HEAD F - PARLIAMENT

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Head F - Parliament

The Chairman: Head F - Parliament. Mr Ang Mong Seng.

Written Records of Mother Tongue Speeches

Mr Ang Mong Seng (Hong Kah: ): Sir, I beg to move,

That the total sum to be allocated for Head F of the Main Estimates be reduced by $100.

(In Mandarin) : Sir, allowing speeches to be made in the four official languages is a distinguishing feature of our Parliament. All along, I have been using my mother tongue, Mandarin, to speak and participate in parliamentary discussions where I raised a good number of suggestions, such as lift upgrading, medical check-ups for senior citizens, lowering of Sentosa entrance fees and reviewing the criteria for school ranking,

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etc, and they have been accepted and implemented by the relevant authorities. However, when I wanted to look for the text of my past speeches, I could only find the English record and not the Chinese version.

Under the present parliamentary records system, if a Member of Parliament speaks in his mother tongue, his speech will be orally translated into English and recorded in the verbatim report. The translated text may not capture the original flavour and humour expressed in the original language, and the essence of the language is lost. The original text of speeches delivered in mother tongue may become an important archival material of the historical and cultural legacy of our Parliament. As such, I hope that the Minister would consider keeping the original text of speeches made in the mother tongues, eg, Mandarin, Malay and Tamil, as a record for our future reference.

Dr Ong Seh Hong (Aljunied): Sir, I support the hon. Member Mr Ang Mong Seng's call to keep records of speeches delivered in Mandarin, Malay and Tamil made by Members in this House. Sir, some Members in this House, indeed even myself on occasions, made our speeches in official languages other than English. Just this morning, Mdm Cynthia Phua delivered her maiden Mandarin speech in this House. On these occasions, only audio recordings and video footages of these speeches are kept on record, and there is no written record of the original speeches.

Sir, while I commend the proficiency and competence of Parliament interpreters, we must acknowledge that the translated records in English archived in the Hansard might lose much of the nuances intended in the languages spoken. Moreover, in future, if we want to retrieve the original speeches, it will be very difficult in the current audio and

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video records. In this age of modern technology, I am sure it is very easy and possible to archive transcripts of these speeches in their original languages in a very easily retrievable format. This is an important part of our parliamentary history and heritage worth preserving.

Professional Support Staff

Mr Chandra Mohan K Nair: Sir, on the topic of professional support staff in Parliament, our Government departments are getting more professional. It would, therefore, be useful for us in Parliament if more professional support staff could be provided. For instance, more political science, legal, economics and accountancy graduates could be employed by Parliament to beef up what we currently have today. Also, it creates employment for our citizens.

The Supreme Court Judiciary engages Law Clerks to assist the Judges in legal research and related matters. Perhaps, it is time that professional support staff were recruited to assist all Members of Parliament. I take it that Cabinet Ministers and Ministers of State do have great support from the Permanent Secretary and his colleagues in various Ministries, Attorney-General's Chambers, etc, and they do not need much help. I believe most of the responses to questions and comments that the Ministers give us as Members of Parliament must have been coming, to some extent if not to a large extent, from a whole string of civil servants and support staff.

With such useful support, Members of Parliament will get more professional, and the level of debate in Parliament would be of a higher standard.

Hansard

Ms Braema Mathiaparanam (Nominated Member): Sir, I am advocating

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a Hansard for all. Currently, the Hansard of this Parliament is available online on its website. This is commendable. However, I would like to ask why our archives are limited to no earlier than March 2002. A cursory look at Hansard made available online by other countries show that the archives of Canada and the USA go back to 1994; the UK, 1988; the Australian Hansard goes as far back as 1981. I am asking that the Hansard be made more readily available to the public, especially for busy Singaporeans who do not have the time to visit public libraries or come to Parliament directly. Singaporeans should also not be made to pay for this use. An ad-hoc subscription to LawNet for a search will now cost $30 per half hour, not including the GST charges. It is interesting that on top of paying $30 per half hour, we still have to pay GST. It may be argued that copyright issues are involved. Yet if, on the other hand, it is the Singaporean who pays for the enactment of our laws through his or her own taxes, then should the Singaporean not also have an easier access to these documents through Hansard ?

Sir, having Hansard online is not just for researchers or an academic process. Members of the public too need to be engaged and these archives help each citizen to get a sense of history of our nation, how it was built, and how it is reinventing itself. An example will be the recent discussion in Parliament on head of household. It was first brought up, according to Hansard, in 1994 by NMP, Kanwaljit Soin. The social climate then and now are interesting comparisons for members of the public to also look at. The public can then make meaningful contributions to debates with better access to the archives. We have just heard DPM mentioned about things that are nice to have and things that we have to be prudent. I do understand that. Nevertheless, I see the accessibility of the Hansard as something that should be

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given to citizens, and one way is using SingPass.

The Leader of the House (Mr Wong Kan Seng): ( In Mandarin ): Sir, both Mr Ang and Dr Ong wanted the text of their speeches made in Mandarin to be kept in the Parliament Library for future reference.

