Politics and Me!

What politics to me? Why join politics? Why join this party? 

All these questions keep repeating in my ears, be it myself or concerned friends. For once, I will set my record straight, I’m not born in a politician family nor affiliated to anyone of them. I’m just like you who are Singaporeans who are concerned about the development of Singapore.

To others, politics are for those people who have high education background or belong to a certain party. You and me, especially me, are just normal graduate or  below standard. We are nobody, what can we do to change the development of Singapore? Some might even said, “I don’t care about politics, it’s non of my concern”.

Back to the questions:

What is politics to me?

Politics to me is not something hard to understand. The government who themselves politicians. create policies or bills to manage the country. All  these polices or bills passed through the parliament will then come into force. These policies or bills are those we should concerned about. In fact, we are talking about it everyday without us realizing it. Take for a few example, our child education, HDB price COE etc are policies that pass through the parliament that will be affecting all of us. Shouldn’t we start looking at what the policies passes through the parliament?

Why join politics?

Having a simple mindset, I want to contribute back to the society within my capability. I must confessed that I’m not the elites but I believe that by having strong logical thinking born within me, I hoped that  I would able to contribute by giving logical solution for the government to consider. Take for an example, under this post: Common myth about HDB Resale, I did write about: “The resale price will continue to raise so long there is COV is involved“. At that time flat buyer or seller are talking about COV rather than the selling price. I do not know if Minister Khaw had read my post, but he had implemented that all transaction must agreed on the price first before obtaining the valuation report of the flat. This will make buyer and seller to looking into the pricing of the flat first before COV.

Being politically driven, I see no point of keep hitting hard at PAP, rather we should debate and find solutions on the policies/bills to the maximum benefit for Singaporeans.

Why join this party?

It’s doesn’t matter which party I join, more importantly, the party would want to change the approach. It need to start to get their act together and truly serve the citizens with sound and logical ideas for the government to consider. Hitting at the incumbent will serve no benefit to the citizens.

As from next week, I would starts to give ideas to improve the policies pertaining to CPF, Housing, Education, Medicial, Transportation and some other that comes along the way. So stay tune.

POST GE2015 REVIEW

The General Election on 11 Sept had drawn to a closed and a new chapter of Singapore beings. PAP and won a surprise landslide victory with a vote swing of around 10%. It’s surprises many, even from the PAP camp. Let look at the factors that causes this landslide victory.

1. Too Many Opposition Parties

A total of nine opposition parties took part in the GE 2015 against PAP. The general feeling is for the opposition to claim victory which was not happening. A lot of people are afraid that PAP will be toppled and the future is uncertain if Opposition won the election. The considerations mainly is, if opposition was to win the election, with so many parties involved, who will be the Prime Minister, who will be the Minister. With each party want the best for their party, this might cause a turmoil for Singapore. This is the major fear factor Singaporeans had when they go to the polling station.

2. Election Strategies

PAP had been using the town council as their firing tools while the opposition parties are using mainly: 6.9 million population white paper, asking Government to return the CPF to citizens at age 55, alternative policy paper, medishield life.

So what went wrong for the opposition parties on election strategies?

On the ground, is majority of citizens really against 6.9 million population white paper? Maybe, what citizens are looking forward to, what are the solution to be offered if they vote against the white paper! Apparently, non of the parties really offer ideal solutions as citizen are afraid of economy downturn which will affect their rice bowl.

Next, return of CPF at age 55! Are majority of the citizens wanting to withdraw their CPF money when they turn 55? The citizens are more concerned about their retirement than taking their money out. The majority of the money in OA account is being used for Housing and Education for their children which left little for them to retire with sufficient money. The opposition parties had not touch on this at all!

Alternative policy – while this is a good initiatives, but do citizens concerned about what you are going to offer? No! the reason is very simple, your party are not big enough to form the government even all your members are elected into the parliament. At most, citizens will treat it as alternative solutions for the government to consider.

Medishield Life – A good initiatives by the government but the drawback is the cost of insurance is rather high. Wanting the citizens to reject it without any ideal solution is crazy especially the high cost of medical in Singapore which the citizens are more worried about.

Do the parties engage people to do survey on what is the real concerned they have? Using parties member to engage the citizens will not enable you to get the true picture.

