HAWKER CENTRE OPENING HOURS

Mr R. Ravindran asked the Minister for the Environment what are the steps taken by his Ministry to ensure that hawker centre stalls are open for regular daily periods to serve customers.

Mr Lim Swee Say: For stalls on subsidised rental, ENV, HDB and JTC conduct periodic checks on stallholders to see that they operate their stalls regularly to serve the public. Generally, stallholders are expected to operate their stalls for at least a few hours a day for 5 to 6 days a week to serve the public. Those found not operating their stalls regularly or for a prolonged period of time will be asked to resume business, unless they have good reasons for not doing so, for example, due to medical reasons or if they were on overseas trips. Action may be taken to have the tenancy agreements terminated and the stalls repossessed for stallholders who persist in not opening their stalls regularly.

In 2001, 170 stallholders were found to have not operated their stalls regularly. All of them resumed business at their stalls, after they were asked to do so. In the last 3 years, only one subsidised stall was repossessed in 1999 because the stallholder did not operate the stall regularly, after repeated reminders and warnings.

For stalls paying market rental, the stallholders would normally terminate their tenancy agreements if they are unable to operate their business viably.