Media Relations Division, Ministry of Information,
Communications and the Arts,
Tel: 6837-9666
SPEECH BY MR WONG KAN SENG, MINISTER
FOR HOME AFFAIRS, AT THE SECOND READING OF THE PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS
(AMENDMENT) BILL 2005 ON MONDAY, 16 MAY 2005
Mr Speaker, Sir, I beg to move, ‘That the Bill be now read a second
time’.
Introduction
1.
Sir, after the
General Election (GE) in 2001, the Prime Minister set up a Review Committee to study
how the election processes can be streamlined and simplified and how the
conduct of elections can be improved, for both candidates and voters. The Review Committee was chaired by the Permanent
Secretary (Prime Minister’s Office), Mr Eddie Teo and comprised senior election
officials who were involved in the conduct of past GEs.
2.
The Committee made
a number of recommendations, many of which have been adopted. Members may recall reading about public
officers undergoing election training.
This is one of the Review Committee’s recommendations which was implemented
by the Elections Department as it did not require a legislative change. The amendments contained in this Bill, and in
the Presidential Elections (Amendment) Bill that will be read a second time
after this, are introduced to implement those recommendations that require
legislative changes.
3.
Sir, there are 3
main groups of amendments in this Bill. Firstly, there are the amendments which focus
on nomination processes. These are meant
to reduce the present complexity in nomination procedures but still ensure
responsible candidature to stand for parliamentary elections. The Bill tries to improve accessibility to
standing for election to Parliament by reducing or mitigating the existing risk
of aspiring candidates failing to be nominated on account of technicalities and
errors. We are also taking the opportunity
to clarify certain provisions to ensure greater certainty in operation. The second group of amendments relate to
post-election processes, namely, post-election reporting of election
expenditure. The third and last group consists of miscellaneous amendments ranging
from abolishing obsolete fees connected with voter registration to conferring
powers of composition on the Returning Officer or officials in Elections
Department.
4. I will cover each one of
them in turn.
Nomination Procedures
5.
Sir, the purpose
of any parliamentary elections is to enable the electorate to cast votes to
select representatives to Parliament from the various candidates who come
forward. However, the best and most
suitable individual cannot be elected if he or she does not successfully complete
the nomination process. The process by which a person is nominated is therefore
as important as the final act of casting a vote. While our nomination process must continue to
ensure that only responsible and serious candidates can gain access, the
process can afford to be simplified to reduce the risk of aspiring individuals
failing to be nominated due to formal errors or non-compliance with procedures.
Deserving candidates should not be
disqualified from standing because of minor technicalities.
6.
Our nomination proceedings today centre heavily on 4 sets
of documents : the nomination paper, a
Statutory Declaration as to qualifications, a political donations certificate
and the relevant Certificate for a GRC. These
documents have to be submitted to the Returning Officer, in a certain manner
following certain formalities and within the prescribed time. Nominees or candidates with incomplete or
incorrect documents may find their nomination rejected or objected to
successfully by their opponents.
7.
In practice, the most common errors in nomination
papers are wrong or incorrect register numbers of the proposer, seconder or the assentors (not fewer than 4). To reduce the risk of such errors
invalidating nominations, the Government has decided to remove the requirement
for register numbers in the nomination paper. The nominee and his proposer, seconder and
assentors may be identified in the nomination paper by their NRIC numbers. You can see this change in clauses 5 and 6 of
the Bill as they amend sections 27 and 27B, respectively. The form of the nomination paper will be
revised after this Bill is enacted. The
new form will also have space for up to 8 assentors, instead of the 6. Nominees can therefore help themselves by
obtaining a higher number of signatories just in case some of them are
invalidated on account of errors. This will allow nominees a margin of error of
up to 4 (an increase by 2). However, these changes do not do away with the
current legal requirement that every nominee must secure constituent support
for his nomination. The proposer,
seconder and assentors must all still be electors registered in the
constituency for which the nominee is seeking election. To facilitate the checking of the electoral
status of these signatories in nomination papers filed by their opponents, the
Returning Officer will make available personal computer (PC) facilities loaded
with the database of the registers of electors at every Nomination Centre for
their use.
8.
Next, clauses 5
and 6 amend sections 27 and 27B by merging the nomination paper with the
statutory declaration as to qualifications to stand for election. This will reduce the number of papers to be
filed with the Returning Officer on nomination day.
9.
