy and self-government can work in Singapore. We on this side of the House, as the Government, are responsible to this Assembly. All of us in this Assembly are responsible to the people of Singapore for its peace, for its wise government, and for its progress towards self-government and independence. It is the primary task of each and every one of us in this House to see that peace is maintained here and that we progress in an orderly manner. He who is not with us in this task is against us, and is against the true interests of Singapore, and if any there be here who do not believe in peace and democracy, let him now declare it.

I ask this House to treat my motion this morning as a vote of confidence in the Government.

Inche Mohd. Sidik Bin Haji Abdul Hamid (Southern Islands): Mr Speaker, Sir, I rise to second the motion moved by the Hon. the Chief Secretary. Sir, the reason for my seconding the motion is that this country needs the security and safety of the lives and property of the people.

Question proposed.

Mr Speaker: No one wishes to speak? I will put the Question. The Question is -

Mr John Ede (Tanglin) rose -

Mr Speaker: Mr Ede.

Mr John Ede: Mr Speaker, Sir, I rise to address this House in full consciousness of the fact that the good of the country at this juncture can only be assured if we are willing to rise above party considerations to the highest interests of the State; that is to say, to the safety and welfare of every man, woman and child on this island who breathes the spirit of Singapore, or in other words, the vast majority of the population. Unfortunately, I feel bound to say that the Government, in its short term of office, took too long to rise above the level of party rivalry, and we have been watching with growing concern the struggle between the Labour Front - the ruling Party - and the People's Action Party for the control of trade unions for political ends, failing dismally to see what a dangerous game they were playing. The Progressive Party members of this House will, nevertheless, support the Government's determination today to maintain law and order, provided that they turn their faces away from thoughts of political advantage to the hard and not necessarily unrewarding business of government. Let us remind ourselves that the wound which has eaten deeply into the vitals of this island is stemmed and not healed, and unless it is cauterized firmly and effectively, it will fester and poison the whole body politic. The worst of a serious crisis is over, we hope, but the causes of that crisis have yet to be removed, lest we drift into another, and proper remedies can only be applied when the causes have been thoroughly diagnosed.

In looking into some of these causes, I hope I may have your permission, Sir, to look just a short way back into past history, because while we know only too well where the true enemy lies, the Government cannot be exonerated from all blame for these tragic events.

The Labour Front threw itself into the recent election campaign with an Opposition mentality, a platform which in some respects, to say the least of it, was disingenuous, and an orgy of hatred of the Progressive Party, which was labelled as the opponent of Labour's twin bogeys - colonialism and capitalism - conveniently overlooking the fact that the Progressive Party had done more than any other Party to send colonialism on its way out, and that capitalism is to be found in Soviet Russia as much as in the United States or Britain. However, by the strange process of democratic arithmetic that afflicts elections when there are a number of parties in the field, 42,000 votes out of 150,000 put into power the very Party which had conditioned itself to years of happy irresponsibility in opposition. Their extravagance of outlook, pardonable in an election campaign, has taken longer to wear off than the country can afford, and the rhetoric in which the Chief Minister indulged at the first sitting of this Assembly must, I fear, be regarded as, to some extent, responsible for the disasters of last week. Can one use the following words in this House -

"It is the labourer thrown on the slag-heap of our gold-mining town who made our prosperity and fortunes. The smouldering embers of this slag-heap threw out poisonous fumes of hatred so bitter that it cannot distinguish between the system and the rulers," - can one, I say, use these words and then three days later go down in person to solve a strike and not expect to get a snub from workers whose "poisonous fumes of bitter hatred" one has oneself aggravated and at a time when the situation was still not out of control? Even in his broadcast to the people of Singapore last Thursday, my hon. Friend could not resist the flamboyant ring of "the dreadful effects of more than a century of Colonialism and cruel uninhibited Capitalism". Was there need for such verbal dramatics, when even at that moment the drama, the tragic stark drama, was being enacted of the "cruel, uninhibited" battering to death of men in Alexandra Road? And surely by thundering against Colonialism, which is so far on its way to extinction that even the Bandoeng conference could not take it seriously, and by inveighing against the wickedness of Capitalism, these two "Isms", dressed up by the Labour Front in the guise of virulent and uncontrollable monsters, the livelihood of the masses which you desire to protect was at once endangered. You cannot have workers, Sir, without employers. Both must work together in increasing harmony for the country's good. Admonish the employer if he is unreasonable, but do not hold him up to contempt with such terms as a cruel, uninhibited capitalist, as such intemperate language can only breed hatred and destroy the harmony which is so necessary if we are determined to rid our country of the present evils that beset it. If you undermine confidence in the future, you choke expansion in industrial and commercial enterprise; and if you do that, there will be less factories and shops, less employment, and less wages. Competition and full employment borne on the wings of security alone will bring better living for the workers of this country. Our interpretation of events is, therefore, this - that Government was too obsessed with the need to honour impossible election pledges and, alas, too blind to what the People's Action Party really stood for to take serious enough account of what happened as early as the 25th April. I refer to the appearance of those misguided singing and dancing Chinese middle school students as strike sympathisers for the first time on an organised basis, which from that moment made it impossible for the workers to exercise their free will in deciding their own interests.

