Train service on a stretch of the East-West Line returned to normal last night after encountering disruptions at peak hour for almost four hours.
The train disruption began at about 6.30pm and service returned to normal at about 10.15pm.
The Straits Times understands that a track circuit between Jurong East and Clementi MRT stations had failed.
To alleviate the eastbound build-up of commuters, some westbound services got passengers to disembark at Queenstown MRT Station.
The trains then turned around to ferry eastbound passengers from Redhill MRT Station.
Train operator SMRT advised commuters at around 7.30pm to expect additional travel time of 25 minutes from Joo Koon towards Clementi, due to a track fault at Jurong East MRT Station.
Train service was still available, it said.
SMRT tweeted there was a track fault from 6.34pm.
The initial delay was estimated to be about 10 minutes, but became 20 minutes, and then 25 minutes.
The delay was shaved to 20 minutes at 9.30pm, then down to 10 minutes at 10pm.
“Train service is running normally now,” SMRT tweeted at 10.17pm.
This delay came less than a week after disruption in the morning on Jan 19, which caused trains to crawl haltingly between Boon Lay and Clementi MRT stations.
The delays from 7.30am to 10am were traced to a track circuit glitch between Jurong East and Clementi MRT stations.
chuimin@sph.com.sg
christan@sph.com.sg
This article was first published on Jan 24, 2017. Get The New Paper for more stories.
While Mr Tan Kok Keng, 67, did die after his son allegedly put him in a chokehold, it is not conclusive what killed him.
Forensic pathologist Gregory Davis, who testified for the defence yesterday, said stress could also have hastened the death of an already fragile heart.
Businessman Mark Tan Peng Liat, 30, is accused of culpable homicide for the death of his father on Feb 10, 2015.
Tan, the defence argued, did not know his actions were likely to cause his father’s death.
During the cross-examination yesterday by Deputy Public Prosecutor Kumaresan Gohulabalan, Dr Davis said two apparently competing causes of Mr Tan’s death, hypertensive heart disease and neck compression, are not mutually exclusive.
‘MANUAL COMPRESSION’
He disagreed with Health Sciences Authority pathologist Lee Chin Thye, who said, when he took the stand last October, that the primary cause of death was believed to be a “manual compression of the neck”.
While Dr Davis agreed there had been pressure to the victim’s neck, resulting in a fracture of the thyroid cartilage, he had expected to see more florid petechiae – red or purple spots caused by bleeding into the skin – if manual strangulation caused death.
While Mr Tan’s injuries did include a thin film haemorrhage, it is not conclusive evidence that pressure was applied on his neck, said Dr Davis.
He said such a haemorrhage occurs “commonly without pressure on the neck” as well.
He also said cartilage of an older person, aged 45 or so, could be calcified – hardened due to calcium salts – and a blow could break it.
Dr Lee had earlier disagreed that the elderly tend to have more brittle bones and said calcification could have made cartilage stronger, not weaker.
But Dr Davis agreed with DPP Kumaresan that considering Mr Tan’s age, it may have been dangerous for him to be placed in a headlock, with enough force causing the injuries in his neck.
This could potentially place a person at risk of cardiac arrest, he said.
Heavy rain from 10pm on Sunday until noon yesterday led to 32 traffic accidents and multiple flooded areas across the island.
Flash floods occurred at a 20m stretch at the junction of Craig Road and Tanjong Pagar Road, and a 30m stretch at Maxwell Road (towards Kadayanallur Street) after South Bridge Road at around 9am, PUB said in a statement yesterday.
A PUB spokesman said: “Drainage improvement works at the junction of Maxwell Road and Tanjong Pagar Road will commence next month and are expected to complete by the third quarter of this year.”
At around 9.30am, PUB said on its social media pages that the water level at the Alexandra Canal Sub Drain B, at Prince Philip Avenue near Redhill MRT station, was at 100 per cent.
It also sent out a warning for several high flood-risk areas as water levels rose above 90 per cent at Tanjong Penjuru/Penjuru Road, Tiong Bahru Road/Boon Tiong Road and Jalan Seaview.
Bishan Road and Yio Chu Kang Road were also added to its list of high flood-risk areas at around 11.20am.
The water levels for all of these areas fell below 90 per cent by noon.
The Meteorological Service Singapore (MSS) had said on Jan 16 that more showers are expected in the second half of the month due to prevailing North-East Monsoon conditions.