Presently, all speeches are recorded in Hansard in English, which is the administrative language. As Dr Ong has said, the speeches in Mandarin, Malay or Tamil are now recorded on CDs and kept in the Library. Members can have access to these CDs and listen to the speeches, if they wish. They can listen to the speeches that they have made in the mother tongue.

If the Member does not have a written script and requires our Parliament staff to have the speech transcribed and keep it in the Library, I think that will add extra work and cost to Parliament. Afer all, Members' speeches are already recorded on CDs in their original language. I do not think it is necessary to have them transcribed.

( In English ): Next, I come to Mr Chandra Mohan's request for more professional staff to be employed by Parliament so that they can help the parliamentarians to do research and provide support to them in their work.

Sir, Mr Chandra Mohan raised this before and I will give him the same answer. Our Parliament Library already provides some kind of a research support for MPs. If they want to look up some materials, they can ask the librarian to look up for them. But if they want work to be done for them, I think that is not possible. Work has to be done by the MPs. If they want more research to be done, then they have to provide guidance

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to the librarian and she can help them search for the materials. But if they want an analysis to be done by the professional staff, that is not the task of Parliament staff. Ministries are different. Ministries function to serve the Government. Parliament staff function to serve the MPs in the proceedings of Parliament, and not to help them to do research work.

Ms Braema asked about having Hansard for all and allowing free access to the Hansard . She asked why the earliest available Hansard on the website is dated March 2002. From what I was told by the Clerk of Parliament, the current session of Parliament's Hansard is available on the website. The Hansard records before that are available from the LawNet and if anyone wants to access the Hansard before the current session, they can access the LawNet. Of course, there is a cost to maintaining the Hansard , whether it is by Parliament or by LawNet. Therefore, those who wish to access it have to pay for it. Paying for access to the LawNet is not a new thing. In the past, before such records were placed in the LawNet, members of the public have to buy a copy of the Hansard from the Singapore National Printers. They already have to pay for access. If they do not want to pay for access, they can go to the National Library and read the Hansard . I do not think we need to do anything more than that.

Dr Ong Seh Hong: ( In Mandarin ): I would like to seek further clarification from the Minister. Just now the Minister mentioned that speeches made in Malay, Mandarin and Tamil are already recorded on CDs. This, I know. But the record is only in audio and visual. In future, if we want to do research and need to refer to previous speeches, it would be difficult to access these records. I am hoping that we could have written records. This would enable us to have easy reference. Of course, if we can have our speeches

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transcribed and kept in the written form in our Library, it will be much more convenient for our future reference.

Mr Wong Kan Seng: (In Mandarin) : As I said, this will add to the administrative cost of our Parliament. It may be difficult under the present financial situation.

The Chairman: Dr Ong, I will allow you one more question by way of clarification, no additional points.

Dr Ong Seh Hong: (In Mandarin) : I am only hoping that the Minister will consider this. I agree that this will add to the administrative cost but this is part of our history. That is the first point.

Secondly, speeches made in the mother tongue in Parliament are not that many. The additional cost involved may not be very high. I hope the Minister will consider conducting a feasibility study and see how much cost would be involved. Please do not tell us that it is not feasible right away.

Mr Wong Kan Seng: ( In Mandarin ): If the Member looks at this from a historical value point of view, I think the best thing is to listen to the CD. Because from the CD, he can hear his own voice too.

( In English ): Mr Ram will confirm this. He said that after a few more months, they are going to have video CDs of speeches made by MPs.

( In Mandarin ): From the video, he will be able to see and listen to himself making the speeches and this will be able to satisfy his needs. But if he wants it to be recorded in written form, we would have to ask our Parliament staff to look into it to see whether it is feasible. I suggest Members make this request to them.

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Mr Ang Mong Seng: (In Mandarin) : Sir, I am saying that we could submit our original written text to the Library every time we make a speech in Mandarin. There should be no difficulty. We are not asking Parliament to transcribe our speeches.

Mr Wong Kan Seng: (In Mandarin) : If the Member has the written text, he can submit it to our librarian. I am sure she will keep and file it for future reference. Will this satisfy the Member?

Ms Braema Mathiaparanam: Can I seek one clarification too? On the LawNet, at the current cost of $30 per half hour, it is quite prohibitive. I think schools can benefit a lot from getting access and Hansard is a document for all. How do we reconcile the two effects? Could we have a little bit of a clearer answer? We would appreciate that.

Mr Wong Kan Seng: The Clerk told me that he is negotiating with LawNet to see how access can be made on a per log-in basis. If that can be done, I am sure the unit cost of access will be less.

Mr Ang Mong Seng: Sir, I thank the Minister for his replies to all the points raised by the Members. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

The sum of $23,718,920 for Head F ordered to stand part of the Main Estimates.

The sum of $781,300 for Head F ordered to stand part of the Development Estimates.

The Chairman: Order. It is almost 6.30 pm.

Thereupon Mr Deputy Speaker left the Chair of the Committee and took the Chair of the House.

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Mr Wong Kan Seng: Mr Deputy Speaker, Sir, I beg to report that the Committee of Supply has made progress on the estimates of expenditure for the financial year 2004/2005, and ask leave to sit again tomorrow.

Mr Deputy Speaker: So be it.