LEMBAGA GERAKAN PELAJARAN DEWASA (AMENDMENT) BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

3.05 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Education (Inche A. Rahim Ishak) (for the Minister for Education): (In Malay): Mr Speaker, Sir, I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

The Lembaga Gerakan Pelajaran Dewasa, constituted under section 5 of the principal Ordinance, consists of eleven members appointed by the Minister for Education. Under paragraph (c) of section 5, one member is to be appointed on the nomination of the Minister for Labour and Law; under paragraph (f) of the same section, one member is to be appointed from among the tutorial staff of the University of Malaya in Singapore and under paragraph (h) of the same section, two members are to be appointed on the nomination of the Trades Union Congress in Singapore.

Due to the change in ministerial responsibility in the portfolio of Labour and Law and of nomenclature in respect of the University of Malaya in Singapore and to the fact that the Trades Union Congress is no longer in existence, no appointment of members to the Board can be made under paragraphs (c), (f) and (h) of section 5 of the principal Ordinance. Therefore, it is necessary to amend these paragraphs to enable the Minister for Education to make such appointments.

To avoid going to the Legislative Assembly in future for amendments such as those I have just mentioned, it is considered that the Minister for Education should be empowered to vary the composition of the Board, by notification in the Gazette. It is also considered that the Minister should be similarly empowered to vary the number of the members of the Board and provide for the manner in which additional members, if any, shall be appointed. The additional subsection (10) to section 5 proposed in the Bill serves such purposes. In fact, identical provisions have been made under subsection (4) of section 3 of the Architects Ordinance (Cap. 189).

Sir, I beg to move.

Question put, and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time and committed to a Committee of the whole Assembly.

Assembly immediately resolved itself into a Committee on the Bill. [Inche A. Rahim. Ishak].

Bill considered in Committee; reported without amendment; read a Third time and passed.