When The New Paper visited the Alexandra Canal at noon yesterday, there was a slight drizzle, and the water level of the 1.2km-long canal had subsided to about half its height.
Workers from Toh Guan Enterprise Hub, who declined to be named, told TNP that the water threatened to overflow at 9am but did not.
High water levels at the Kallang River at Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park also receded after the rain stopped, said the PUB spokesman.
Madam Cheong Lee Meng, 66, a retiree who lives in a block overlooking the park, said high water levels were common there.
“There is shallow water if there is no rain. There was heavy rain today, but I was not alarmed because the water didn’t reach the bridge or pathway. The water receded fast after the rain stopped,” she said.
Social media was flooded with photos and videos of the flash floods.
Places included Maxwell Road, Tanjong Pagar, Commonwealth, Supreme Court Lane and Upper Cross Street near the State Courts.
Facebook user Jama Mohamed posted a video of a flash flood in a drain near the Commonwealth Crescent carpark.
Twitter user Shaiful Rizal, 30, was on his way to work at Lim Teck Kim Road in the Tanjong Pagar area at 9.20am when he lost his slippers in ankle-deep water.
He told TNP: “I lost my slippers while I was crossing the road at the traffic lights. My feet were fully submerged. Luckily I found some spare shoes in the office.”
Lianhe Wanbao also reported that the water was gushing out from drains at the bus stop outside Haw Par Villa MRT station.
SPARED
Upper Thomson Road, which was hit by flash floods last Thursday and on Christmas Eve, was spared during yesterday’s rain.
Mr Syed Ridzwan, 40, a waiter at The Roti Prata House, near Jalan Keli, told TNP that he was thankful that it did not flood.
He said: “I was worried at first, but everything was under control. I am still worried about business being affected because customers are scared that it will flood here.”
Shop owners in Chinatown said the rain had dampened sales in the run-up to Chinese New Year on Saturday. (See report below.)
An MSS spokesman said the heaviest rainfall as of 5pm yesterday was recorded mostly over the south-eastern and south-western parts of the island – around Kallang (99.6mm), Buona Vista (96.6mm), Queenstown (92.4mm) and Marina Barrage (91.0mm).
bxliew@sph.com.sg
This article was first published on Jan 24, 2017. Get The New Paper for more stories.
Should the US scale back its engagement in Asia Pacific, ASEAN should step up to the challenge of filling the void, Malaysian Defence Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said yesterday.
He was the first foreign defence minister to speak at the fifth Fullerton Forum: The Shangri-La Dialogue Sherpa Meeting, which serves as a prelude to the Shangri-La Dialogue taking place later in the year.
While US President Donald Trump has indicated he wants to reduce American commitment overseas, Mr Hishammuddin urged him to reconsider as the region is crucial to the US’ security and economy.
Still, ASEAN should stand ready to pick up the slack through initiatives such as the ASEAN Defence Ministers’ Meeting (ADMM) and the ADMM-Plus, he said.
The latter includes the 10 ASEAN members and its dialogue partners Australia, China, India, Japan, New Zealand, Russia, South Korea, and the US.
Such groupings have been critical in addressing issues such as maritime security, counter-terrorism, and disaster relief, he added.
For instance, the navies of Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand have been jointly patrolling the Malacca Straits since 2006.
“Indeed, I see both these initiatives as crucial part of ASEAN’s regional security architecture, which provides us with the flexibility to address fast evolving challenges in a punishingly complex landscape,” he said.
He also suggested that smaller groupings with common security concerns within ASEAN can work on those specific issues more effectively.
“… the reality of our very diverse political systems and foreign policy priorities means that it is sometimes more productive to work via focused caucuses among member states.
“At the end of the day, these initiatives are fundamentally building blocks towards the greater goal of a secure and united ASEAN community,” he said.
He also said ASEAN’s role should be emphasised as it can amplify the voices of individual countries that may otherwise be too small to have a decisive say.
“But… nobody, not the US, not China, can ignore the destiny and the future of 10 ASEAN countries that are united,” he said.
ziliang@sph.com.sg
This article was first published on Jan 24, 2017. Get The New Paper for more stories.
U.S. PRESIDENT Donald Trump formally withdrew the United States from the Trans–Pacific Partnership trade deal on Monday, distancing America from its Asian allies, as China’s influence in the region rises.
