BOGUS INSURANCE COMPANIES

Mr Speaker: Questions 1* and 2+ have been postponed to 29th July, 1963.

*Question No. 1 stood in the name of Mr Low Por Tuck -

To ask the Prime Minister who were the members of the Singapore team that attended the inter-governmental financial talks in Kuala Lumpur on 10th and 11th April, 1963.

+Question No. 2 stood in the name of Mr Tee Kim Leng -

To ask the Prime Minister what is the progress in negotiations on the question of compensation for the massacres by the Japanese Army in Singapore in the last war and what further action he intends to take.

Mr Ong Chang Sam asked the Minister for Finance what progress has been made in the action taken against bogus insurance companies since 9th April. 1963.

The Minister for Health and Law (Mr K. M. Byrne) (for the Minister for Finance): Mr Speaker. Sir, the Member for Choa Chu Kang will recall that in the last sitting of the Legislative Assembly in April, he was informed that the process of liquidating bogus insurance companies was in the hands of liquidators appointed by the High Court of Singapore in respect of three insurance companies incorporated in the State, and by the High Court of Malaya in respect of the other 13 insurance companies incorporated in the Federation.

The liquidators of most of these companies are still processing, summarising and sorting out tens of thousands of claims from all over Malaya and Singapore, as well as realising the assets of companies where available. The liquidators of two insurance companies - one from Singapore and the other from Malaya - however, have already begun paying out claims to policy holders, and payments are now almost completed. These payments are practically in full satisfaction of claims by policy holders. The process to make payments of claims to policy holders for another two companies - again one from Singapore and the other from the Federation - is reaching its final stages and claimants will receive their payments within the next three months.

The liquidators for the Singapore company reported that all claims from policy holders can be met in full. The remaining one Singapore insurance company under liquidation proved to be insolvent and some legal action is still necessary before any payment can be made.

As for the other bogus insurance companies incorporated in Malaya, it is not known how long the liquidators will take before any payment to policy holders can be made. However, as stated before, many of these companies were in a poor financial position and it would be optimistic for any policy holder to expect more than a small fraction of his claims to be honoured.