NATIONAL HERITAGE BOARD BILL

Order for Second Reading read.

The Minister for Information and the Arts (BG George Yong-Boon Yeo): Mr Speaker, Sir, I beg to move, "That the Bill be now read a Second time."

The National Heritage Board will enable the Government to better preserve and promote Singapore's heritage. The Board will be a one-stop resource centre bringing together the National Museum, the National Archives and the Oral History Department, the current heritage departments of the Ministry of the Information and the Arts.

The National Heritage Board will explore and present the heritage and nationhood of the people of Singapore in the context of their ancestral cultures, their links with Southeast Asia, with Asia and with the world through the collection, preservation, interpretation and display of objects and records. It will also promote public awareness, appreciation and understanding of our past.

As a statutory board, the National Heritage Board will enjoy flexibility in its operation and in recruiting, deploying and developing staff. There are also cost savings in integrating the three departments into a single organisation.

Although the Government will fund the greater part of the development and recurrent costs of the National Heritage Board, it is very important that we also encourage members of the public, as corporations and as individuals, to give their full support. The Government has announced plans to expand the present National Museum and organise the exhibits into separate museums. The Singapore Art Museum and the Asian Civilisations Museum and the History of Singapore Museum will be ready from 1995 onwards. We will provide ample scope for public participation. Collectors and well-wishers from Singapore and abroad will be encouraged to lend and donate their art collections.

As a young nation, it will take us many generations to build up our national collection. Unlike countries like the UK and France, we have no imperial booty to draw upon. Happily, travelling exhibitions are easier to organise in the age of the jumbo jet. Thus, we have been able to put up world-class exhibitions on Imperial China at Empress Place. We recently signed an agreement to bring in exhibits from India, and I hope to sign similar agreements with the Turkish and the Egyptian Governments later this year. Next month, the National Museum will display 63 exquisite pieces from the Rockefeller Collection of the Asia Society. In this way, we supplement our own collection with loans from others.

The various communities in Singapore should also participate in the effort to preserve our heritage. They are in a good position to collect, preserve and promote an awareness of their own heritage in a living way. As I announced last year, the Federation of Chinese Clans Association is interested to set up a Chinese Heritage Centre at the old Nantah Administration Building to research and present the heritage of the Chinese outside China, their migratory patterns and way of life and the way they have sunk roots in different countries and made contributions to local communities.

The Malay community is now exploring the concept and feasibility of setting up a Malay Heritage Centre. The Government will make available the old Istana at Kampong Glam for this purpose at nominal rental. Likewise, the Government will provide similar assistance to the Indian and Eurasian communities.

As I informed the House during the Committee of Supply, the Government will help the four communities set up endowment funds to run these centres subject to a ceiling of $5 million for the Chinese, $2 million for the Malays, $1 million for the Indians and $1/4 million for the Eurasians on a dollar-for-dollar basis. For the Singapore History Museum, it will present Singapore's history in a national and international context. The community heritage centres can capture the social and cultural heritage of each community in greater depth and in a more particular way. These heritage centres will help Singaporeans anchor their cultural roots. In this way, we strike a balance between emphasising our unity and celebrating our diversity.

The National Heritage Board will also work closely with the Singapore Heritage Society and other heritage organisations.

The Government will give maximum autonomy to the National Heritage Board. The Board will formulate its own personnel policies so that the right people can be engaged, retained and developed. There is a shortage of trained and experienced heritage administrators in Singapore, a shortage that may hamper the development of our museums and archives. The National Heritage Board will help to build up such a core of heritage professionals.

In addition to Government's financial support, the National Heritage Board will be free to raise its own revenue and receive donations in cash and in kind. All donations to the National Heritage Board will be tax-exempt. For donations to the National Museum, the Finance Minister has recently announced that double tax deduction will be allowed. The Board will also be free to acknowledge donors by naming rooms or wings in the various museums after them. The Board will also be able to form companies to undertake functions more effectively carried out on a commercial basis.

Mr Speaker, Sir, the National Heritage Board will comprise a Chairman, a Deputy Chairman and 10 to 25 other members. The membership will be broad-based. We will have representatives from heritage organisations, the private sector and the public sector. We have to strike a balance between supporting heritage for heritage sake and getting value for money.

To ensure that the National Heritage Board is well advised on methods pertaining to heritage in Singapore and elsewhere, the Bill enables the Board to form advisory committees. Their members need not and should not be confined to Singaporeans. We must look for foreigners who can help us. These committees will cover the major fields of museums, archives and oral history.