All these issues raised by the opposition parties compare to PAP firing at Town Council, Citizens would rather choose the latter as they are the government before election.

3. Internal and Inter-parties Issues

Internal fighting within the party itself, and disagreement between parties which usually happened when the election is near. This is very damaging to the parties involved and it will serve any help to the opposition cause.

4. Parties Supporters

Opposition Supporters should support and encourage whichever party to contest in their constituency. Instead, they went about smearing, laughing at the parties and worst wanting a specific party to go and contest there. In the opposition unity, it actually create chaos within the party contesting there as they had to do firefighting first and derailed their preparation. It also gives swing voters more doubts about the party.

It’s nothing wrong in supporting whichever party you like. But contesting an election requires lots of financial and logistic support which the party might not able to support them.

5. Swing Voters

This election saw a huge increase of swing voters, swing voters are the strong forces behind each election. In order to win the election, the party must convinced them before they were to vote for you. Sadly, opposition parties are fighting gorilla warfare against PAP which they are not interested in. They want what kind of benefit, security for them and their family.

The election results never lie, it’s clearly that the opposition parties had played their cards wrongly in this election. It might be a wakeup call for all the parties to rethink and prepare for their next election!

Ban Uber Taxi in Singapore

Recapped what I had say since early April 2014

Singapore Affairs

Dear Minister Lui,

I’m a full-time taxi driver and I would like to share with you my concerned about Uber limousine Taxi into Singapore market.

Uber had come into Singapore market since 2013, catering services that offer high-end limousine services to their member. Lately, they started their new UberX which cater to the standardise taxi limousine.

In the newspaper report, they had highlight that they do not infringe the LTA rules as they cater to their “Member” only. So What are their so-called members? Members are those who just registered in the Apps and instantly becomes their member. It’s like a wolf in a sheep clothing.

The main concern that I have is as follows:

1. Private limousine should not charge by meter but rather they should be charged a flat fee. Why are they allowed to charge based on meter which is no different from our local taxi, be it…

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Why should Singaporeans Boycott Uber, UberX or Uber Taxi?

With past couple of weeks with Uber company offering free rides under UberX or Uber Taxi, Consumers were delighted that they were able to get two free rides a day. While  the drivers for UberX and Taxis are happily earning to the max.

It brought cheers to consumers and drivers, but there are some angry passengers too. They couldn’t get a free ride after trying to get one after 45 minutes. It’s just a marketing strategy by Uber to market their services to the Singapore consumers.

Let’s get back to reality, here are a list of concern that Singaporeans should think about before using their services again.

1) Credit card information – While the credit card details are stored in the Uber data storage which might be prone by hackers

2) Global Position System (GPS) – Your traveling pattern will be known to unknown as Uber is using GPS to track where your journey starts and ends. Thus disclosing your location to unknown sources.

3) Credit card payment – The payment terminal is not located in Singapore but in United States where you might suffered exchange loss. Right now there isn’t significant different as they are still offering 25% discount on your taxi rides.

4) Unethical ways of doing business

I) Seeking customers to release details of  which taxi drivers and their contact who do not sign up with Uber. While it’s no wrong to share the good things to others, but it’s wrong to share our contact to other people without our permission. It’s the same that as a taxi driver, we do not send out passenger contact details to third parties. It’s the privacy of our rights that the contact must be kept confidential at all times.

II) Which ever taxi drivers that took up their free IPhone and their jobs, received a call from Uber that they are not allowed to use other third parties apps and are told to delete them off. Who are they to mind our business which apps taxi drivers use since they do not have any legal document that say that taxi drivers are not allowed to use other apps. This also create an anti-competition act in Singapore!

5) Most Importantly, Why we Singaporeans should boycott Uber?

While the government are not allowed to ban Uber outright due to the free trade agreement, but What I’m seeking is changing the business model of Uber and UberX which is using metered-charged system (I have previously mention in my blog).

The company comes here to earn money in Singapore without any employment benefit to Singaporeans. Yes they have Singaporean on the ground to run the promotion and signing up drivers. But once they have establish themselves in Singapore, all these job are made redundant. For your information, even their telephone operators are foreigners based overseas, using internet to contact drivers and customers. In other words, their company is nothing but an empty shell in Singapore.