The warnings were not heeded, and the growing challenge of the next two and a half weeks against law and order was not taken up strongly enough to avoid the disasters of last Thursday, as they should have been avoided.

The use of force is an action which all of us would ponder deeply before adopting, but the worst thing still was to show weakness in the face of a ruthless enemy whose "pattern of action followed the Communist technique" - to use the Chief Minister's own words. But the truth of the matter is that the Government failed to act responsibly at the first signs of trouble when that very "pattern of action" began to unfold itself. They wanted, if possible, to avoid the risk of unpopularity which taking stern action always brings, hoping that, by waiting, the dispute would solve itself.

Yet "the forces of chaos" which the Chief Minister only announced for the first time on Thursday night were there plain for all to see - well over a fortnight ago. And in our view it was Government's plain duty at that early stage to have made a clear distinction between the innocent and the guilty; between the ordinary and legitimate striker and the subversive agent and agitator; between the boy and girl with their books and the bands of regimented student-provocateurs. They failed to act on these lines; hesitant to submerge party interests in the national interests; still vying for votes among the workers with the People's Action Party, and taking the chance that the affair would blow over and that they could claim a victory in which both the innocent and the guilty would then be found on their side.

And what happened? The sinister forces of evil were fortified by the realisation that the Government would bend over backwards rather than take a firm line. The gangsters, the hooligans moved in behind the strike agitators; and the Chinese students danced and chanted with increasing defiance.

So matters moved to the inevitable climax, and the bloody blows began to fall, with the Chief Minister still trying to cloak their hideousness behind an announcement about Professor Arthur Lewis of the University of Manchester.

What of the three Chinese schools which are now closed, so that innocent children must be deprived of their education along with the guilty, whose activities demonstrate that they are not fit to be in these schools? Two weeks ago, in our view, the Government had the chance to separate the sheep from the goats; those who stayed in schools from those who went off in their lorries in clearly defined groups to mingle with the strikers. But no action was taken. If this student insubordination had been tackled at the right time, the schools might well be open today, and law-abiding children would be carrying on with their lessons.

Sir, the innocent students, like the innocent strikers, had to suffer with the guilty, because the Government would not do the right thing at the right time, and because previously they had in indecent haste begun to tear down the barriers put up long ago against the forces of chaos, by revoking a number of Emergency Regulations.

We in this part of the House recognise the need, the imperative need, for the reimposition of the Regulation which is before us today. We welcome the declaration of the Government that they are resolved to govern henceforth with the utmost firmness; and in view of what has been said this morning, in the national interests, we will side with them in this time of crisis to strengthen and support them with equal resolution. We are confident that not only the 38,000 who voted Progressive at the elections, but all those who have seen the Red lights of warning in the Singapore sky will expect us to do our duty to support the Government above all party considerations and affiliations. In doing so, we shall be gladly available for consultation should they want our counsel. We shall ask them to re-examine with the greatest care any new legislation to be introduced which could again open the doors and let in the forces of evil. And we shall forego the thoughts of party advantage if the Government, in the national interests, have to go back on part of their party programme, as we trust they will. Let us never forget in this Chamber, where traditions are still in the making, that Singapore is greater than ourselves, greater than any political party, and that freedom has no meaning if there is no security.

Mr Lee Kuan Yew (Tanjong Pagar): Mr, Speaker, Sir, I have not come this day with prepared speeches, with long reports and long narratives of things I wish the people to listen to without having to prove them. I am glad that it is to two Englishmen that I rise to reply on behalf of the People's Action Party. I would have preferred the vile accusations that have been slung at us today by the Hon. the Chief Secretary to come from the Hon. the Chief Minister (Mr Marshall). I think he would have weighed his words with more care, with more circumspection, and with more understanding of the difficulties and the dangers of the situation; with more understanding of the hopes, fears and aspirations of people who think alike with him, but who disagree with him that the Labour Front is a vehicle through which such hopes and aspirations can be achieved. I am relieved that it is to a colonial official and to an expatriate who has resided here for seven out of the last ten years -

Mr R. Jumabhoy (Telok Ayer): We cannot hear!

