MP Seah Kian Peng: Teachers pay for student treats & red pens, yet asked to pay for parking

Economic thinking only goes so far without thinking about value.

Belmont Lay | May 19, 2018, 01:30 AM

During the final day of the debate on the President’s Address on Friday, May 18, Marine Parade GRC Member of Parliament Seah Kian Peng spoke out strongly against the pure economic rationale for asking teachers to pay for parking in schools.

Economic rationale without values

While Seah said it is important for the government to ensure a responsible use of funds and to be prudent, economic thinking needs to be accompanied with value and meaning.

"Thinking about the issue using a pure economic lens is as, I argue, a mistake, as is the reduction to clean wage. Surely a moral idea to a mere tableau of taxable benefits," Seah said.

"For too long, we have made decisions based more on an economic compass, as if the use of one dollar has the moral equivalence of the loss of another."

He also said it is time the government recognises that money is merely a proxy for value, and at times, a very bad one.

Teachers to pay for parking

Seah's speech was to address a controversial decision the Ministry of Education (MOE) announced in March 2018, where teachers at all national schools and junior colleges will have to pay for parking at school premises from Aug. 1.

MOE said it has “become increasingly clear that the current treatment of allowing school staff to park for free constitutes a taxable benefit”.

In line with the Public Service Division’s clean wage policy, an appropriate season parking charge in schools will be imposed, MOE then said.

Teachers use their own money

Seah illustrated his point by arguing that teachers do not get compensated whenever they use their own money.

These occasions include when teachers fork out from their own pockets to buy treats for students during Children's Day, and use stickers as encouragement for students to do better, and they do not carry out means-testing to distribute goodies to those who really cannot afford it.

Teachers also grade assignments using red pens that are not provided by the schools.

However, Seah also said that while "some things still sits uncomfortably on this matter for me", he didn't want to belabour the point.

And he was also not implying that teachers do what they do because of free parking benefits.

"It is laughable and an insult to think that they do this in exchange for free parking. So, of course, the withdrawal of free parking will not make teachers any less likely to do the many incredible, unpriced things they do," he explained.

"This is not an appeal to populism, rather it is an appeal to the ideas of justice and community that have informed Singapore public policy making at the start of our journey 53 years ago."

[related_story]

This is Seah's speech that focused on the issue of teachers having to pay for parking:

It is far easier to write the policy paper than to actually make a policy happen.

I say this not to belittle the role of bold ideas but to argue their limitations. We ought not let ideas be our masters but think more deeply about their weight and impact.

That is, we should worry less about why we do than why we do them.

Today, Mr Speaker Sir, I argued once which is to rethink the way we value ideas. We need to rethink the role of the market and of economic reasoning.

For a long time the economic reasoning that our government have applied to public policies, they have stood us in good stead. Whether in healthcare, in housing, the management of much of our social policy, such reasoning has allowed us to make good use of our resources. The magic words in any policy was whether it was sustainable. That is if it would pay for itself. The long term reliance on government funding is sometimes the kiss of death for good idea. For if the idea was good, surely money can be found from the market.

But economic reasoning is empty without a moral foundation. Such foundations cannot and do not exist without a conversation about values. Not just what is cheap, but what is right. Not just about generating income, but about giving meaning.

For too long we've made decisions that is more on an economic compass, as if the use of one dollar is the moral equivalence of the loss of another. Sir, it is time we recongmise that money is merely a proxy for value. And at times, a very bad one.

We need regulations on responsible use of funds and fiscal prudence, good procurement but equally, we ought to be having a conversation about reciprocity, trust and relationships.

Teachers know this. They know the magic of little gestures, of a sticker with a thumbs up stuck on an untidy worksheet for encouragement. For a little child who handed in his homework despite family difficulties. A treat of a small snack, a lift to a school to a pupil who otherwise will not want to come. Teachers who have all these years paid for all forms of Children's Day treats, and surprises for children, all these things which cost them no small amount of money and yet whose value transcends price.

Teachers who have bought their own red pens to mark the test papers of our children. They do not think that 'MOE doesn't pay for red pens. Let me use instead the white board markers, which they do pay for.'

They don't think, 'I should means test the kids, and only give treats to those who cannot afford it.'

It is laughable and an insult to think that they do this in exchange for free parking. So, of course, the withdrawal of free parking will not make teachers any less likely to do the many incredible, unpriced things they do. Rather, it's a reciprocity, and a give and take, which I feel we have lost by insisting on this strict calculus of benefits.

Using a clean wage argument implies all the years of free parking had tarred teachers with an unclean wage.

Sir, I do not want to belabour parking any further. Teachers I think have accepted this and have moved on.

But some things still sits uncomfortably on this matter for me.

And I want to address this squarely. Not all government policy has a complete recourse to dollars and cents. We need within our current structures to make more room for the lexicon of morality, duty, relationships and trust.

This is not an appeal to populism, rather it is an appeal to the ideas of justice and community that have informed Singapore public policy making at the start of our journey 53 years ago.

The first practical implementation of my idea: This reform must start, at the Ministry of Finance -- responsible for so many of our policy levers -- reform that requires an explicit recognition of the limits of price, cost and expenditure, as a proxy for value, and to allow for greater use of discretion by public officers in recognising moral reasoning as a legitimate form of argumentation.

Sir, I use the decision to charge parking to illustrate the kinds of conversation we ought to be having.

Thinking about the issue using a pure economic lens is as, I argue, a mistake, as is the reduction to clean wage. Surely a moral idea to a mere tableau of taxable benefits.

Without this lexicon, we will not be able to address the greatest problems that have arisen in our time. The current debate has framed it as a problem of inequality, but that risks mere description without a thesis.

We better might frame it as a problem of an overweening dominance of economic magical thinking. A problem which again, can be addressed by the recalibration of the economics and the morality of our public actions.