While we welcome foreign companies to set-up their business in Singapore, we need to see economic growth and employment benefit for Singapore. Without any employment benefit to Singaporeans, what the use to welcome this type of company to operate in Singapore? I would rather don’t welcome them at all!

The choice is yours, nobody is stopping you from using Uber! But think again, if any company that comes to Singapore to start business without any employment benefit to Singaporeans, then there will be no job for Singaporeans in the future.

Uber giving free rides

Yesterday Uber were offering free rides under UberX and UberTaxi, Commuters were overjoy but the joy soon turn to anger!

Commuters wanting to get the free rides are not able to get a UberX Car/Taxi and they are crying foul over the free rides, questioning whether the Free Rides really exists?

The Truth is, there is free rides, but two reasons behind why you cannot get a ride when you need one.

1) Over Demand for the free rides where not enough UberX Cars and Taxis to cater to all the demand.

2) The number of Taxi Joining as Uber Taxi might be limited. I had came across the Uber Taxi about one and half month ago and given the facts that some taxi drivers like me are angry about the business model of Uber. We had in fact boycotting the Uber Taxi Apps until LTA put a stand on the Uber Business Model.

A normal night like yesterday, resulted in lacking of taxis as non essential travel using Uber X or UberTaxi. Who doesn’t want to have a comfortable rides without cramping inside a pack MRT or Bus without paying a single cent?

Those who unsuccessfully taking the free rides are angry and they have to restored calling for a taxi using conversional apps, GrabTaxi or easyTaxi. In the end, the commuters end up paying more.

All this resulted Grab Taxi coming up a promotion to counter Uber promotion. In the End, majority of the taxi are concentrating on this two apps resulted in lesser taxi plying the roads.

In Summary, it’s can consider a success for Uber but it’s a failure for Taxi Drivers and Commuters. Uber is considered lucky that the promotion is not held on Friday, otherwise there will be Chaos in Singapore!

27 Sept 2014 Hong Lim Park Event – YMCA and “Return our CPF” Protest

I was intending to go to the Hong Lim Park today to see the chain of events happening in Hong Lim Park today but in the end I did not turn up. I came to know about the crash of the events two days ago (26 Sept 14) after Han Hui Hui complain in the facebook that grassroots’ leaders are intimating her against holding her protest on 27 Sept 14.

At the later stage, I came to know that the event held there will be YMCA annual event and being organized by volunteers. YMCA is a Non Government Organization (NGO).

As what had happen on 26 Sept 14, nobody knows except those few people involved including Han Hui Hui. I should not said anything here but highly suspicious of the intention of Han Hui Hui.

How could the events be better managed?

1) Npark are the ones approving these two events  but failure to recognize the seriousness of these two event held on the same day.

Although these two events are approved on two different dates, Npark should have kept a record of event that happening on the same day and should have advise the organizers accordingly.

If Han Hui Hui had been informed about the clash of event, I believed that she would not want to held the event on the same day with YMCA. Rather she would have chosen another date for the protest.

2) Npark director should have better prepare himself when approaching Han Hui Hui as shown in the Video. With the seriousness of chain of event, he should at least prepare himself with the firepower with rules and regulations not waiting for his man to provide him with the information.

While I respect the Police IO his calmness on handling of the situation which he advise Han Hui Hui accordingly.

What happen can be avoided and this is  a total failure from the NPark!

In event day itself, videos from Yahoo, another video here. The chain reaction was a careful planned by Han Hui Hui. Whether had she sought the advise from lawyer on the planned collusion is in question.

But what happen today is a sad day from activists as what had shown in the videos had shown what she had done through the “hooligans” way of protest. It’s also sway away the fence-sitting voters away from the alternatives parties. While a lot of activists are helping the alternatives parties in gaining votes but it all wash down the drain within one day of collusion.

All along I had declared that I’m not the fan of Han Hui Hui or Roy Ngerng. But now I shall openly declared that I have no dealing with these two activists and will not support their events (past or future).//

Tips for getting a taxi during Formula One Singapore period

This Year Formula one is here again. I have reblog this for your information again… All remain the same with some changes:

ERP Gantry
Non Operation Dates and Time

New Bridge Road
18 September (Thursday) &
19 September (Friday)
between 6pm and 7pm

South Bridge Road
Temasek Boulevard
18 September (Thursday) &
19 September (Friday)
between 12pm and 8pm
20 September (Saturday)
between 12.30pm and 8pm

Singapore Affairs

Getting a Taxi is always a nightmare during the Singapore Formula 1 period. As a Taxi Driver, I would give tips and loopholes to get a taxi during the period.