Mr Lee Kuan Yew: I am much obliged to the hon. Member. I take it that no one in the Progressive Party had the courage to say the things that the Member for Tanglin (Mr John Ede) with 4,000 expatriate votes had the courage to say this morning. But I would like today to meet, apart from Parliamentary levity, the full charge that has been levied against the People's Action Party. The Chief Secretary would wish to put the People's Action Party and its leaders on trial on the floor of this House. We stand accused because he has recited this narrative, and in this narrative no one but the People's Action Party comes out as the devil of the piece. Let me tell him that we have not come here as prisoners to be accused, or as prisoners who must discharge the burden of their guilt. We have come here as representatives of the people, and we shall speak as such. The Chief Secretary has said that the Member for Tanjong Pagar should declare what he stands for, apart from clever sophistry. I think, Sir, I have been accused of many things in my life, but not even my worst enemy has ever accused me of being afraid to speak my mind. What I say now is on my behalf and on behalf of the People's Action Party. The People's Action Party cannot be responsible for every single member of the Party, but let me say here and now what the People's Action Party stands for. If what the Chief Secretary said was true, then he would have found the People's Action Party completely and wholeheartedly with him. We have said time and time again that we stand for a free, independent, democratic, non-Communist Malaya, and I say it today - now. The Chief Secretary wants to know what I would say, without quibble, about Communism and colonialism. But it is not sophistry, Sir; it is an honesty which transcends temporary expediency when I say that I will not fight Communism to support colonialism. Not all the riots will make me do it. But I say here and now that if I had the choice between democracy - an independent, democratic Malaya - a Communist Malaya, and a colonial Malaya, I have no hesitation in choosing and in fighting for an independent, democratic Malaya. There is no sophistry in that choice. And the Chief Secretary may wonder why it was -

The Minister for Communications and Works (Mr Francis Thomas): It takes two people to fight!

Mr Lee Kuan Yew: Sir, I would fight for it against anyone!

Mr Speaker: We must have order. No interruptions.

Mr Lee Kuan Yew: Mr Speaker, Sir, I am obliged for your kindness, but I am not a person to seek protection from those who hope that, perhaps, a happy word here and there might disrupt what is absolutely true. We will not fight the Communists or other Fascists to preserve the colonial system. Let the Colonial Office officials here take note that that is the feeling of a vast majority of the people, particularly the younger people of this country. But we will fight, if we have something worth while to fight for. It is no use for the Member for Tanglin to say, "Self-government is bound to come." They have been telling us that for months, for years and years. Give it to us now and we will fight Communism or any other ideology that seeks to destroy an independent, democratic Malaya. That is the first stand of the People's Action Party, and let there be no sophistry construed upon that.

The second stand of the People's Action Party is equally unequivocal and clear. We seek to destroy the colonial system and we seek to do so by methods of non-violence. We abjure violence as a method of achieving political ends. We have said that before, and we say that now, that we are opposed to any group, or any quarter from which violence comes.

Those are the two grave doubts which the Chief Secretary has sought to cloud over the People's Action Party. Having made clear those two stands - and as I say I speak for myself and for the Party I represent - I can now proceed to answer his account, his conclusive and decisive judgment, on what were the causes of the unhappy events of the 12th May.

Mr Speaker, Sir, the Chief Secretary would like to have me to answer for my clients. I am the legal adviser to the Singapore Bus Workers' Union. I am the legal adviser to the Preparatory Committee of the Chinese Students Union. Therefore, I am the devil of the piece. Therefore the People's Action Party, and myself in particular, were the people who fomented, who instigated, who fed the flames that finally broke out into the rioting of the 12th May. It is simple. It is easy. But it is a pity that if what he said was true, he did not have the courage to get his Attorney-General, who is today absent, to take those things to a court of law and prove them. He has made very serious charges against several of my colleagues. In so far as they are personal charges, my colleagues will answer them. But in so far as they are allegations against the People's Action Party, I will deal with them now.

Let me first, to get these things in perspective, give another account - another viewpoint - of these facts, of these events, which led to the riots of the 12th May. To the Chief Secretary it was a case quite simply of unreasonable workers who linked arms and sat on the floor and blocked the gates of a bus depot; who were gently and gingerly, with as little force as possible, removed. And then there descended like locusts hordes of agitators, out to exploit the situation, to fan the flames of bitterness and hatred that finally blew up on the 12th May! It is quite simple - there were the workers, unreasonable; there were these hidden enemies who came and fomented them; there were the students who fed, instigated and stiffened their morale for worse and worse things.

