Mr Muhamad Faisal Bin Abdul Manap (Aljunied): Sir, at the Budget statement a fortnight ago, the rollout of a number of enhancements to ComLink, dubbed ComLink+, was announced. I welcome moves to provide additional assistance and support and empower low-income households. This can go a long way.
One feature of ComLink+ is having family coaches and voluntary befrienders working directly with beneficiaries’ families, providing custom support. This is indeed a fundamental aspect in facilitating and empowering families towards achieving their goals. For households who are facing life challenges: mentorship, facilitation and, at times, handholding, are crucial. Financial and other tangible forms of assistance will not be effective without this human aspect.
In 2022, I have highlighted the importance of a good interpersonal relationship between the beneficiaries and the caseworker in order to optimise the effectiveness of the assistance and support rendered. I would like to reiterate this crucial point. I recommend that MSF maintain a low beneficiaries-to-coach and befrienders ratio. This will not only ensure that beneficiaries’ families get adequate support from their coach and befrienders, it can also help reduce burnout and stress on the coaches and befrienders.
I also welcome the introduction of assistance with debt repayment to licenced moneylending companies and organisations that are trackable and verifiable. Nonetheless, there are and will be cases where low-income households turn to unlicensed moneylenders. I would like to ask MSF if any assistance will be offered to low-income households in such a predicament. I suggest that MSF could also explore working together with organisations focused on debt counselling, such as Adullam Life Counselling.
Additionally, Sir, I would recommend that MSF and MOE explore integrating basic financial literacy into the curriculum for secondary school students. I have made numerous calls for the adoption of the social protection framework developed by the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the introduction of an annual social protection report, which tracks the effectiveness and efficacy of our social policies meant to uplift society. I would like to propose piloting the ILO’s social protection framework and social protection report for the ComLink+ scheme.
The Chairman: Mr Faisal Manap.
Mr Muhamad Faisal Bin Abdul Manap: Thank you, Sir. I have one clarification for Minister Masagos.
I believe Minister Masagos mentioned earlier that the ComLink+ family coaches are actually social workers from the FSCs and I believe the Minister is aware of the already heavy workload of FSCs’ social workers. So, I would like to ask whether MSF will actually be able to provide additional resources and funding to FSCs, so that FSCs are sufficiently equipped?
Mr Masagos Zulkifli B M M: The families who live in rental homes who have children, part of them are already under the FSC. So, they have a relationship with the FSC social worker and this is not an additional job for them. It is to let them do their work even better because we give them more tools to incentivise their families to achieve their lifelong goals, in addition to resolving issues like divorce or family violence and so forth. So, I do not see this as an additional burden to them but actually they would very much welcome that now they have more tools to enable them to achieve the objectives that they want for these families.
Ministry of Social and Family Development
6 March 2024
https://sprs.parl.gov.sg/search/#/sprs3topic?reportid=budget-2390
Office of the Leader of the Opposition 