Here we goes….

1) Let see a statement from LTA:

Non Operation of ERP Gantries during Race Week
As the ERP gantries may interfere with sensitive video transmission equipment used for the race, the following ERP gantries that are within the proximity of the race circuit will not be in operation. Vehicles going under these gantries during the specified dates and time will not be charged:

ERP Gantry	Non Operation Dates and Time
New Bridge Road	19 September (Thursday) & 20 September (Friday) between 6pm and 7pm
South Bridge Road
ECP (eastbound) from Ophir Road	19 September (Thursday) & 20 September (Friday) between 6pm and 8pm
Temasek Boulevard	19 September (Thursday) & 20 September (Friday) between 12pm and 8pm and 21 September…

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Disappearing Act by taxi drivers angered Commuters

It’s been the long time that I had written in the blog as I had concentrate my posting in my facebook. With the recent article in the straits times, It probe me to continue writing here.

The articles: Are taxis doing a “disappearing act” just before peak-hour surcharges kick in? Or is it simply a case of demand outstripping supply? What are the ways to improve taxi availability? 

What the report said have some valid points. Commuters and Taxi Drivers have their own point of views.

On the commuters’ side, It’s a pain in the neck during these hours:
1) 7.30am to 10.30am (Monday to Friday except Public Holidays)
2) 5pm till 7.30pm (Monday to Friday except Public Holidays)
3) 9.30pm till 10.45pm (Everyday)
4) 9am till 6pm (Weekends and Holidays)

Why is it pain in the neck during this hours mention above? The only reason that I can offer is, everyone needs a taxi during these hours. Remember, there are currently only about 28,000 taxi plying the roads daily.

Assuming 5% of the population looking for a taxi at these timing, 250,000 commuters are looking for taxi. How many can the taxi take a one go? There is always a timing that the commuters are expected to wait a longer than usual before boarding a taxi, coupled with traffic conditions that taxi drivers have to navigate through.

Being a taxi driver for the last three years, it taught me lots of things and I learn from the trade. The few problems that are causing the slow turnovers in my own perspective view are the followings:

1) Uneven geographical location for taxis. Higher demand in the Housing estate going to CBD or industrial estate, resulting shortage of taxi in the estate further away from the mentioned locations. In the evening, higher demand is on the opposite, higher demand in the CBD and Industrial estate. The government had in facts trying to distribute out the prime location to different areas like IBP, CBP etc, but the taxi drivers are not benefiting is as yet. And sorry, I had been digging my brains for the past one year and I had failed to offer any solutions on this problem yet.

2) LTA had a rule or law that requires Taxi Drivers to follow the commuters instructions on which route to take or take the shortest possible route.  This rule comes about is to ensure that taxi drivers do not take a longer route in order earn the extra dollars which I fully agrees. But this rules might not be applicable during the peak hours as there are jam along the route which resulted in slower turnover of the taxis or taxi being caught in the jam. Sometime by taking a longer route which will enable the commuters reaching the destination faster and sometime cheaper (based on the commuters that commented on the route I had taken).

Due to this rule, taxi drivers are afraid to make any recommendation to their commuters for afraid that they will complain against him especially the CDG Drivers. They will just follow the instruction given. Being caught in the jam will cost the commuters to pay more while taxi drivers earning less.

To solved this problem, the rules should be amended to the following:  Taxi Drivers to follow the commuters instructions on which route to take or take the shortest possible route, suggest whichever possible route to get to the commuters’ destinations.

3) The third reason which I’m going to give might anger some taxi drivers, but I need to be fair on the commuters side too… Master your trade well and you should know where to find commuters in the shortest possible time even in the middle of the night. Take pride with what you do and offer no regrets. New Drivers, do not over depend on GPS and know your route as fast as possible.

Taxi drivers are self employed, they do want to earn the highest possible return in the shortest possible time. It’s the same in any trade, the boss would want to earn the most with the least cost and wages. Commuters, please put yourself in the taxi drivers’ shoe and you will understand why.