I think I should proceed, first, with how the dispute was solved. For it was not his firm, his efficient Police Force that resolved this dispute. It was not even the Emergency Regulation for which he now seeks the approval of the House. It was, if I may say so with great respect, the patient handling, the firm understanding of the Chief Minister which led to a solution of what was a very important industrial dispute, which involved a basic trade union principle, and which so bestirred the workers of this colony that they were prepared to go on a general strike to establish this principle. Had it been the Member for Tanglin and his friends who, together with the colonial officials, had to deal with such a situation, I can assure them that all their threats of use of force would not have been any use at all in solving something which was a human problem.

In February this year, 250 out of the 300 workers in the Hock Lee Bus Company joined the Singapore Bus Workers' Union. Sir, before I proceed, as a matter of formality, I should declare that I acted as their counsel at the Commission of Inquiry - but what I have to say I will say regardless of whether I had an interest to declare. On the formation of this Union on the 24th February, the employer announced in the Chinese Press the formation of another union in the same company. He announced also that since he expected industrial unrest, he was recruiting, and he had recruited, 200 workers to meet any trouble. Six days before the formation of that Union, to prove his good faith in trade unionism, he dismissed the two organisers of this branch union. Needless to say, when the Union was formed, the first dispute was the reinstatement of these two men. Eventually they succeeded in obtaining the reinstatement of one, through arbitrators - but not before very strenuous attempts had been made to buy the man off. A company director offered the man who was dismissed, in order to get him to go away, to forget all about trade unionism - offered him for this three months' pay from the company and three months from his own personal pocket and if he should wish to go for further studies, all expenses for further studies would be met by him personally. The offer was spurned. The worker was reinstated.

Then the company systematically recruited redundant workers into a spare pool and put all these workers into a union which he formed with a few old employees who did not join the Singapore Bus Workers' Union. And thus was created a second union in the company. It was this that bedevilled the whole of the relationship between the employees of the Bus Company and the Hock Lee Amalgamated Bus Company Limited. It was this that made any settlement in good faith between the parties almost an impossibility. It would still have been an impossibility were it not for the fact that the employer finally conceded that their union was bogus. He repudiated the union, and the union agreed to dissolve itself. That is the background of the dispute which, so far as the Chief Secretary was concerned, was not a matter of relevance. But so far as my clients were concerned, it was a constant irritant in the whole dispute.

The first series of disputes was settled by an agreement between the company and the Singapore Bus Workers' Union on the 4th April, but that was just a temporary lull because the employer was, then, not yet ready with his full force to take over when there should be a strike or, as it turned out, when he dismissed the lot of them. Recruitment went on apace into this spare pool. He even departed from his customary practice of not paying anything to the band of drivers and conductors waiting for permanent employment should there be a vacancy, by paying persons in this spare pool $2 a day per person. They were forced to join his union. They paid no subscription fees, no entrance fees; they were given badges. They were no more than 'black legs', all the time waiting on the side-lines ready for the moment when the employer was ready to take over. In that situation no real goodwill was possible between employer and employee.

A minor dispute arose about the interpretation of two clauses in that agreement. The employer refused to give any increment to nine people whom he had promised increment by agreement. The employer refused to put on the permanent establishment two of the spare workers who were most senior and who ought to have been put on because one term of the agreement said that spare workers should be put on the permanent establishment according to seniority. They were minor things which would have fizzled out with a bit of goodwill on either side, but because of this real fight between a union fighting for survival against an employer determined to break the union, the untiring efforts of the Chief Minister did not meet with any success for quite some time - because the company would not admit that it could not break this union by forming its own 'yellow' union.

Sir, the Chief Minister - I beg his pardon - the Chief Secretary - (the Chief Minister has not accused me of anything yet; in fact, in a moment, I hope it was not alone, of elation, he complimented counsel involved in the case for their civic consciousness and said a few other kind things.) And I am glad that it is not he who has pointed the accusing finger at me and said, "What have you done, you scoundrel!" Let me say now that if it were not for the constant efforts of those whom he would believe to be the forces of evil, there would have been a great deal more trouble for the Hon. the Chief Secretary and his friends.

