School curriculum

"The following will come into effect as from the beginning of the third term 1959.' And the summary of teaching hours was given: Primary V - 4½ hours a day, six days. 26½ hours. Primary V1 - 4½ hours a day, six days. 26½ hours.

That was what I quoted. And I put in the extra homework, corrections, etc. But the Members on the Government Bench said that teachers do 3½ hours a day when the Education Department circular asked them to do 26½ hours a week. I think the Minister for Education had better look into the schools that are doing 3½ hours, if there are any.

Inche Baharuddin Bin Mohamed Ariff (Anson): (In Malay): Mr Speaker, I will not dwell at length on the debate. I will only make a short speech. A moment ago, we heard very many and varied accusations - this and that - from the Member for Mountbatten, that she did not oppose the six-day week principle. I know that she is not opposed to that. I have often heard the teachers say that working six days a week is good, but it is better if the salary is increased in the form of overtime and so on. This is the position. There is the story of a man who is asked to work voluntarily. He says it is good to work voluntarily, but if he is paid it is even better.

Similarly the Member for Mountbatten said just now that she did not disagree, but indirectly she meant that it would be better if the salary was increased. On the whole, Mr Speaker, this matter emanated as a result of the cutting out of the allowances, although the Member for Mountbatten had repeatedly said that she did not mention the butting out of the variable allowances. On the whole, however, the subject centred around the cutting out of the variable allowances. If additional allowances were given for working six days a week, this matter would not have arisen at all.

The Chairman: Order. The Member for Mountbatten made it quite clear that she did not touch on the cutting of salary or the paying of allowances. I do not think the Member should assume that that was in her mind. Nobody can read what is in a person's mind.

Inche Baharuddin Bin Mohamed Ariff: (In Malay): However, on the whole, the theme is like a merry-go-round-it goes back to the cutting of allowances. Teachers are leaders. They are more powerful than the political leaders because the teachers lead the children to think like human beings and live like human beings. When I was at school, I was taught this. The teachers said, "We teachers are leaders, to lead all of you to become useful citizens in the future." But now such words no longer exist because, firstly, their allowances have been cut. They have to work harder and six days a week. In my opinion, Mr Speaker, there is no necessity to debate this question further. We should remember that the population of Singapore is increasing. There is a shortage of schools, shortage of premises, and lack of funds to erect more schools.

Once again, Mr Speaker, I would like to say that the debate which has arisen has centred around nothing more than the cutting of the variable allowances.

Mr Thio Chan Bee: Mr Speaker, Sir, the Deputy Prime Minister made an unhappy comparison which I am sure is not the official attitude of the Government towards teachers. He said that teachers were like dogs and horses-

An hon. Member: And elephants!

Mr Thio Chan Bee: And elephants which could be conditioned to respond to lights and bells. I am sure he did not mean what he said.

He said further that the reason for the large proportion of failures in the Government secondary entrance examination was due to the five-day week. Sir, there were quite a number of schools, among which I am glad to say mine was included, where the proportion of passes was about two-thirds and these schools were run on a five-day week. So that is not the relevant factor. I believe that basically what we need is an attitude towards the teachers which the old-fashioned Chinese had - an old-fashioned practice which we hope will be revived - that the teacher is like the head of a family. His pupils are his children, and on that basis, we shall find that some students need a five-day week, others need a five-and-a-half-day week, and others again will need a six-day week. Once a student has got the habit of studying, he studies on and on. No matter how many days are imposed on a child, unless he has a love for learning, a six-day week simply means one day of additional torture. Whereas if he comes under the right teachers who are regarded as the head of the family - you will find teachers who are willing to teach, as has happened already before, not only five days, but unofficially six days, and part of the seventh day - he will not mind the six-day week. So let us put it to the test of result and public reaction - whether the five-day week will produce the best result or the five-and-a-half-day week, (I think the Chinese schools have a five-and-a-half-day week), or a six-day week. So let us not be rigid. Let us be flexible and open-minded, and judge by the result of this experiment.

Sir, I also feel that one mistake made before is to regard the school as a factory and the teachers and children as so many pieces of wood, to be transferred about. I believe that has produced a condition where the pupils do not regard the school as a home. Now and again there is a new head. Now and again there is a new teacher. We cannot expect a pupil to regard that school as a home where today his father is so and so, and after one year, his father changes: He does not get a home. So I suggest there is something good in the old system in Chinese schools and some aided schools where they permanently post certain teachers and certain heads, and they regard their schools as their homes. I think with that attitude we can contribute a great deal towards nation-building. When we develop in pupils a loyalty to the school to the point where they can regard personal advantage as being secondary to the good of the school, it is quite easy from there to help them to reach the point where loyalty to the nation is more important than loyalty to individual self or individual advantages.