Lastly, public transports infrastructure needed to ramp up as fast as possible. With better public transport infrastructure, people will tend to drive less and less traffic congestion on the road which will offer the best solutions for everyone.

Ban Uber Taxi in Singapore

Dear Minister Lui,

I’m a full-time taxi driver and I would like to share with you my concerned about Uber limousine Taxi into Singapore market.

Uber had come into Singapore market since 2013, catering services that offer high-end limousine services to their member. Lately, they started their new UberX which cater to the standardise taxi limousine.

In the newspaper report, they had highlight that they do not infringe the LTA rules as they cater to their “Member” only. So What are their so-called members? Members are those who just registered in the Apps and instantly becomes their member. It’s like a wolf in a sheep clothing.

The main concern that I have is as follows:

1. Private limousine should not charge by meter but rather they should be charged a flat fee. Why are they allowed to charge based on meter which is no different from our local taxi, be it standard taxi or limousine taxi?

2. Anyone can become a Uber driver so long they have a valid insurance to have commercial coverage. So where is the service standard that we are looking at? Anyone without a valid vocational license can become a Uber driver so long they are registered with Uber. This lead to another question: Is the LTA is the main authority to allow who can drive a taxi in Singapore or Uber are the authority?

   This will give taxi driver want-to-be no incentive to get the vocational license if they can drive one without having the license.

3. The re-surfacing of pirate taxi! With the private car enable to pick up commuters, how can the commuters knows if they are genuine taxi drivers, there will bound to have some driver taking the risk picking commuters without proper insurance coverage just like early 80s.

4. Bad Taxi service without proper control will create free for all to pick up commuters off the roads.

5. Protect the only jobs for Singaporean only!

   As a displaced PMET, driving a taxi is one of the last resort that we have to survive in today high cost of living in Singapore, With Uber Taxi services, apart from Singaporean can drive, they allowed PR as their limousine Taxi driver as well.

   If this is the direction the government that heading, the only Singaporean job will be at risk! What can those other misplaced PMET going to do is there isn’t anymore taxi driving as the last resort?

   This is going to reflect badly towards the government caring towards Singaporean!

6. Negative image of Singapore will be presented to Tourist. While we are known to have strict regulations, nothing is done with this instant. How would the tourists feel if the they take a private vehicle as taxi?

7. How accurate the meter can be? Although it goes according to the GPS via their phone applications, LTA have no control of how the meter has been charged, will the commuters fairly over charged will be unknown.

8. The last of the concern is for all commuters! The Safety of the commuters.

   With LTA have not authority on who UBER engaged, effectively those former taxi driver who had been revoked of the taxi vocational license can continue to ply their trade via UBER. Current Taxi Driver with valid vocational license will conduct themselves well as their vocational license is at stake. But nothing can be say so if it is from private taxi.

With France, Belgium, Germany and England, in United States (Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Chicago), they have banned or having the intention of banning UBER and other private taxi which do not have the regulation control of the taxi drivers. It has brought unfair advantage of those unlicensed taxi drivers over those license drivers.

With the above concern that I have highlighted, I hoped that your good ministry will take a proper stand on this issue. Any misstep by your good ministry will create chaos in the public transport system that the government had built up over the years.

Note: This email will be cc to The Online Citizen, TR Emeritus, The Real Singapore and LTA

Is the Taxi Booking Landscape in Singapore going for a major reform?

                      

Two Apps have appear into Singapore Taxi Booking systems, namely the Easy Taxi and Grab Taxi. They allowed commuters to book the taxi via their apps, taxi drivers to get their booking who have sign up with the company.

These two company comes to Singapore with a big bang! How are they going to affect the taxi booking landscape in Singapore? This is everybody guess… Let me as a Taxi driver as well as commuters (on weekends) see the apps in my view.

Let me starts off with the application as a commuter:

Easy Taxi

Not very user-friendly, give up trying to use the apps after a few attempts. Currently, commuters do no need to pay booking charges to the driver as now they are having promotion.

Grab Taxi

A far more user-friendly apps which allow us to see how many taxi available in the area, see how many taxi bidding for the our job, track the location of the taxi that have successfully bided our job. Two Way communication is made available as driver’s mobile number is shown to the commuters.

As I have limited usage as a commuter, I would leave other users who often use the apps to post the comments in my blog on the apps.