I was called into the dispute on the morning of the 27th April, when this House was sitting for the second day. At 6.15 that morning I was summoned by the Bus Workers' Union to go down to the garage at Alexandra Road where there had been - as the Chief Secretary would put it - a very gentle and restrained effort to remove workers who were obstructing the gates of the garage. The Chief Secretary would have us believe that there were two who feigned injuries, lay on the ground, moaned away, and disappeared when the ambulance came! Sir, I had this one advantage over the Chief Secretary in that I was there at a quarter past six that morning, and he was not. I have no desire, either in this House or outside, to exacerbate or in any way irritate the feelings of mobs or workers against the Police or against the Government. And I have no desire, therefore, to describe the somewhat lurid scene which I witnessed that morning. But let me tell him that it was not as he was informed. In my whole life I have never seen Chinese workers emotional and distraught; but at that moment I found drivers and conductors, ordinary workers, literally sobbing their hearts out with pain, frustration and bitterness. It was a scene which I hope I will never witness again as long as the Chief Minister is in office. I came to the Assembly that day and I never - I could have if I wanted to, as the Chief Secretary would have us believe - made political capital out of this. I could have raised this quite easily to the embarrassment of the Chief Minister and his colleagues, who did not know what had happened that morning. I congratulated them when, the moment they came to know of what had happened, they appointed a Commission of Inquiry into the facts and circumstances of the dispute, and a little while later appointed a commission to inquire into the force, or alleged force, that was used that day.

Sir, the Chief Secretary would have us believe that on that little bit of very restrained police action a crowd of agitators and hate-mongers were able to foment and blow up a great deal of bitterness, anger and emotions which finally overcame them on 12th May. I do not know if he has ever tried to go to a crowd of people, such as clerical servants in the Secretariat, and tried to excite them over things which are not true. I could also, if I were given time and given notice, write a seven-page manuscript closely typed, giving a full recital of what took place from another point of view, but I think it serves very little purpose unless we are to have the whole matter once again before the public eye, and before tempers have died down. To my personal knowledge there were several cases where more than just the necessary force was used.

The next step in the dispute in which the Chief Secretary would have us believe that the People's Action Party deliberately frustrated every attempt at settlement, was when after considerable effort, despite very strong, very bitter feelings on the part of the workers against the management, I was able to convince and persuade the Secretary of the Union and the Committee of the Branch to go to the Commission of Inquiry, to place their case before the Commission and settle the dispute in a peaceful and orderly fashion. I say once more I am glad that it was not the Chief Minister who has accused the People's Action Party of these things, because if he had I think he would find it very uncomfortable to be reminded of certain negotiations in which both he and I were involved. But, no doubt, his Chief Secretary has no knowledge of these things.

That night, after the award was given in Court, it was found that the Secretary of the Union and the Branch Committee had misjudged the temper of the men, that they were more bitter, more frustrated [Interruption.] and it was not until the early hours of the next morning that the Secretary and myself were able to persuade and reason with the men to do what was the right thing. There was so much bitterness, distrust and suspicion from the employees towards the employer. At four o'clock in the morning the employees told me that the employer was out to trick them, and would make them sign a form when they went back, to register individually for employment. If that happened, they would not go back to work. To forestall any such hitch, any such difficulty, I called at, at four o'clock in the morning, the residence of counsel for the Hock Lee Bus Company, woke him from his slumber, after considerable difficulty with his Alsatian dog, and informed him that everything was all right, but that he was to warn his client not to do anything which he should not do, such as requesting his employees to sign forms, which they had never done before. In my presence he rang up his client, the Manager of the Company. At first he allowed me to speak to his client, which I did. I informed his client that the men would be ready to go back to work at quarter past five, and that they would be glad if he would lend us transport to collect all the necessary paraphernalia of their work - punches, ticket pads, arm badges - and I warned him not to ask them to sign any forms. I then passed the telephone to his own counsel who, in my presence, told him: "Now, do not do anything foolish! Do not ask them to sign anything new!" I went home, and went to what I thought was a well-earned rest.

I was awakened at nine and informed that the Union was told by the men that they were asked to sign forms, and the men walked out. All the buses stopped and they refused to go on. The employer had an explanation, and it was, for reasonable people like his lawyers, a very good explanation. He did not want anything that would prejudice the employees. All he wanted of them was to sign a piece of paper which said: - this is my name, this is my badge number, this is the bus I am on; information which he had, and had never asked for before.