Fulfilling a campaign pledge to end American involvement in the 2015 pact, Trump signed an executive order in the Oval Office pulling the United States out of the 12-nation TPP.
Trump, who wants to boost U.S. manufacturing, said he would seek one-on-one trade deals with countries that would allow the United States to quickly terminate them in 30 days “if somebody misbehaves.”
“We’re going to stop the ridiculous trade deals that have taken everybody out of our country and taken companies out of our country,” the Republican president said as he met with union leaders in the White House’s Roosevelt Room.
The TPP accord, backed heavily by U.S. business, was negotiated by former Democratic President Barack Obama’s administration but never approved by Congress.
Obama had framed TPP, which excluded China, as an effort to write Asia’s trade rules before Beijing could, establishing U.S. economic leadership in the region as part of his “pivot to Asia.”
China has proposed a Free Trade Area of the Asia Pacific and has also championed the Southeast Asian-backed Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership.
Trump has sparked worries in Japan and elsewhere in the Asia-Pacific with his opposition to the TPP and his campaign demands for U.S. allies to pay more for their security.
His trade stance mirrors a growing feeling among Americans that international trade deals have hurt the U.S. job market. Republicans have long held the view that free trade is a must, but that mood has been changing.
“It’s going to be very difficult to fight that fight,” said Lanhee Chen, a Hoover Institution fellow who was domestic policy adviser to 2012 Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney. “Trump is reflecting a trend that has been apparent for many years.”
Harry Kazianis, director of defense studies at the Center for the National Interest think tank in Washington, said Trump must now find an alternative way to reassure allies in Asia.
“This could include multiple bilateral trade agreements. Japan, Taiwan and Vietnam should be approached first as they are key to any new Asia strategy that President Trump will enact,” he said.
Trump is also working to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement to provide more favorable terms to the United States, telling reporters he would meet leaders of NAFTA partners Mexico and Canada to get the process started.
U.S. President Donald Trump hosts a meeting with business leaders in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington January 23, 2017. From left are Corning CEO Wendell Weeks, Trump, Johnson & Johnson CEO Alex Gorsky and Dell CEO Michael Dell. Source: Reuters/Kevin Lamarque
Business Leaders
The new president met with a dozen American manufacturers at the White House on Monday, pledging to slash regulations and cut corporate taxes – but warning them he would take action on trade deals he felt were unfair.
Trump, who took office on Friday, has promised to bring factories back to the United States – an issue he said helped him win the Nov. 8 election. He has not hesitated to call out by name companies he thinks should bring outsourced production back home.
He said those businesses that choose to move plants outside the country would pay a price. “We are going to be imposing a very major border tax on the product when it comes in,” Trump said.
He asked the group of chief executives from companies including Ford Motor Co, Dell Technologies Inc, Tesla Motors Inc and others to make recommendations in 30 days to stimulate manufacturing, Dow Chemical Co Chief Executive Officer Andrew Liveris told reporters.
Liveris said the CEOs discussed the border tax “quite a bit” with Trump, explaining “the sorts of industry that might be helped or hurt by that.”
“Look: I would take the president at his word here. He’s not going to do anything to harm competitiveness,” Liveris said. “He’s going to actually make us all more competitive.”
At part of the meeting observed by reporters, Trump provided no details on how the border tax would work.
The U.S. dollar fell to a seven-week low against a basket of other major world currencies on Monday, and global stock markets were shaky amid investor concerns about Trump’s protectionist rhetoric.
“A company that wants to fire all of its people in the United States, and build some factory someplace else, and then thinks that that product is going to just flow across the border into the United States – that’s not going to happen,” he said.
Cut taxes and regulations
The president told the CEOs he would like to cut corporate taxes to the 15 percent to 20 percent range, down from current statutory levels of 35 percent – a pledge that will require cooperation from the Republican-led U.S. Congress.
But he said business leaders have told him that reducing regulations is even more important.
“We think we can cut regulations by 75 percent. Maybe more,” Trump told business leaders.
“When you want to expand your plant, or when Mark wants to come in and build a big massive plant, or when Dell wants to come in and do something monstrous and special – you’re going to have your approvals really fast,” Trump said, referring to Mark Fields, CEO of Ford.
Fields said he was encouraged by the tone of the meeting.