Right now, as a taxi driver, I use the apps every day to get extra jobs for myself. I will touch on each individual apps that I have used.

Easy Taxi – Drivers

Easy to use as almost guarantee that the job will be yours if accept it. It’s currently offer driver SGD $5 per job completed. IT can be used on Andriod Only. Currently it does not charge any fee to drivers to take up their booking.

The downside of the apps are as follows:

1. The job offered can be as far as 8Km away which is not very practical in Singapore. It might be useful in area like Tuas, Jurong Island & Loyang area but not in town area.

2. Nothing to complain about except that their promotion and marketing are lagging behind Grab Taxi, thus we driver concentrate on Grab Taxi then Easy Taxi (will explain in detail later).

Grab Taxi – Drivers

Currently available in Andriod Phone only. With all the happening going on, I’m using Iphone which is not available, make me purchase a cheap Hua Wei Andriod phone to test out how good the Apps is.

To encourage drivers to take up their booking, they are having a promotion now for the drivers till 2nd March 2014, on top of the booking charge payable by commuters :

1. Make twelve booking in a week will receive a bonus of SGD $88.

2. Additional payment of $9 for taking booking during their declared peak hours while non peak entitle the drivers SGD $6.

Due to the promotion they are having now, commuters are able to book a taxi easily as a lot of taxi are going after the extra payment by the Grab Taxi.

In general, their Apps are quite easy to use and they only charge SGD $0.30 per booking completed.

Due to the popular demand from Commuters, there are also some improvement can be enhance on. Based on my two weeks experience using their Apps, the following concern which I hoped that Grab Taxi can improved on:

1. With increase number of booking during peak hours, the refreshing rate can be as fast as less than quarter of a second, this happen to me on the first friday evening (14 Feb 2014). We driver will not able to see where is the booking from.

2. When drivers bid for a job, drivers might need to wait for up to 15 seconds to see if they had successfully bid for the job. This is a potential hazard for taxi drivers as they might not know which direction they should be heading to.

3. Booking usually confirm to the nearest taxi driver (eg 0.1km).

The above mention concern could be improved as follows (in my view):

i. Despatch booking to only certain number (say 5 taxi drivers) and this can increase the number of confirmation booking at a short period.

ii. Instead of using shortest possible distance, use a radius of 1km range  (increasing the range if no taxi drivers are not bidding for the job) to dispatch the booking.

iii. Fastest finger gets rule. This can almost give shortest possible time confirmation to the commuters and taxi drivers.

4. We taxi driver are constantly on the road and booking offer comes, we need to double confirm the booking thus it created a road hazard for the taxi driver. Thus suggesting that confirmation of acceptance of the job should be made once only not twice.

Now having saying the pro and con of the Apps from Easy Taxi and Grab Taxi, how would these two Apps affecting the landscape of the taxi booking system in Singapore?

Well, as of the current system, with no extra incentives to the taxi driver, whichever booking comes first from the company booking or the Apps booking, the taxi driver will take it. That is to say, most of the time, Comfort or SMRT booking system will always comes first before the Apps booking comes. Thus there are chances that the drivers taking Apps booking will be greatly reduced. Unless the driver are so sensitive to the charges the company levied SGD$0.30 from Grab Taxi compared to SGD $0.40 from Comfort or SGD $0.50 from SMRT. But however, those taxi driver from other taxi company apart from Comfort or SMRT will continue to use the Apps as their company taxi booking is very limited.

How the landscape is going to changed is very much depend on the commuters and taxi drivers. How supportive they are towards the Apps. Also, how the Apps going to impact on the revenue of the taxi companies, how much decrease of their revenue, what kind of counter measure are they going to take? Would they be forced to combine forces and create an integrated booking system? All the answer will be known after the taxi start to report their earning or any counter measure they have made.

In conclusion, I would very much support the Apps and in line with what I had previously blogged. It definitely will help to decrease the monopoly of certain taxi company thus resulting better benefit for the taxi drivers as well as the commuters.

Lastly, I would like to see a direct competition from the Apps company by offering direct call centre to engage the commuters who wants to book a taxi through them. Engaged LTA to have the Apps address printed on all the Taxi Stand so that commuters can know how to book the taxi through their Apps and it could gain recognition from the authority as well.

I would write another blog on how the situation after all incentive ends for the two Apps.