In a Budget 2023 debate speech, MP Leon Perera highlighted the need for a meritocracy that promotes both equality of opportunity and social mobility, while also ensuring a decent standard of living and societal respect for those who are less successful in conventional terms.
Key points:
- He suggested that a focus on vocational and trades jobs was necessary to balance out the advantages now conferred by a university degree.
- Mr Perera called for policy efforts to improve wages, skills, productivity, and working conditions in trades jobs, as well as fast-tracking foreign work pass holders who are very skilled and experienced in trades jobs to become Singapore citizens.
- He proposed a Skillsfuture education loan to help fund Continuing Education and Training (CET) for adults who cannot competitively secure scholarships and places in retraining programs like PCP, the supply of which is still limited.
- Mr Perera also urged the government to consider lowering form class sizes and to publish randomized controlled trials on the benefits of smaller classes on learning outcomes.
- He emphasized the importance of fostering respect across socio-economic lines, rejecting an extreme form of meritocracy that creates a natural aristocracy, and warned against heartless meritocracy that inevitably leads to a backlash from those who feel disadvantaged and discriminated against.