But that little device to have a psychological victory over his employees made further attempts to bring the parties together before the real core of dispute was got rid of, an impossible task. Sir, we went on with the Inquiry hoping that the employer would see sense. We invited him to have direct negotiations and settle this dispute. He refused. He was going to have it out. He was going to fight it out. He was a very brave man, but a very foolish one, because he was not only fighting the Hock Lee Bus Company employees, but he was fighting the whole of the trade union movement in Singapore, including a lot of the trade unions which the Chief Secretary knows are strong supporters of the Labour Front. They, as much as any other union, were angered by the disreputable and contemptible methods of their employer.

Sir, the Chief Secretary has complained about the attitude of some sections of the Chinese Press in their presentation of the events of the last week. I do not have any complaint. I just wish to record a fact - that we are really living in different worlds: those who read the English Press, those who read the Chinese Press, those who read the Malay Press, and those who read the Indian Press. In the Chinese Press, in the Malay Press and the Indian Press, everyday, was published the evidence presented before the Commission of Inquiry, the evidence of how the workers were cajoled, were coerced, to join the employer's union on recruitment. Evidence was heard of how the employer tried to buy trade union leaders over with rewards, and of all the other disreputable tactics which readers of the English Press were so happily spared. I do not wish to have it said that the People's Action Party is against the English Press or any other Press. They own the newspapers. Subject to what the general law has to say, they have the right to publish what they wish. But it was this clear divergence between the actions of the English and the Chinese Press which explains the complete difference of two sections of public opinion. In every coffee-shop in town - I think the Chief Secretary's very efficient C.I.D. could have told him this - the Chinese-speaking people were talking about the Hock Lee Bus workers. They knew the Hock Lee Bus Company. They knew what was happening, and the thing was before their eyes everyday.

English-speaking people only knew about counsel for the employer asking whether my clients and witnesses support the Chinese People's Government in Peking. This has nothing to do with the case. But it was very good. It created the sort of atmosphere in which genuine trade unionists become subversive elements of this vast Communist conspiracy which spreads out from Peking. That was what got reported one day in one English paper. And so it was that when the thing blew up we found ourselves in Singapore in two completely different segments.

So far as the trade union world was concerned, there was no doubt - I think the Chief Minister would be the first to acknowledge it - that all trade unionists were solidly behind the fight for survival of the Singapore Bus Workers' Union's Branch in the Hock Lee Bus Company, Limited, It was a straight fight between an employer who had decided, the day the union was formed in his company, that he was going to crush it, and who then systematically set out to recruit redundant workers whom he fed at two dollars a day, whom he forced into his own union. He just waited for the time which he knew was coming when wage claims would be made, and an industrial dispute would arise, and either they would go on strike, in which case he would just carry on with his new workers; or he would dismiss them, which was what he did. It was a plain straight fight for survival. That was the basic cause of the bitterness, the hostility, the anger in the dispute.

The Chief Secretary hinted - I cannot say that he did more than hint - that there were other genuine trade disputes in town. But this one was not. This one was subversive. But there are about 30,000 trade unionists, I think, who knew better, men with very good credentials who know that what the Chief Secretary hinted at is completely untrue.

Let us look at the solution. Was it the Emergency Regulation? Was it the firm and tactful handling of the Police which resolved, which averted a wave of industrial unrest throughout Singapore and in which many unions which supported the Government Benches on the other side were going to be involved? If the Member for Tanglin (Mr Ede) and his crowd had been in, I have no doubt whatsoever that they would have dealt with it as good employers deal with good employees. I am quite sure that they would have dealt with them in a suitably firm and decisive manner. Whether their firm and decisive handling would have solved the dispute with less bitterness and violence and unhappiness is quite another matter.