Sir, the manner in which nomination papers are to be
delivered to the Returning Officer is also changed. Clause 7 amends section 29 to require nominees to be
present at the nomination centre in person and accompanied by their proposer,
seconder and at least 4 of their assentors. Besides facilitating corrections of any
particulars in the nomination paper, this requirement will also prevent any
insertion of particulars or forging of signatures of any registered elector in
nomination papers without the elector’s knowledge. As our present law already requires
nominations to be made by the nominees in person, and accompanied by their
proposer and seconder, it should not be difficult for the nominees to comply
with the additional requirement of having their assentors to be present during
nomination.
10.
Currently, there is little room under present law for some minor errors
in nomination papers. Defects in a
nomination paper that are potentially rectifiable can be overlooked since they
will not invalidate the nomination.
Hence, inaccurate names or misnomers, inaccurate descriptions of
persons, or inaccurate descriptions of places can be overlooked where despite
these inaccuracies or mistakes, the person or place is still identifiable. That is the position under section 103 today. However, blanks and errors in numbers are
fatal errors. That is, these cannot be
rectified and a nomination paper with any such defect has to be rejected or may
be successfully objected to.
11. Two amendments are made
to enlarge the scope for corrections to be made. Clause 8 introduces a new
section 29A to allow a candidate or nominee to correct his nomination papers
before
12. Sir, these changes to
allow candidates and nominees to correct their nomination papers prior to final
determination if defects are discovered will help the aspiring candidate. However, the responsibility for filling in and
verifying the accuracy of their papers remains with the nominees and their
supporters. They have to ensure that their papers are in order. The Returning
Officer still cannot overlook serious mistakes in nomination papers.
13. Next, clause 13 amends
section 33 to make the nomination process more efficient. Presently, nomination
proceedings last from
14. In 2001, the law was
amended to invalidate multiple nominations. However, it does not deal with the situation
of multiple nominations of the same person in the same constituency. This can happen in the present environment
where alliances have been formed between political parties. For example, we now have the Singapore
Democratic Alliance (SDA) making up of SPP, NSP and PKMS, etc. An individual belonging to a political party,
say SPP, may contest in a GRC concurrently as a member of the group from SPP
and as a member of the group representing SDA.
Who knows, there may be other alliances in future. Multiple nominations of this sort are
therefore not hypothetical. To make it clear that this is not allowed, Clause
12 amends section 32A to invalidate multiple nominations involving the same
person in the same constituency. If, at
the close of nomination for an election, a person is nominated to be a
candidate in more than one constituency, or a person is nominated to be a
candidate in the same constituency more than once, all his nominations will be
void.
15. Finally, Sir, I now come to the amendments which seek
to clarify certain provisions in the interests of certainty during nomination
proceedings. First, owing to shortage of
suitable premises, we have always had a single school serve as the Nomination Centre
for more than one constituency during a general election. Invariably, candidates of one constituency
find objections being filed by candidates of a different constituency as they
are all within the same Nomination Centre. Under section 29(4) of the Act, it is clear
that only the candidate for a constituency and his/her proposer, seconder,
assentors and one other person, if any, appointed, are entitled to examine the
nomination papers of the opponent candidate for that same constituency. They have no entitlement to inspect the
nomination papers of candidates of other constituencies even if the Nomination
Centre is the same. Logically then, only
those persons allowed to examine a nomination paper are entitled to lodge an
objection to that nomination paper. To
avoid further confusion in proceedings on nomination day, clause 9 amends
section 30 of the Act to make it clear that only candidates or groups of
candidates contesting in a constituency, and their proposers, seconders, assentors
and the one other person appointed by each candidate, and that only persons
authorised to be present at the Nomination Centre can lodge objections.
16. Clause 10 repeals and
re-enacts section 31 regarding persons entitled to be present at nomination
proceedings. The provision now sets out a list of such persons.
17 Finally, I turn to
withdrawal of candidature. Today, a
candidate who wishes to withdraw his candidature must do so before
Returns Respecting Elections Expenses
18. Let me now move on to explain the changes to post-election reporting of
election expenditure.
19. Currently, the returns must contain details of election
expenses incurred by the candidate and “all
moneys, securities and other valuable considerations received by or promised
to the election agent from or by any …. person for the purpose of expenses
incurred or to be incurred on account or in respect of the management of the
election … whether it is received as contribution, loan deposit or otherwise”,
regardless of their origins.