“I know I come out with a lot of confidence that the president is very, very serious on making sure that the United States economy is going to be strong and have policies – tax, regulatory or trade – to drive that,” he said.
Trump told the executives that companies were welcome to negotiate with governors to move production between states. – Reuters
Since Jan 1, non-Malaysian work permit holders from the manufacturing sector have no longer been eligible to rent a whole Housing Board flat, and can only rent rooms.
Those currently renting can stay on until their existing subletting approvals expire.
The rule change, reported by Chinese daily Lianhe Zaobao yesterday, affects about 3.5 per cent of HDB households that are subletting all or part of their flats.
It is unclear how many households this represents. As of Sept 30, there were 52,394 wholly sublet HDB flats. The HDB does not release figures on the number of flats that are partially sublet.
On June 1, 2016, the HDB sent a letter to flat owners who currently sublet their flats to non-Malaysian manufacturing work permit holders “to inform them of the change, so that they would have time to make the necessary preparations”.
In response to queries, the HDB said: “This revision in subletting conditions is part of the Government’s longer-term plan to house non- Malaysian work permit holders in purpose-built dormitories and approved workers’ quarters with facilities to better cater to their needs.”
Work permits are for semi-skilled foreign workers in the construction, manufacturing, marine, process or service sectors.
Since Nov 7, 2006, non-Malaysian work permit holders from the construction sector have not been able to sublet HDB flats or rooms. This was extended to the marine and process sectors from May 1, 2015.
Now, only non-Malaysian work permit holders in the service sector can rent whole flats. Asked if the rules will be changed for them too, the HDB said only that it “reviews its rules regularly to maintain the balance between the needs of flat owners and sub-tenants”.
The HDB said Malaysian work permit holders can still rent HDB flats and rooms “due to the close historical and cultural similarities between Malaysians and Singaporeans”.
The rule change is unlikely to have much impact, said employers.
Some firms, such as timber product manufacturer LHT Holdings, house workers in dormitories.
Mr John Kong, managing director of M Metal and a council member of the Singapore Manufacturing Federation, said most firms that do not house workers in dormitories are not involved in their workers’ housing choice.
OrangeTee property agent Aaron Hong said that, in his experience, work permit holders from the service sector are more common as tenants.
janiceh@sph.com.sg
This article was first published on Jan 24, 2017. Get The New Paper for more stories.
BEIJING – China has announced a 14-month campaign to “clean up” internet service providers and crack down on devices such as virtual private networks (VPNs) used to evade strict censorship.
The ruling Communist party oversees a vast apparatus designed to censor online content deemed politically sensitive, while blocking some Western websites and the services of internet giants including Facebook, Twitter and Google.
It passed a controversial cybersecurity bill last November, tightening restrictions on online freedom of speech and imposing new rules on service providers.
But companies and individuals often use VPNs to access the unfettered internet beyond China’s “Great Firewall”.
Telecom and internet service providers will no longer be allowed to set up or rent special lines such as VPNs without official approval, the ministry of industry and information technology said Sunday.
Its “clean up” campaign would last through March 2018, it said in a statement on its website.
The announcement comes days after President Xi Jinping extolled globalisation and denounced protectionism in a keynote speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, where he insisted that China was committed to “opening up”.
China’s internet access services market has grown rapidly, and the “first signs of disorderly development are also appearing, creating an urgent need for regulation”, the statement said.
The new rules were needed to “strengthen internet information security management”, it added.
IT expert Li Yi told the Global Times newspaper, which often takes a nationalistic tone, the new regulations were “extremely important”.
While some multinationals such as Microsoft needed VPNs to communicate with overseas headquarters, other companies and individuals “browse overseas internet pages out of illegal motivations”, Li said.
A 2015 report by US think tank Freedom House found that China had the most restrictive Internet policies of 65 countries it studied, ranking below Iran and Syria.
China is home to the world’s largest number of internet users, which totalled 731 million as of December, the government-linked China Internet Network Information Center said Sunday.
US President Donald Trump took office vowing to rebuild industry.
One where he has achieved inadvertent success is political music, with songs against his presidency quickly proliferating.
His campaign, in which he denounced Mexican immigrants, Muslims and other minorities, set off a deluge of protest songs and a new round has emerged as he was sworn in on Friday.
The tone has often been angry, with many artists taking to high-decibel guitars to vent frustration, while others took a more dour and contemplative look at the political shake-up.