I believe that in January there will be a wholesale transfer of heads and teachers. Maybe it is necessary, but I hope that after the initial mass transfer, gradually there will be stability in the staffing of schools, so that the students will begin to identify the school as a home and the heads and teachers as their foster fathers in the field of education.

On another matter that I raised under the head of Ministry of Finance. Now that the Minister for Education has definitely said that the principle of equality will apply, we need not, therefore, worry about scholarships and bursaries being unfairly allocated. All will be treated in the same way, whether the students are from aided schools, Government schools, Chinese, English, Malay or Tamil schools.

Dr Toh Chin Chye: Mr Speaker, to bring up a point of correction, I have never at any moment in my speech earlier on compared teachers to dogs, horses or elephants. I am quite sure the House remembers very clearly what I said. Never at any time did I say that teachers are horses or elephants. What I did was to bring out an analogy. I have explained to you, Mr Speaker, very clearly the processes of conditioning, and in my speech I gave out examples of how even elephants can be conditioned, so that even they do not grumble about a six-day week.

Mr Yong Nyuk Lin: Mr Speaker, Sir, it is a very forlorn Opposition I see across this table, one a retired school principal in the Member for Mountbatten and the other-

The Prime Minister: About to retire!

7.45 p.m.

Mr Yong Nyuk Lin: A principal who is about to retire and whose appointment comes up for confirmation every year. And quite far away, the Member for Kampong Kembangan who is perhaps the third person who makes the crowd.

I have been criticised for introducing the six-day week, and for requiring teachers to work harder for less pay. I should have thought that our Minister for Finance's Budget speech would have impressed Members of the Opposition with the stark realities of the cost of education. But apparently they are incapable of appreciating the full impact of his remarks. Even in an empty room, Mr Speaker, if there is a noise there will have been an echo. But I presume in the case of the Opposition, it is like a room which is not only empty but a vacuum and void, so that there is no sound nor echo.

We are not a static population. On the contrary, the population of Singapore increases annually at a rate higher than anywhere in the world, thanks perhaps to our efficient Ministry of Health. This single feature of our population has wide ramifications in the social, educational and economic fields. I am for the moment concerned with the educational and economic sectors. The story can be told very simply in figures.

It means that each year some 56,000 to 60,000 children of school-going age want to be admitted into our schools. The annually recurrent and special expenditure for 1960 amounts to $65.3 million, which is almost one-fourth of the total budget for 1960. [I am glad that Members of the Opposition are now increasing in number!] Of this sum, $53 million represents the salaries of 10,000 teachers in Government and aided schools and a few thousand members of the staff. And this is after the cut in the variable allowances in July 1959. 1 think it would be very interesting, Mr Speaker, to disclose at this stage that the cut in variable allowances has affected 7,243 out of the 9,832 teachers, and that the savings for the last half year of 1959 amounted to $3.3 million, or the equivalent of $6.6 million for a full year.

According to the 1957 census figures, those working in the education service amounted to 12,000 people, which is equivalent to less than one per cent of the population of Singapore's one and a half million people. Therefore, simple arithmetic will show that less than one per cent of the population of Singapore is in receipt of $53 million or 20 per cent of the revenue alone. Can this expenditure go on increasing with half a million or one-third of our population illiterate? I say to the teachers: that one per cent of the population receiving 20 per cent of the revenue of the country should prove that they are not only worth 20 times but one hundred times more, as a contribution to the country, now that we have Merdeka, now that we want to build a nation. It is clear that the resources of the Ministry of Education must be expanded to cope with our growing school population, but it is equally clear that economies must be effected in all directions. The cost of new buildings will be carefully watched and cut down to the bone. Economies to the salaries of civil servants which are of general application have brought down the cost of administration in this Ministry. But something more has to be done if these economies are not to be nullified by increases to the numbers of teachers to be employed in our schools. We are going to appoint at least 770 new people for the education service. The solution lies in requiring teachers to put in additional hours of teaching. These measures have been introduced with the greatest reluctance on my part, for I can find no other alternative solution to this problem of mounting costs to provide the education which our children have a right to expect. We have inherited four streams of education which are at different stages of development, and it is our aim to bring about integration, as soon as possible. Parents have complete freedom of choice over the media of instruction in which their children are to be taught. The two common languages in all streams will be Malay and English. Our readers and textbooks in all media must be truly Malayan in content and context. All communal barriers are being torn down. All organisations of school children and sports meetings run on communal lines have been abolished. A very successful display of 6,000 school pupils from all streams for Malam Raksaksa Ra'ayat on Tuesday, 8th December, bears testimony to the new spirit of this Government. A bigger and better show will be organised for National Day on June 3rd next year. In future, our children will meet in friendly competition which will cut across communal feelings and differences. To remove any difficulties that might stand in the way of the full integration of our young people, this Government has intensified its drive to make the idea of a national language a reality. A crash programme of instruction of our teachers in the Malay language is in full swing in the Teachers Training College, and it is hoped that by the end of 1961, we shall have more than 3.000 teachers qualified to teach the national language in our schools.

