President and Mrs Nathan

Former Ministers and pioneers of the Ministry

Friends and colleagues

Ladies and gentlemen

Good evening and welcome to our 60^th Anniversary Dinner.  We are very honoured to have our President and Mrs Nathan here with us. Your presence is extra special tonight because you started your career as social worker and subsequently worked your way up to the highest office of our state. And you have never lost that first instinct. Till today you continue to serve and care for the less fortunate members of our society. Thank you Mr President.

2                    I am very glad to see many familiar faces.  Several former Ministers and Ministers of State, Parliamentary Secretaries, PSes and DSes of MCYS.  Just as important, are the former and current staff of our ministry who have given their best years to serve Singaporeans in need. Thank you for your contributions.

3                    I also see colleagues from our statutory boards and statutory bodies, chairpersons and members of our various councils, Mayors of CDCs, our GPC members, and representatives from VWOs.  Thank you for being key partners in this noble mission that we have embarked on.

4                    We all have milestones in our lives, be it graduation, marriage, cradling our newborn child or buying our first home.  Tonight, we mark a milestone in MCYS’ history as we celebrate the Ministry’s 60^th Anniversary.  As part of the celebrations, we launched the MCYS Heritage Gallery at the MCYS Building to provide a permanent showcase of our 60 years of social service a few months ago.  If you have not seen it, I would urge you to pay a visit to Thomson Road.

5                    President Nathan has also helped us in the publication of a special commemorative book entitled “Helping Hands Touching Lives”.  This commemorative publication details the 60 years of MCYS from the perspectives of the staff and caregivers, as well as those whose lives have been touched by their work.

6                    I hope their stories will inspire more people to come forward.  As the President so aptly puts it in the book, “each of us has the power to make someone’s pain a little less”.

7                    If we look at Singapore and its people as a huge artwork on a piece of canvas, we can see the Ministry’s brushstrokes throughout its progress.  The first brushstroke can be seen in the start of the first People’s Restaurant which opened this very day over 60 years ago.  For that, we would like to acknowledge Lady McNeice, who is seated here in the front, for helping to feed a generation of Singaporeans.  A mammoth task for a distinguished lady who turns 90 tomorrow.  Happy birthday Lady McNeice.

8                    Another pioneer in our midst today is Associate Professor Ann Wee.  Dr Wee’s involvement with the Public Assistance Section saw her personally going into the kampongs and knocking on doors to seek out and help those who need public assistance. Thank you Ann.

9                    Since those early days, Public Assistance and several other schemes have evolved. The year 2001 saw the establishment of the Community Assistance Fund, which was replaced by the Community Care (ComCare) Endowment Fund in June 2005.  The ComCare Fund has benefited many lives by encouraging individual responsibility and self-reliance.

10               Building resilient families and giving children a hope for the future could not be better exemplified than by our former Minister for Social Affairs, Mr Othman Wok.  You can read Mr Othman’s story of how he first met his adopted son while he was hosting a Foster Children’s Party as Social Affairs Minister back in 1974.  Minister Othman would have joined us this evening, but he is under the weather and is thus unable to be here.  We wish him a speedy recovery.

11               President Nathan, too, was one of our pioneer social worker.  In the book, he recollects – as a young social worker – coming to the aid of a widow whose husband died on a ship, but whose body would not be released till his company debt of $30 was paid. 

12               I am sure all our pioneering social workers, partners and staff will agree that we have come a long way in the last 60 years. From rebuilding Singapore society in the immediate post-war era to helping to forge stronger inter-racial ties in the aftermath of the turbulent 1960s and again after 9/11; from simply feeding the hungry at our People’s Restaurants to a comprehensive social support framework through ComCare, MCYS has been there for Singapore and Singaporeans and will continue to do so going forward.

13               But MCYS, indeed the Government, cannot achieve as much without the support and contributions of passionate and dedicated partners in the people and private sectors. And for that, I need to thank the “many helping hands” who have helped to build and make for a better society that we live in today. We have a unique and valuable partnership, where the Government works closely with our voluntary welfare organisations, self-help and religious groups, clans and charities, sports associations, youth and grassroots organisations, and corporations to help the disadvantaged, to engage the young, strengthen our families, fortify our community bonds, and inspire a sporting nation.  With your “Helping Hands”, we have been able to reach out and change lives, to ensure that no-one is left behind even as we progress and move into the league of developed nations.

14               Our greatest assurance of a better life for all in Singapore is to continue to grow our economic pie so that there will be more to share.  Much has been discussed about the effects of globalisation. Never before in human history have so many people been competing in the world’s economy at the same time. India and China alone have contributed more than 2 billion people to this competition. Outsourcing and the use of information technology have placed downward pressure on wages of those who are less educated or less skilled. Hence, merely growing the overall economic pie is no longer enough.  We must help those are greatest risk to cope, to make a living, to get the necessary skills, to educate their children, and to spend their senior years with dignity. There will be no quick easy answers. And there will be many arguments, even acrimonious political debate. MCYS will have to constantly innovate as we do our best to ensure that our social safety nets are robust enough.

15               When MCYS celebrates its next milestone anniversary, I hope the leaders at the helm then will look back and say that all of us here today have performed our stewardship role well, risen to the challenges and seized the opportunities that came our way, and served our fellow Singaporeans to the best of our abilities.

16               With that, it gives me great pleasure to once again welcome all of you to this special occasion.  I hope you enjoy catching up with one another and celebrate this significant milestone in the history of the social sector in Singapore.  I wish all a wonderful and memorable evening.  Thank you.