I am not in the habit of giving unnecessary compliments to my opponents, Mr Speaker, Sir. But if I may mention what I consider to have been a very strong influence in bringing about a solution, it was the untiring patience of the Chief Minister and his determined spirit to get a peaceful settlement. Even I nearly gave up trying for a peaceful settlement. A vicious employer should have it out with his employees, and that is the way trade unionism has grown up in other parts of the world. But he was determined. "Let us have peace!" In fact, his flamboyance, his colourful rhetoric was able, where the workers were not able earlier, to make the employer see the stupidity of going on with his policy of repression of trade unions. The moment that point was conceded, that the employer recognised the Singapore Bus Workers' Union, and would dissolve - he did not want to dissolve it because he kept up the fiction to the end; he said: "I cannot dissolve the Union since I am not an official of the Union, but I would cease to recognize it, and I shall get the Union officials to dissolve the Union; and the Union officials have obliged me and said 'Yes, we will sign on the dotted line, and we will dissolve ourselves' " - the moment that happened, there was a complete transformation. The tension died down. The whole dispute settled into an ordinary normal industrial dispute, with no extra bitterness. But before that point was conceded, it was a fight for survival, and one in which I could not have prevented the workers from fighting for existence. I think the Chief Secretary was careful throughout his seven pages of narrative never to have, at any single time, held his finger at the strikers for violence. Not one single striker to my knowledge, and I think to the knowledge of the Chief Secretary, has been arrested for having done anything which involved the use of force. They did squat on the ground; they did link arms. It was passive resistance in the best traditions of another struggle elsewhere. They did it as a gesture of protest against the men inside, the `black legs', 150 to 200 of them. They showed to the others inside what their jobs meant to them, what their union meant for them. They could have gone back and signed individually, and their employer would have taken them back, giving them back their jobs but without their union. But they did it as a gesture of protest to show the employer and the 'black legs' that this is what they think of themselves, of their jobs and their union. I find myself in agreement with that policy of passive resistance of people who are determined to stand for what is right. But I am in complete disagreement when any force is used to oppose what must inevitably come, a forcible removal of the workers. To my knowledge there was never any resistance - no force was ever used against any policeman who ejected them.

We have always stood against the use of force or violence in any form, whether as a method of resolving a trade dispute, or as a method of achieving political objectives. We have said so openly. The Chief Secretary would wish to know what the leaders of the People's Action Party were doing when the riots were on. The police had given out messages, saying: "Do not go out into the area!" If the leaders of the People's Action Party had turned up in the area, they were likely to have been involved in a skirmish with the police, who would have been quite convinced that they had gone there to stir up the mob. But let me tell the Chief Secretary this - and I had no intention of telling this earlier, even though it has been distorted in an English newspaper. This English newspaper said that I asked for police protection to go down and speak to the rioters. Sir, I have never asked for police protection, and I did not ask for police protection. But I did suggest to the police that if we would be allowed to go into the area, we would be prepared to meet the mob. We are not people who run away from trouble.

Mr Speaker, Sir, when you fight a colonial system, there are bound to be a lot of side-eddies and cross-currents. We are not frightened or intimidated just because something untoward happened and the mobs got out of hand. I was prepared to go down there, and I was quite prepared to face that mob and tell them to disperse, if I had any power with them at all. Even if I had not, I would have tried.

Well, now, of course the Chief Secretary would want us to believe that we engineered this whole bag of tricks just to terrify the Labour Front, just to break the Chief Minister and his colleagues. I think, other than the Chief Minister, no one worked harder than myself to see that his Government and its policy of firm but understanding handling of the situation succeeded.

Sir, I said before that if I went into all the lurid details of what took place and gave it from another point of view, there would be further trouble. But if the Press would refrain from publishing some of the things which I think I must mention just in passing - I would say that if there was no force used, in the way in which some people alleged was used in the later stages - I was not there myself - but if it was not used in that way, it would have been impossible to get that degree of animosity and hostility. It is a difficulty of people from other countries of never understanding the Asian mind, and they try to hide their embarrassment behind a sneer. There is a great deal of uneasiness at the moment because the four people who carried the dead body to the General Hospital were detained, released, detained - arrested at 1.30 a.m. on the morning of the 13th when they appeared at the General Hospital, released at 4 p.m. in the afternoon of the 13th, re-arrested on the 14th, released in the afternoon of the 14th, recalled to the C.I.D. yesterday afternoon. Sir, some of the matters cannot be referred to in this place, but one of the four persons is now, I am reliably informed, very gravely ill in the General Hospital, with internal injuries which he did not have at the time he took the corpse to the General Hospital. I witnessed a scene yesterday with the mother wailing beside her son in obvious pain lying on a lorry. A new storm was gathering, and we the trouble-makers, we got someone into the lorry and whipped the man off to the General Hospital before the crowd got too big.

But the Chief Secretary must have his theory, and he must justify some of these things he would wish to do. What better opportunity than this one to justify every Emergency Regulation, every strong, firm colonial action? Before it was just colonial. Now, in the name of Democracy he can do all these things. "Give us those powers." They were quite unnecessary. I do not blame the Chief Secretary, or the Chief Minister for that matter, for having acceded to the request of his police officers for stronger powers, because the colonial police have different traditions from that of other police forces in independent countries like Britain for instance. Whenever they are faced with a new situation other than the arresting of hawkers and the taking down of traffic offences - anything out of the ordinary - "Let us have new powers. Let us deal with them, but we cannot deal with them under the ordinary law."