I wish now to enlarge on certain provisions in the 1960 Estimates not dwelt upon by the Members of the Opposition. This is perhaps the most appropriate time to do so.

In accordance with our declared aim to popularise Malay as the national language of this country, naturally we shall recruit more Malay teachers. This we are doing for 1960. Of the 770 new appointments for the Ministry of Education, one-third, or 252, will be Malay teachers, made up of 50 trained teachers and 202 probationary teachers.

Furthermore, we shall raise the Malay stream from the present primary level to secondary level, and thereafter to university level. As a first step towards the setting up of Malay secondary schoo1s in 1961, teaching at secondary level in Malay will begin next month at the Kallang Secondary School.

Besides an increased provision of $8,400 for Malays in respect of Island scholarships as compared with $3,000 for 1959, and $18,000 for Malays attending English Secondary schools. I wish to draw the attention of the House to the fact that this Government recognises the special position of the Malays by making a special provision of $15,000 for the higher education of Malays in the University of Malaya for 1960. These bursaries will be made available to those who have recently taken the Higher School Certificate Examination and gain admission to the University next year.

I wish now to draw attention to the provision of $50,000 under sub-head 56 for the provision of bursaries to students in the Polytechnic and for technical and vocational education. This is to indicate Government's genuine earnestness to ensure that deserving students should not be prevented from pursuing their studies in technical subjects because of lack of finance. This is in addition to an item for scholarships already provided for in previous years. Then there is sub-head 54 which shows a 50 per cent increase in the provision for Nanyang University students at $600,000 as compared with $400,000 for 1959. It should be added that the increased provision will enable the Government to offer some scholarships to Nanyang University graduates to undergo further studies either in the University of Malaya or universities abroad.

Lastly, I wish to touch upon capitation grants now paid by Government to aided schools which involve a sum of more than $1 million per annum. This, Mr Speaker, falls within various sub-heads known as Grants-in-aid under O.C.A.R. totalling $26.9 million. The existing rates are 50 cents per pupil per month for primary schools, and 75 cents per pupil per month for secondary schools.

According to the Grants-in-Aid Regulations, 1957, capitation grants may be used to cover contingent expenditure for, I quote, "apparatus, stationery, City Council charges, telephone charges, auditing fees", etc. Since auditing fees have been included, I regret to say that certain aided schools have failed to submit their audited accounts to the Ministry of Education as far back as 1957. I have here a list of aided schools which are very much behind in their submission of their accounts. 34 schools have not rendered their 1957 accounts, 33 being Chinese and one Tamil: 37 schools for the 1958 accounts, 36 Chinese and one Tamil. I regret to state that if these audited accounts are not received by the, Ministry of Education by the end of this month, they will not be able to get their capitation grants for 1960.

At this juncture, I wish to state that the 1959 audited accounts should be submitted to the Ministry not later than 30th June, 1960, and so on thereafter.

Question on the amendment put, and negatived.

The sum of $65,338,120 for Head 47 ordered to stand part of the Estimates.

The Chairman: Perhaps the Minister for Finance will check me if I go wrong - the remaining heads of expenditure in respect of which no amendments stand on the Order Paper are, 3, 5, 6, 9 to 16 inclusive, 19, 20, 23, 24, 28, 29, 30, 32, 33, 35, 39, 41 to 44 inclusively and 46.

Question, "That the sums stated for those heads as they appear in the last column of the Abstract of Estimated Expenditure on page 31 of Paper Cmd. (New Series) 32 of 1959", put, and agreed to.

Question, "That the sum of $246,646,260 shall be supplied to the Government under the heads of expenditure for the public services shown in the Estimates contained in Paper Cmd. (New Series) 32 of 1959", put, and agreed to.

Resolution to be reported.

And it being 8 p.m. Mr Speaker left the Chair of the Committee and took the Chair of the Assembly.

Dr Goh Keng Swee: Mr Speaker, Sir, I beg to report that the Committee of Supply has made progress on the Main Estimates, and beg leave to sit again tomorrow, 14th December.

Mr Speaker: So be it.