A heated exchange followed the almost two-hour-long Budget wrap-up speech by Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat.

Pritam Singh, Workers' Party (WP) chief and the Leader of the Opposition, raised a point of contention to a part of Heng's speech, which also led to a back-and-forth with Indranee Rajah, Leader of the House.

The exchange happened after Singh asked Heng about a figure he stated in his speech when referring to a WP proposal about a parliamentary budget office.

Suggestion to set up a parliamentary budget office

In his speech, Heng referred to Singh's call to increase the scrutiny of expenditures through a parliamentary budget office, and said he was "glad" that Singh agrees with the need to be prudent and accountable in spending money.

Heng said it would be "helpful" if WP Members of Parliament (MPs) could state how much their spending proposals cost, and how it would be funded. He added:

"Instead, the Workers' Party has called on the government to spend S$20 million to set up an independent parliamentary budget office to do this job for them, even as they call for more scrutiny on government expenditure. We invite them to hold themselves to the same scrutiny."

Where did the S$20 million figure come from?

In his reply, Singh asked where Heng had gotten the figure of S$20 million from.

In his own speech on Feb. 24, Singh did make the suggestion of setting up the independent office, but did not state how much it would cost.

Singh previously elaborated that the office would add an "important element" of public accountability and transparency of taxpayer dollars, bearing in mind the drawdown of reserves to fight Covid-19.

Figure from Jamus Lim's COS cut, which has not yet been delivered

Responding, Heng said, "I got it from your Member, who mentioned it. It is in the record."

Singh then asked for the WP MP in question, Jamus Lim, to clarify whether the figure had actually been given.

Lim responded that the figure of S$20 million had not yet been delivered in Parliament, but rather, had been shared with the Ministry of Finance (MOF) in bullet-point form in advance of the Committee of Supply (COS) debates, where he would make a cut.

MOF's COS debate was scheduled to take place after Heng's Budget wrap-up speech.

As the Finance Minister, Heng is likely to be the Minister addressing the COS cut.

Singh then asked Speaker Tan Chuan-Jin for a point of order, calling attention to the fact that the COS debates had not yet begun.

Therefore, while MOF officials had asked Lim for information ahead of COS, the figure should not be part of the Budget debate at hand.

Parliamentary budget office not meant to help Opposition

Singh continued on with his clarifications, sharing more information about the proposed budget office.

He said that the office is not meant to help the Opposition in Parliament, but rather to help all MPs, consistent with the principle of separation of powers.

Singh said that when he was a member of the Estimates Committee — a Parliamentary Select Committee that examines the government's budget — a senior civil servant said, "I cannot be smarter than my boss", referring to the Minister of Finance.

Therefore, Singh said the proposed office is meant to provide independent analysis of the Budget.

Indranee Rajah asks for clarifications

Indranee Rajah then asked Singh to clarify that the purpose of the proposed office would be to assess outcomes of government expenditure. She also asked if the office is the same as the "independent fiscal council" proposed in Lim's not-yet-delivered cut.

Singh responded that his proposal is mirrored after Canada's Parliament Budget Officer. He also clarified that it is not the same proposal as Lim's which, he emphasised, has not yet been delivered. He suggested that Parliament wait until Lim had delivered his cut, and then, he said, "the clarification will be obvious".

Indranee replied, saying that she was not asking in advance, but wanted to know whether the office that Singh is calling to be set up is the same as what Lim is suggesting, or if they are asking for two separate things:

"The Leader of the Opposition is, well, also the leader of the Workers' Party. So I assume he knows what he's talking about, and I assume he knows what his member is going to ask about."

Singh then responded, "I can assure the Leader that it will be the same thing."

'Your arguments are totally convoluted': Heng

Responding next, Heng said he was "totally confused" by Singh's statement that the proposed offices are the same, as "they are very different entities".

He then responded to Singh's idea of setting up an independent office to examine outcomes and his anecdote about the Ministry of Finance official's comment, saying, "Your arguments are totally convoluted. One does not lead to the other."

Heng asked if Singh and the Workers' Party MPs had read the interim report on the impact of the Covid-19 Budget measures, and asked if they had any comments.

"I sat through the debate. I read your transcripts. But no one, no one mentioned about outcome. No one raised a question about, you know, could this have been done better?

So what is the purpose of setting up an office when with information that is publicly available, is there for you to ask?"

Singh explained that MOF and his proposed office play two different functions. The office would offer an independent analysis for the benefit of those asked to approve the Budget, Members of Parliament.

Budget debate should be about whether broad direction is correct: Heng

In his initial clarifications, Singh had also brought up several questions that he posed in his Budget speech that had not been answered by Heng:

• More details on how the headline figure of S$24 billion to help firms and workers revamp themselves would be allocated, and accountability for this sum of money.
• How much money had been spent on the Capability Transfer Programme (CTP), and whether the government was satisfied with the outcomes.
• Whether the support for private-hire drivers given in the 2020 Unity Budget will be extended for private-hire bus drivers, as the tourism industry is "decimated".

Heng said that Singh's questions about the details about CTP and support for private-hire bus drivers could be discussed and debated in the respective ministries' COS debates.

"This Budget debate is a serious debate about whether our broad direction is correct. And do you have suggestions on how we can do it better? I'm open to your ideas, but I have to say, unfortunately, so far I have not, I have heard none."

Singh said that he accepted Heng's response to ask his specific questions during the COS debates, and said that he will do so. However, he also brought up a point of order:

"I understand that when there's a Budget debate it's again, part of the rules of debate [that] when I bring up a subject matter, that's the subject matter I want to talk about.

I'm not sure another member has [the] capacity then to ask me about a matter I have not spoken about.

So just as a point of order, I think we should make that clear. I mean, these standing orders exist for a reason, I suppose."

Top photos via YouTube / MCI.