Following Deputy Prime Minister (DPM) and Finance Minister Lawrence Wong’s Budget Statement 2024, Parliament convened for two weeks between 26 February and 7 March where MPs discussed and shared their views on Budget Statement 2024 as part of the debate on the annual budget statement and 2024 Committee of Supply (COS 2024).
DPA spent the weeks leading up to the debate on the annual Budget Statement and COS 2024 reaching out to various MPs to raise specific concerns facing the disability community with the aims of such concerns being raised in the respective MPs speeches and cuts during the two weeks of Parliament sittings.
DPA would like to thank the various MPs whom we had the opportunity to engaged with leading up to the debate on the annual Budget Statement and COS 2024 – in particular NMP Ong Hua Han, MP He Ting Ru, and MP Rachel Ong – who raised various points we shared with them in their respective speeches and cuts during the two weeks of Parliament sittings.
Below is a summary of some of the discussions pertaining to disability held during the two weeks of Parliament sittings – along with our recommendations based on the discussions during the two weeks of Parliament sittings.
SkillsFuture
As we noted in our response to Budget Statement 2024, and in previous write-ups, the lack of a requirement in the SkillsFuture system for training providers to provide reasonable accommodations to learners with disabilities has led to notable inconsistencies in learners with disabilities receiving reasonable accommodations – which are essential for persons with disabilities to participate in education, including in life-long learning through SkillsFuture.
This is all the more important due to the emphasis the government has placed in aiming to use SkillsFuture to attempt to enhance employment prospects for Singaporeans and to establish SkillsFuture as a “key pillar” in Singapore’s social compact – as outlined in Budget Statement 2024.
We take this opportunity to thank again the afore-mentioned MPs who noted and emphasised such concerns in their respective speeches during COS 2024.
While the Ministry of Education (MOE) did not provide specifics in their reply to such concerns raised by the afore-mentioned MPs during COS 2024, MOE did note that inclusion of the SkillsFuture system is a “work in progress”. We thus reiterate our calls for the need for baseline requirements for training providers in at minimum being required to discuss reasonable accommodation options with the learner with disability and if unsure on the process of provision of reasonable accommodation, to at minimum be required to seek consultation from entities such as the Enabling academy or disability organisations such as DPA – rather than simply dismissing the learner with disability from taking their courses without having taken such steps – as it has been the case in a number of accounts from persons with disabilities we have spoken with in our research and conversations.
As outlined in our response to Budget Statement 2024 and write-ups, such baseline requirements are the minimum to ensure that persons with disabilities are not left behind – all the more especially if SkillsFuture is to be established as a key pillar in Singapore’s social compact.
Mainstream Education
As we highlight in our response to Budget Statement 2024, the move to lower special education (SPED) school fees is a welcome move – especially for families who need to rely on such education options.
However, as we noted, the focus also needs to be just as much on continuously optimising accessibility and inclusion of mainstream schools to optimise opportunities for students with disabilities. While we note that currently 80% of students with disabilities are integrated in mainstream schools, there currently are limitations to the quality of such integration – as we have previously highlighted.
As we have previously done, we call on the government to continuously focus on increasing the accessibility and inclusion capabilities of mainstream schools, and we hope that improvements to accessibilities and inclusion capabilities of mainstream schools will be a key focus of MOE in next year’s budget and COS.
Insurance Discrimination from Private Insurance Companies
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) is set to introduce non-discrimination guidelines for private insurance companies later this year. This comes after accounts from persons with disabilities – particularly within the neurodiverse/autistic community – citing instances of discriminatory practices by private insurance companies – including instances where such companies use irrelevant and discriminatory criteria (such as IQ which has nothing to do with neurodiversity and autism) when assessing such applicants – leading to many in the neurodiverse/autistic community not receiving coverage from such private insurance companies.
Again, we thank the afore-mentioned MPs and others for raising this important concern during COS 2024.
While we thank the government for previewing their plans for their guidelines during COS 2024, their outline of what is expected in the upcoming guidelines still leaves many unanswered questions. For example, during COS 2024, the government noted that an insurer cannot “reject an application solely on the basis of declared personal information, such as a disability or a medical condition”, and that doing so “would fall short of the expectation for insurers to conduct an objective assessment of every application”. The government also noted that “insurers should not reject applications from PwDs and persons with mental health conditions without an assessment. And after they have conducted the detailed assessments, the insurers may choose to accept applications as is, with higher premiums or with specific benefits excluded”. The government finally noted that they are conducting training and awareness-raising efforts with the aims of insurers to better and more accurately take into account the various realities of persons with disabilities in their assessments.
However, without a clear definition of what constitutes an “objective assessment” or “detailed assessments”, it still leaves room for insurers to apply irrelevant and discriminatory criteria in assessing applications. It is further worth noting that the government reiterated during COS 2024 their position that “MAS has not found instances where insurers have indiscriminately rejected applications by PwDs” in their review of cases highlighted to MAS.
As DPA has previously highlighted, and will elaborate in write-ups published closer to debates on the upcoming guidelines, ideally such guidelines should be not only guidelines but also enshrined in law with clear articulation of what constitutes an “objective assessment” and with such definitions inclusive so as not to arbitrarily and discriminatorily exclude persons with disabilities from attaining much needed coverage.
Transport
During the COS of the Ministry of Transport (MOT), a significant portion of the discussions centred on the recommendations on the use of personal mobility aids (PMAs) published in December 2023. The recommendations outline several new regulations on the use of PMAs including lowering the speed limit for motorised PMAs from the current 10 km/hr to 6 km/hr, along with restricting the use of motorised PMAs to only individuals with “certified walking difficulties”.
DPA has received mixed feedback from persons with disabilities about the new recommended regulations on motorised PMAs. Some persons with disabilities welcome the move as the new regulations has the potential to enhance safety on pathways which could overall enhance ease of mobility. However, other persons with disabilities, particularly persons with disabilities who have the skill to operate their motorised PMAs to travel faster than 6 km/hr, have expressed concern that the new regulations will take away the use of such skills to travel quickly even with their mobility disabilities.
What DPA finds particularly concerning is how the issue of motorised PMA abuse has been discussed. For example, during MOT COS 2024, when referring to individuals who may abuse the use of motorised PMAs, several MPs referred to such individuals as “young people with no visible disabilities or health issues” or individuals who are “seemingly able-bodied”. We know that such statements and descriptions were made with no poor intention. However, such descriptions only further stereotypes and inaccurate perceptions of persons with disabilities – especially persons with disabilities who are motorised PMA users. There are persons with disabilities who are young and/or may not be visibly disabled and can still walk short distances but may still have to rely on motorised PMAs for longer distances or on occasion. As it is, the occurrence of persons with disabilities being falsely accused of faking or exaggerating our disabilities is a common and unfair experience that persons with disabilities face regularly, and the promotion of such inaccurate language and descriptions (even unintentionally) will only exacerbate such experiences and attitudinal barriers.
DPA is concerned that such problematic language and descriptions may be used in the promotion of the new proposed regulations on motorised PMAs, and thus recommend that any further discussion on this topic refrains from such inaccurate descriptions. DPA also recommends that the enforcement of such regulations be non-rigid to accommodate the various realities of disabled motorised PMA users as outlined.
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The above are just some of the various discussions that pertained to disability during the two weeks of Parliament sittings.
We note and acknowledge the government’s efforts, and we thus hope that such points and others will be taken into consideration in the implementation of the various items outlined in the two weeks of Parliament sittings.