The National Heritage Board will have powers similar to other statutory boards. Its specific powers include developing and managing museums, archives, oral history centres and other facilities. It will also be empowered to conduct archaeological investigations of land under development which the Board believes may contain artefacts of historical or heritage value. In exercising this power, the Board will be careful to minimise inconvenience to the owners of the affected premises.

The National Heritage Board will absorb the present staff and properties of the National Museum, the National Archives and the Oral History Department. The National Heritage Board Bill provides for the repeal of the National Archives and Records Centre Act of 1967.

Mr Speaker, Sir, the purpose of our effort in heritage is to instil in all Singaporeans the sense that while we are a young nation, we are an ancient people.

Sir, I beg to move.

Question proposed.

Mr Ho Peng Kee (Sembawang GRC): Sir, I speak in support of the Bill.

The integration of the National Museum, National Archives and Oral History Department is timely. Indeed, some will say it is overdue. It will provide greater coherence and synergy to Government's efforts in ensuring that Singaporeans, particularly younger ones, remember and cherish our roots.

Sir, an important result of the Bill is that more Singaporeans and foreigners with relevant expertise, as the Minister has mentioned just now, will have a say in how our heritage, both as Singaporeans and as members of different races with global links, is preserved, interpreted and presented. Heritage is never a top-down exercise. To invoke passion and a sense of belonging, involvement and identification are vital. This the Bill seeks to achieve.

I hope Singaporeans will indeed feel this sense of passion in being involved and being identified with the cause underlying the Bill. We have heard from the Minister that the setting up of community heritage centres or museums is part of this overall approach. Each community is given the opportunity to share its heritage and culture with fellow Singaporeans, and it is a good thing that they themselves have a say on how this is to be done. In this way, greater awareness and pride are created in one's roots and culture. However, may I add a word of caution here. I hope this awareness and pride will not stop there. Awareness must cross the physical boundaries of one's own community museum to encompass the other community museums or centres of the other races. And more importantly, pride must not rest solely on one's own roots, but rise to a higher and common level, based on the fact that we are all Singaporeans. I hope parents will make the extra effort to bring their children to visit not only their own community museum, but also those of the other races and the Singapore History Museum.

Schools and community groups can do likewise. Here, Sir, I would urge MITA to monitor the racial profile of visitors to each of these museums when they are set up and take appropriate steps should there be an imbalance.

Sir, Singapore's heritage is also captured by several buildings and structures dotting the island. Examples are the Ford Factory, St James Power Station and the Armenian Church. There are many other examples that I am sure Members know of. Each of them, Sir, has a story to tell. I would like to ask the Minister whether steps are being taken to ensure that these stories are told, again and again, to our children and their children.

Finally, Sir, I think it is common experience that in many quizzes that are conducted in Singapore, participants seem to know more about world history and events than Singapore's history or events which impact on Singapore's major races. I hope this Bill will go some way to rectify this unfortunate situation.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Foreign Affairs (Encik Yatiman Yusof): Mr Speaker, Sir, I rise to support the Bill.

Mr Speaker, no society could be strong and resilient if it detaches itself from the past. A Spanish-born American philosopher, George Santayana, once said, "Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness ... Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to fulfil it."

Sir, for a country with a short history, such linkage to the past is a crucial factor in building the foundation for the future. It is an amalgam needed for the evolution of a great society.

The setting up of the National Heritage Board with the objective of bringing the National Museum, the National Archives and Records Centre and the Oral History Department, therefore, must be seen in this context. After the setting up of the National Arts Council, the formation of the National Heritage Board is a logical step. The introduction of this Bill is. therefore, both timely and essential.

Unlike my colleague who said that this is a bit too late, to me, Sir, the Bill is a first step that provides a seriously coordinated effort in proactively using the past to the optimum in educating the future generation of their past history and culture. In doing so, we are also meeting the challenge of whether we have the wisdom to use wealth to enrich and elevate our national life and to advance our quality of civilization.

We have committed ourselves into the Next Lap and our varied past that stemmed from the rich Chinese, Indian and Malay civilizations are assets to us. The setting up of this Board, therefore, should ensure that these multi-cultural aspects of Singapore are sufficiently projected and represented.

