USE OF COMMUNITY CENTRE'S GROUNDS

Mr Ho See Beng asked the Minister for Culture the reasons why the People's Association cannot allow the use of a Community Centre's playground for the holding of a dinner party by a civic organisation to commemorate the birthday of a certain Chinese deity.

The Minister for Culture (Mr Jek Yeun Thong): Mr Speaker, Sir, community centres are meant to serve the interests of the community as a whole and not religious or sectional interests. The People's Association, therefore, does not as a general policy grant permission to a civic organisation to stage any functions or activities of a purely religious nature inside community centre's grounds.