20. Promises are not something that will certainly be
fulfilled. Now that we have a clear
definition of “donation” in the Political Donations Act (PDA), we should do
away with the impractical requirement for promises to be disclosed in the
returns respecting election expenses and adopt a consistent language in our
election law. Clause 14 amends section 74(1)(e) to dispense
with the requirement to disclose promises made to candidates or their election
agents as regards election expenses. Candidates
and their election agents will in future need to disclose all donations as
defined by the PDA that have been accepted by the candidate or his election
agent.
21. Next, under the Parliamentary Elections Act, the election
agents are required to file with the Returning Officer a return on election
expenses with their statutory declaration, together with another statutory
declaration from their candidates, within 31 days after the election results
are published.
22. Under the PDA, the election agents, together with the
candidates, must also file a post-election donation report and declaration with
the Registrar of Political Donations (RPD) within 31 days after the election
results are published. The PDA forms
only require an ordinary declaration from the candidates and their election
agents.
23. It is administratively inconvenient for candidates and their
election agents to make a statutory declaration each to accompany the returns
respecting election expenses. This is
because the statutory declaration must be made before a Commissioner for Oaths
or Justice of the Peace, and any statutory declaration has to be re-sworn or
re-affirmed if the form, which is the subject of the declaration, has to be
corrected in any way.
24. As the PDA forms do not require a statutory declaration and
will be filed with the same Government agency, i.e. the Elections Department,
there is no strong reason to insist on the returns to be accompanied by a
statutory declaration. In any event, the
punishment for making a false statutory declaration is the same as that for
making a false ordinary declaration. Therefore,
abolishing the need for a statutory declaration to accompany the returns respecting
election expenses will be consistent with the requirement for an ordinary
declaration under the PDA forms. Clause
14 amends section 74(2) of the Parliamentary Elections Act to this effect.
Obsolete Stamp Fees
25. Let me
now deal with the last group of miscellaneous amendments. Clauses 3 and 4 of
the Bill concern provisions on objections and appeals as to
the inclusion of a name in a register of electors. Following the
amendments to the Stamp Duties Act that do away with adhesive stamps, the
requirement in the Parliamentary Elections Act for an objection or appeal to
bear a stamp of $1 is rendered obsolete.
Clause 3 amends Section 11 of the Act by abolishing the payment of a
stamp fee of $1 for filing an objection. Clause 4 amends Section 12 for the same reason
by abolishing the payment of a stamp fee of $5 to the Revising Officer for an
appeal against any decision of the Registration Officer.
Composition of Offences
26. Let me
now turn to the issue on composition of offences. The Returning Officer
currently faces a constraint in dealing with technical breaches of the
provisions of the Parliamentary Elections Act pertaining to offences such as
the illegal display of posters. Offenders
are either let off with a light warning or prosecuted. In the latter instance, criminal proceedings is
taken only after the election and hence fails to deter repeated breaches during
the election period.
27. Clause 16 inserts a new section 109 to
allow the Returning Officer or an authorized officer of the Elections
Department to compound appropriate offences. Composition
of an offence is a procedure by which an agency that administers a written law
gives a person who is reasonably suspected of committing an offence under that
law (the alleged offender) the chance to avoid prosecution and conviction in
court by paying a sum of money to the agency. On payment of the sum of money by the alleged
offender, the agency will not take or will discontinue any criminal proceedings
against the alleged offender in respect of the offence and the alleged offender
is taken not to have been convicted of the offence. The offences will be those the Minister
prescribes by regulations to be compoundable. Examples of these which we have in mind are
offences such as displaying an election poster/banner without affixing to it an
official stamp issued by the Returning Officer, damaging authorized posters/banners
displayed by other candidates or using a loudspeaker on polling day. The composition
sum will be half the amount of the maximum fine that is prescribed for the
offence, or a sum not exceeding $500, whichever is lower. Composition will definitely not be a means
for the Elections Department to generate revenue. The Elections Department will be drawing up internal mechanisms so that there will be
clear and consistent criteria as to when composition can be offered, and in
every case that meets these criteria, composition will be offered.
28. In connection with the amendments on
nomination proceedings and post-election reporting of election expenditure,
clause 17 amends the First Schedule by deleting Form 10 and Form 21.
Conclusion
29. The proposals will help candidates standing
for elections because they
simplify the processes and cut red tape.
30. Sir, I
beg to move. Question proposed.
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