Sir, sometime ago, I raised in this House the question of acquisition of our cultural artefacts which could possibly be buried in Singapore, its surrounding islands and seas, and the possibility of introducing laws to effect their acquisition. In this connection, I wish to thank the Minister for incorporating clauses under the Miscellaneous Provisions in clause 46 the power to achieve this aim. However, the element of compensation or compensations to those who suffer loss as a result of the acquisition work is not clearly stated.

Another question that I would like to ask the Minister is: since the effort to preserve or redevelop certain places or locations with historical significance will also involve some degree of participation from the communities who had been part of the life of such places, I wonder whether their aspirations and participation are given sufficient consideration. As an example, when we decided to preserve the Kampong Glam area, whether we had made the effort to seek for the opinions or views of those people who are living in this area.

Sir, I support the Bill.

Mr Goh Choon Kang (Braddell Heights): ( In Mandarin): Mr Speaker, Sir, now that we have made certain achievements in economic performance, we are beginning to spend some time and effort on cultural matters and development of the culture of Singapore. To preserve our cultural heritage is an effort in the spiritual construction of Singapore. Therefore, I welcome the National Heritage Board Bill which seeks to set up a centralised coordinating statutory body for the preservation of our national heritage so that we will be better able to carry out the work of preserving our cultural heritage.

Mr Speaker, Sir, as the Chinese saying goes, "to do a job well, we must have the good tools in hand." The National Heritage Board, when established, will be able to work towards the preservation of our cultural heritage and artefacts and create favourable conditions for this purpose. Apart from material conditions, we should also have some talents in this field to come forward to do the work. Unfortunately, I believe that we are in dire shortage of such talents in Singapore. So to carry out this work of preserving our heritage, I think we will have a great obstacle here. I would like to ask the Minister what plans he has to develop and nurture such talents that are so badly needed in Singapore.

Mr Speaker, Sir, we know that we are a society that places emphasis on commerce, science and technology. People do not seem to give much weightage on culture and artefacts. Even in our own university, there is no Department of Archaeology. Even if we have such a subject, graduates majoring in the subject will not be able to find jobs easily. Now, with the establishment of the National Heritage Board and we are launching all our efforts to preserving our cultural heritage, we need more of such talents. I believe that, at the beginning, we may find it necessary to recruit such talents partially from overseas. But I hope that the Minister will not overlook the need to develop such talents locally.

Mr Speaker, Sir, from my knowledge, there are people in Singapore who are interested in culture and in the preservation of culture. They have done some studies and research on this. I think we have such people around, albeit not many in number. These people are working quietly because of their own personal interest. I hope that after the establishment of the National Heritage Board, we will be able to take advantage of these rare talents that we have locally.

Sir, I am also glad to know that the Government is encouraging every community here to set up its own heritage centre. For example, for the Chinese community, a museum on Chinese emigration will be set up at the former administration block of the Nanyang University. This is a very significant project. The Government has also promised to provide financial assistance to the various communities in this direction. I believe that this kind of work needs not only financial assistance but also expertise. I would like to ask whether the Government has any plans to help these various communities by providing them with the necessary expertise.

Sir, I support the Bill.

BG George Yong-Boon Yeo: Mr Speaker, Sir, I thank Members for their encouragement and support.

Let me first answer Mr Ho Peng Kee's concern that when we develop community heritage centres, each community will be interested only in its own ethnic heritage. That will be wrong. I fully agree with Mr Ho that we should encourage mutual sharing and mutual understanding so that a Chinese Singaporean, for instance, should feel somehow that the Mahabarata, the Ramayana and the Hikayat Hang Tuah are somehow a part of his heritage, a part of his inheritance, and feel enriched by it. And vice versa; that the Malays should also see in the Chinese and the Indian something which makes them what they are today.

I will take Mr Ho's suggestion that MITA should monitor the pattern of visits to these centres when they are established, and indeed MITA is already working with the Education Ministry to encourage our school children to visit exhibitions at our museums. For instance, the exhibitions of Imperial China at Empress Place are truly outstanding and it is a great pity if our school children are not marched through. They may not appreciate, young as they are now, art in all their aspects, but they should at least know. One day, they will recall, and they will recall with satisfaction and they would have improved in the process. But, of course, we must make it easier for the teachers by providing explanatory booklets and maybe simple quiz sheets so that the teachers at the end of the day can ask the students to put something down. And maybe those who do well in these quizzes can be given small gifts or maybe hamburgers at a fast-food joint or something. I am sure we can work out some such ideas to make it more lively and more interesting for our young school children to visit heritage centres.