Two major bands released their first music in years timed with the inauguration – Arcade Fire, one of the top names in indie rock, and virtual rockers Gorillaz, a side project of Blur frontman Damon Alban.
Will Butler of Arcade Fire, which just released an anti-Trump song.Photo: AFP
Arcade Fire’s song, I Give You Power, is driven by a dark synthesised dance beat with vocals by rhythm and blues great and veteran civil rights activist Mavis Staples.
The band said it would donate proceeds to the American Civil Liberties Union, which has vowed to fight Mr Trump aggressively through the courts.
The new Gorillaz track, Hallelujah Money, is a trippy and electronic maze with the rich and wide-ranging voice of the Mercury Prize-winning British singer Benjamin Clementine.
Other musicians have also taken an increasingly strident role since the election.
Green Day chanted “No Trump! No KKK! No Fascist USA!” while performing at the televised American Music Awards in November – refreshing a punk slogan which has since been embraced by anti-Trump demonstrators.
Rapper Joey Bada$$ marked the inauguration with new song Land Of The Free, which ruminates on continued racial inequalities after the exit of Mr Barack Obama as the first African American president.
“Sorry America, but I will not be your soldier/ Obama just wasn’t enough, I just need some more closure,” he raps.
DJ and long-time activist Moby put out a video for Erupt And Matter, a return to his punk roots with his Void Pacific Choir. The video intersperses images of Mr Trump with European far-right leaders, foreign strongmen and pitched battles on the streets.
Other political songs come from more surprising sources.
Fiona Apple, whose music is full of feminist themes and who generally shies from publicity, released Tiny Hands. The track intersperses Apple chanting “We don’t want your tiny hands/ Anywhere near our underpants” with a sample of the infamous video in which Mr Trump was caught boasting of forcing himself on women.
A compilation benefit album released for the inauguration, Battle Hymns, features unreleased music by leaders of the biggest indie rock bands of the 90s including Pavement, Sleater-Kinney and Built to Spill.
And more is on the way.
PROJECT
The Our First 100 Days project plans songs throughout the beginning of the Trump presidency to support groups working on immigrant rights, climate change and other causes seen as threatened by the new administration.
It succeeds 30 Days, 30 Songs, which brought out new or revived tracks by artists including R.E.M., Aimee Mann and Franz Ferdinand.
The protest songs mark a sharp change from the past eight years when Mr Obama hobnobbed with top names in music, including Beyonce and U2.
He also startled music lovers by inviting to the White House, and appearing to show genuine enthusiasm for, more innovative artists including Kendrick Lamar and Frank Ocean.
Mr Trump struggled to find A-list acts for his inauguration, which instead brought the heartland patriotism of country music to the nation’s capital.
The US president – who has accurately noted that he won despite the entertainment industry’s embrace of his rival Hillary Clinton – brings the music world back to its adversarial relationship with power.
Washington became a punk epicentre during the 1981-89 presidency of Mr Ronald Reagan.
Jello Biafra, of Dead Kennedys fame, one of the most influential frontmen in US punk, vowed to battle Mr Trump – although he noted that major punk acts were already active in the 1970s.
“Let’s get over this myth that this is somehow going to inspire great punk rock that otherwise wouldn’t have happened,” he said in a YouTube essay, adding it was like Mr Reagan frequently getting “credit for the fall of the Soviet Union”. – AFP
This article was first published on Jan 24, 2017. Get The New Paper for more stories.
ST05122016-1634072596/ Seah Kwang Peng/
pixlift/ Lift lobby at HDB block at Lorong 5 Toa Payoh. To make lifts safer and more reliable, all People's Action Party (PAP) town councils will be pumping in a total of $45 million over the next five years. This will go towards implementing recommendations unveiled by the PAP Town Councils Lift Taskforce yesterday, which the 15 town councils have accepted.
From April 1 this year, all town councils will have to set aside a minimum of 14 per cent of their service and conservancy charges (S&CC) collected from residents, and of government grants, into a dedicated lift replacement fund.
This is on top of existing regular contributions – at least 26 per cent of town councils’ collections – to the general sinking fund.
But town councils will also get more grants from the Ministry of National Development (MND) to help cover their costs.
The requirement for town councils to set up a dedicated lift replacement fund was announced last September, as part of an overall push to improve Housing Board lift performance and reliability.
