HOTELS AND BOARDING HOUSES (Figures)

Dr Toh Chin Chye: To ask the Minister for National Development (a) what is the number of hotels and boarding houses and their number of rooms as of 1st January, 1983; and (b) what is the anticipated flow of new hotels and boarding houses for the years 1983, 1984, 1985, 1986 and 1987.

Mr Speaker: Dr Toh Chin Chye.

Dr Toh Chin Chye: Mr Speaker, Sir, before I ask the Minister to answer, may I inform the House that I do not speak on behalf of any particular hotel. I am raising the Question in the interest of the tourist industry in particular and in the public interest in general.

Question No. 11.

Mr Lee Yock Suan (for the Minister for National Development): Mr Speaker, Sir, as at 1st January, 1983, there were 130 hotels with 15,724 rooms and 10 boarding houses with 98 rooms, licensed by the Hotels Licensing Board.

Based on planning applications that have been approved by my Ministry, the number of new hotels expected to be operational from 1983 to 1987 is as follows: ______________________________________________________________ Year 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 Total ______________________________________________________________ New 6* 9 6 7 8 36 Hotels ______________________________________________________________ *Including 2 boarding houses.

If all the approved new hotels and extensions to existing hotels are implemented as planned, the number of new rooms expected to be available each year from 1983 to 1987 is as follows:- ______________________________________________________________ Year 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 Total ______________________________________________________________ Expected No. of 1,163 4,376 3,185 4,730 5,511 18,965 new rooms available ______________________________________________________________

Dr Toh Chin Chye: Mr Speaker, Sir, may I ask whether the Ministry believes in a straight-line extrapolation that with the existing number of hotel rooms - we have two million visitors to Singapore - and in the next five years, if we increase the number of rooms by 18,000, the number of visitors will be doubled.

Mr Lee Yock Suan: Mr Speaker, Sir, my Ministry works closely with the Singapore Tourist Promotion Board in monitoring the situation in hotel rooms. Previously, they were projecting a 10% per annum increase in tourist arrivals, but in 1982 the number of arrivals was about three million persons. The increase was only 4.5%. 1 believe the Singapore Tourist Promotion Board is now making new projections and monitoring the situation. Nobody really knows how many new arrivals there will be in the next few years. Of course, right now with the recession, the outlook is not very good. But they will have to look into it and nobody really knows until the time comes. So from these figures, it is possible that there will be some surplus rooms. But this will be good for the tourist industry. In fact, as you will recall, over the last three years, the room rates went up very rapidly because of the tight situation. And if this were to slacken somewhat, I think it will help us to promote tourism in Singapore.

Dr Toh Chin Chye: Mr Speaker, Sir, the Ministry of National Development is not involved in tourist economics, but perhaps it can be a help to the industry which contributed $4 billion to the balance of payments in 1982. The industry is hobbled by taxes that do not promote the industry, one of which is the live entertainment tax of 3% on gross takings. Will the Minister liaise with his colleague, the Minister for Finance, to remove this live entertainment tax to promote tourism?

Mr Lee Yock Suan: Mr Speaker, Sir, I think the proper person to answer this question is the Minister for Finance.