On Mr Ho's concern about some of the sites in Singapore being not well maintained and with stories untold, this is a problem which has vexed MITA for some time. Last year, in conjunction with the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the fall of Singapore, we made a special effort to spruce up these sites and, in fact, to open some sites which were never opened before, like the Percival Tunnel Complex at Fort Canning and the Johore Battery at Changi. But we have no organisation to keep these open. So after organising exhibitions for a few weeks, we sealed these sites and it may be some time before they are reopened.

I am against the National Museum taking over all these sites because the National Museum is already over extended. I think their plate is already over full with projects. But at the same time, this is an area which we should not neglect. So I am thinking of a way of co-opting members of the public, individuals and corporations, who are interested to help us.

We have the Singapore Heritage Society and indeed last year, when we had an exhibition at the Ford Factory, the work was largely done by members of the Heritage Society. So I am thinking of establishing a Heritage Trust which should be a civic organisation supported by the National Heritage Board, an organisation which is somewhere in between a fully private and a fully public body. I think that way we will be able to strike a balance between getting people outside to help us and at the same time giving them enough support so that they will not be running around trying to raise funds all the time. And it is very important. If you look at the gun emplacements at Labrador Park and many other such sites in Singapore, the grass is well trimmed and flowers are planted, but it is not the same. When you visit a site and there is someone to tell you the story, it comes to life and then it achieves its full value. Otherwise, you just pass it by as another ruin and the whole import misses you.

Mr Yatiman Yusof was concerned that owners of premises which are being investigated for possible historical artefacts may be left uncompensated. Let me assure him that our objective is not to cause inconvenience to them. Indeed, we have to minimise inconvenience and if compensation is justified, then compensation will surely be arranged.

As to his concern that the residents of Kampong Glam have not been kept informed of the proposal by Mr Ridzwan Dzafir's working committee on the Malay Heritage Centre, I will ask the committee to consult freely those who have lived in the area or who show a special interest in the area, so that when the Centre is finally established it will become an organic part of what is, in fact, a very historical location in Singapore.

Mr Goh Choon Kang raised the problem of a lack of professional expertise in the museum area. That is very true but we are now working very hard to overcome this lack of expertise. The National Museum has been recruiting. We have also been buying expertise in the form of consultants and we are prepared to engage foreign curators if local curators are not available. I think what we want to do here is not to be excessively nationalistic, but to source expertise wherever and whenever expertise is available. Take, for instance, the present peranakan jewellery exhibition at the National Museum called "Gilding the Phoenix". I commend the exhibition to all Members. It is very well done and it is a splendid collection. I myself was surprised when I toured the exhibition with the First Lady when she opened it, that the Peranakans in fact have a separate set of jewellery just for mourning. They call it tuahar jewellery, which is all white. So I asked the curator, "How did this come about?" because it is not in the Chinese customs. Neither is it in the Malay customs because the Malays do not have tuahar. So it is a mutation, a curious adaptation of Chinese mourning practices in the use of white for mourning and the Malay's love for ornamentation and jewellery.

This exhibition was curated by a young man called Mr Edmund Chin who used to work for the Monetary Authority of Singapore and who took a whole year off just to work on this exhibition. So for him, it had been a labour of love. I overheard the conversation between him and the First Lady and he was talking in the Peranakan patois, and they were enjoying themselves fully as they went through the exhibits. So here is the National Museum co-opting talents outside the Museum and to the benefit of all of us. So it is something we should encourage.

Members will remember that I mentioned in this House before that Mr Low Chuck Tiew contributed some of his paintings to the Hong Kong Museum. I met Mr Low Chuck Tiew a few months ago and I found him a treasure house of knowledge about Chinese calligraphy and Chinese arts. His depth was marvellous. So I invited him to be an adviser to our Asian Civilisations Museum, and he has accepted. This is the way we will do it. We will co-opt expertise where they are available. We will train where we can, and we will recruit where we can. In this way, we will maximise the chances of success for our entire effort in heritage.

But I am pleased to note that the ground is much more favourable now. Without having hard statistics to support me, but just on the basis of my subjective impression, I find many young undergraduates showing great interest in the arts and, many who are overseas, sometimes against the wishes of their parents, have decided to do courses in art history, in archaeology and so on. This partly reflects the fact that the job prospects for culture and heritage in Singapore are much better today than they were, say, five or ten years ago.

Question put, and agreed to.

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

The House immediately resolved itself into a Committee on the Bill. - [BG George Yong-Boon Yeo].

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