There are sections in the Penal Code which deal with an unlawful assembly, and there are other sections which deal with many other offences which may be committed by an unlawful assembly. If it is true, what the Chief Secretary said about these vicious speeches being made on the picket line, then I say it is wrong of the police not to have proceeded under the law as they had the right to do. Anyone fomenting unrest, anyone deliberately provoking hatred to a point where it is bound to break out into violence, must be held responsible for his words. He should have been apprehended and charged, and the police would have the full support of the People's Action Party. But what we object to now, and what we have always objected to, is this insinuation, this smear of evil forces working behind the scenes, behind the People's Action Party and its leaders.

Sir, I have never said one word, either before the election, during the election or after the election, which I wish now to retract. I have been misreported on one occasion. I have corrected that Press report, and I do not retract any word that I said then. It is no use, Mr Speaker, Sir, to tell the people: "You cannot have Democracy. You are not fit for it. You will be devoured by the Communists. Let us first fight the Communists." It does not work. It does not strike one bell anywhere in the hearts of any patriotic Malayan who would wish to see an independent, democratic, non-Communist Malaya. We are not prepared to fight to perpetuate or to prolong the colonial system. But give us our rights and we will fight the Communists or any others who threaten the existence of an independent, democratic, non-Communist Malaya. It is one of those difficult things, because when you are under tutelage, your masters say: "Let me measure your fitness for independence. Let me see whether you have sufficient numbers of literate people, sufficient civil servants, sufficient scientists, doctors, lawyers, sufficient good, mature, old, steady political leaders. If you satisfy this nebulous test, which I have not published beforehand, then you shall have your independence. You shall have your freedom."

One of the worst things about violence is that it so very often succeeds - and that is the real tragedy of Malaya. You never can have, Mr Speaker, Sir, a Malayan who really believes that the British would release their hold without our creating a situation which makes it wise and cogent for the British Government as benign governors and rulers to give us and concede us our independence. It is only when such conditions existed that the British left India and said: "We knew the Indians were ripe for independence. We quitted. So did we leave Burma; so did we leave Ceylon. But we cannot leave Malaya. Malaya is not ready for independence." But the whole world does not challenge the right of the Siamese to govern themselves. By any of the tests, either posed by Sir Anthony Eden or by any colonial governor or colonial official, I think this island in comparison with Siam - perhaps I should put it the other way in case I should offend the Consul General for Siam - but I would say with great respect that we have as many educated people as the Siamese, that we have as many able leaders as the Siamese, that we have less changes of government, we have less violence with changes of government. But there the Americans are determined to defend the rights of the Siamese to self-government, to independence. Arms, ammunition, men - I do not know; I am told by the Press very few men - are being poured into it, to make sure that that country remains an independent, sovereign state. Everybody says: "Look, what has happened in Indonesia. Chaos, violence, corruption, disaster." But nobody challenges the right of the Indonesians to their sovereign right, their divine right of self-determination, and nobody says that the Dutch should go back and tell their former pupils that they have misjudged the maturity of the Indonesians.

I said it once before, badly reported, and I have corrected it, and I will say here and now that if you want an independent, democratic and non-Communist Malaya, then let us have something worth while to fight for at once. Give us something worth while to defend. Give us proof that you will not fight us. But I can say here and now: it is impossible for any person, any political party, to fight the British and fight the Communists. It is not possible, and of the two, the British are in control, so you fight the British alone. But give us our rights, and we shall fight anyone - anyone as Mr Thomas said, the present Minister for Transport, and for a short while the Minister for Housing - we will fight the Communists or anybody else to defend our freedom.

That is what I believe in, and that is what my Party believes in, but you will not get the People's Action Party to join the colonial band-wagon on this anti-Communist hysteria. I have said before in this Assembly that it is not a simple matter of evil men out to destroy good. If it were so simple, the problem would not he so difficult throughout the world as it is. It is a question of men who want to do good, but men who find frustrations, impossibilities, who then slowly decide that this particular system is a way of resolving a bad situation which they dislike. I myself am not convinced that the Communist revolution and its technique is the only way or is the right way to resolve colonialism in Malaya. It is because I believe that the British may be sensible enough sooner or later, and I hope it is sooner, that if you want this Malaya to be democratic, to be independent, to be part of the free world, then - I will not invoke God for this - but I would say: "Do it quickly, whether it is for God's sake, or for the sake of Malaya - for the sake of their political beliefs which they have preached, whether they believe in them or not at the time they preached them, but for the sake of those political beliefs which sometimes have sparked the hopes, the ideals of some of those who came within their system."