Yesterday, the MND announced the specific amount that town councils will have to put into this fund, having worked with them on the implementation details.
The MND added that it will increase the S&CC operating grants it currently gives to the town councils to help cover their costs, and also provide additional grants to match part of the town councils’ contributions to their lift replacement fund.
Details of these assistance measures will be released separately, said the MND, without elaborating.
Explaining the need for the increase, the MND said: “As our HDB estate infrastructure gets older, more expenditure will be needed for the maintenance and replacement of these infrastructure assets.
Town councils must therefore plan ahead and contribute more to their sinking funds to pay for these major expenses, for example, repainting of HDB blocks, maintenance of building facades, replacement of lifts and water pumps.”
In September, the HDB had also announced the $450 million Lift Enhancement Programme to co-fund the town councils’ costs of retrofitting older lifts with safety features and enhancements.
This article was first published on Jan 23, 2017. Get a copy of The Straits Times or go to straitstimes.com for more stories.
Inflation turned positive last month for the first time in over two years – a potent sign that prices are on track to climb at a faster pace this year on the back of recovering oil prices.
The consumer price index – the main measure of inflation – inched up 0.2 per cent last month compared with the same month a year earlier.
Though a tiny increase, this followed 24 straight months of sliding readings from November 2014 to October last year, and a reading of zero per cent in November.
Lower oil and car prices and falling accommodation costs – due to the soft property market – were the main drivers for the long bout of negative inflation.
However, prices of necessities such as education, food and healthcare continued to inch upwards in this period, which is why this run of falling prices is not regarded as “deflation”.
Inflation is likely to continue rising on the back of higher global oil prices this year, the Trade and Industry Ministry and Monetary Authority of Singapore said yesterday.
Oil prices plunged in the second half of 2014 from above US$100 (S$142) a barrel to below US$50, due to oversupply, but have since risen to about US$55 a barrel.
This has already started having an impact. Last month’s inflation uptick was led by higher private road transport costs, which increased 1.7 per cent due to costlier petrol and higher carpark fees.
Other consumer prices also rose, with services inflation edging up to 1.6 per cent, mainly due to a faster pace of increase in holiday expenses.
Food inflation was 2 per cent in December, while retail goods inflation eased to zero in December from 0.2 per cent in November.
Core inflation, which strips out accommodation and private road transport costs to better gauge everyday expenses, was 1.2 per cent in December, slightly lower than November’s 1.3 per cent.
Core inflation for 2016 rose to 0.9 per cent from 0.5 per cent in 2015. Overall inflation came in at negative 0.5 per cent for the second consecutive year.
Low-income households benefited most from lower inflation
Low-income households benefited most from lower inflation in the second half of last year, according to data out yesterday.
The middle 60 per cent also experienced lower inflation but to a smaller extent, Statistics Department data showed.
The consumer price index – the main measure of inflation – for general households declined 0.2 per cent over July to December compared with the corresponding period a year earlier.
The index for the lowest 20 per cent fell 0.8 per cent, the largest decline across income groups.This was due to a fall in accommodation costs and electricity tariffs, which had a more significant impact as these items accounted for a higher share of this group’s total expenditure.
The lowest 20 per cent income group also experienced a smaller increase in the cost of healthcare services compared with other income groups, taking into account government subsidies and support for MediShield Life premiums.
Those in the middle 60 per cent experienced a smaller 0.3 per cent fall in their consumer price index in the second half of 2016 compared with the same period a year earlier.
Households in the highest 20 per cent income group saw no change in their index as the impact of lower accommodation costs and electricity tariffs was offset by higher food prices, tuition fees and road tax.
Inflation for general households fell by 0.5 per cent for the whole of 2016. Households in the lowest 20 per cent by income experienced a 1.1 per cent decline in their consumer price index, while the middle 60 per cent and highest 20 per cent saw a decline of 0.5 per cent each.
Lower-income households have benefitted most from government transfers and subsidies, said OCBC economist Selena Ling. While inflation is expected to inch up this year due to higher oil prices, the impact on different income groups will depend on government measures announced in next month’s Budget, she added.
“Hopefully, there will be some mitigating measures to provide a relief valve for cost pressures – eg. rental rebates for hawker centres and HDB heartland shops to keep costs down.”
chiaym@sph.com.sg
This article was first published on Jan 23, 2017. Get a copy of The Straits Times or go to straitstimes.com for more stories.
