PARLIAMENTARY MEMBERSHIP BILL, 1984

Mr E.W. Barker: Mr Speaker, Sir, a White Paper on the Report of the Electoral Boundaries Delineation Committee has been presented to Parliament as Command 8 of 1984. The Government has decided to accept all the recommendations of the Committee. The Committee recommended that the boundaries of 31 constituencies be re-defined so as to have a more equal representation of electors for all constituencies.

The re-delineation will result in the elimination of the following three constituen- cies:-

(1) Bukit Ho Swee

(2) Havelock

(3) Katong.

The electorates of these three constituencies will be absorbed by the adjacent electoral divisions. As the total electorate for the next General Elections is expected to increase by about 251,000 electors, the Committee recommended the creation of seven new constituencies, namely:-

(1) Bo Wen

(2) Fengshan

(3) Hong Kah

(4) Eunos

(5) Changkat

(6) Teck Ghee

(7) Yuhua.

The acceptance of the Committee's recommendations will increase the number of electoral divisions from 75 to 79. This increase will come into effect as from the next General Elections. It is, therefore, necessary to introduce the Parliamentary Membership Bill, 1984, to provide for the increase in the number of members to 79. Hence, item 6 of the Introduction of Government Bills.

Mr Tang See Chim (Chua Chu Kang): Mr Speaker, Sir, are we allowed to ask questions?

Mr Speaker: Yes.

Mr Tang See Chim: Mr Speaker, Sir, I just want to ask the Minister what is the rationale for calling these new electoral divisions by these names. We are mandarinizing, in fact, some of the existing names of constituencies. For example, my constituency is known as Choa Chu Kang. It is gazetted as Choa Chu Kang. In some Government Ministry communications, it is now known by its mandarinized name as Caicuogang. Indeed the spelling is such that I am not quite used to it. It could be known as Kay Kuo Gang!

I see that at least two of the names here, Hong Kah and Teck Ghee, are definitely not hanyu pinyin names. They are, in fact, dialect names. I wonder whether or not we should not take the opportunity now to use Hanyu Pinyin for these names so that Hong Kah will be known as Fongqiao, or whatever. I leave that to the hanyu pinyin experts. But this is the point that I want to raise.

Mr Barker: Mr Speaker, Sir, if the hon. Member is a bit giddy, how does he think I feel? I am not responsible for these names. My knowledge of Mandarin does not exist. But he has a good point. I would prefer to retain the older names, like Au Kang, Teck Kah and even Alexandra, which our taxi drivers are conversant with. But some of these new names are completely beyond me.