10 thoughts on hawker centre cleaning saga
The man who can’t be moved
If you, like Minister Vivian Balakrishnan, haven’t moved on from this whole hawker centre cleaning saga, here are ten thoughts that may interest you. For background reading, please refer to the “dossier” and this email chain between AHPETC and NEA. All observations below are on the assumption that everything in the dossier is true.
1. The NEA officer, Ms Chin Peiyun, clearly misled AHPETC in the email on 7 Feb 2013 by writing “pl note that the Hawkers Association will make the necessary arrangements with their contractors on the scaffold erection/ dismantling during the spring cleaning period from 4-8 March 2013 for the above food centre (538)”. In all likelihood this could be unintentional, but NEA should acknowledge this miscommunication instead of insisting that it was referring to “the scaffolding and canvas covers for the individual stalls”. Nowhere was “canvas covers” mentioned in the email.
2. I am guessing that, after Ms Chin’s email, someone from AHPETC informed ATL Maintenance that the Hawkers Association (HA) will be responsible for the erection of the scaffolding, which led to ATL delivering the quotation to the HA without its asking.
3. Vivian B urged for clean politics and for mistakes to be owned up, which is what everyone wants. But by refusing to admit (1), it makes his grand speech sound a bit rich. The fact that Ms Chin’s email was mentioned but not included in the dossier in full suggests selective choice of “evidence”.
4. A representative from HA claimed that ATL workers only came down on only one day (7 Mar) to clean, even though the hawker centre was closed for 5 days. This was after HA had rejected the quotation from ATL which was for 4 working days. My guess is that Mr Tai Vie Shun, AHPETC’s property manager, could be thinking: “NEA has already said the hawkers are responsible for the scaffolding. If they don’t want to pay, fine, we will just do the normal one day cleaning without scaffolding”.
5. There’s a small argument over whether MP Faisal Manap’s writing of an appeal letter to AHPETC on behalf of the hawkers implies that he was/was not aware that the hawkers shouldn’t be liable for additional charges. I find this moot and irrelevant. On the other hand, it is odd that Mr Manap as an elected MP of Aljunied GRC had to write a formal appeal letter to his own town council (albeit a joint TC between 3 wards), instead of speaking to it directly. This leads me to think that he is not very involved in the running of the town council.
6. We can blame Block 538’s botched cleaning on the misunderstanding over the email from NEA, but it is inexplicable why Mr Tai continued to insist that the hawkers have to pay in subsequent meetings with NEA officers present. There couldn’t possibly be any more misunderstanding on whether it should be an annual or quarterly cleaning. And in May, after several meetings, Mr Tai became very uncooperative to both HA and NEA by insisting that the two parties liaise with each other directly and not involve him.
7. Some online commentators said that WP’s refusal to take up Vivian B’s challenge to sue him or Mr Low’s refusal to further investigate imply they have something to hide. But there could be other factors. For example, they may know something that will lead to questions on the integrity of NEA officers or the hawkers, but that would be a politically suicidal battle that they won’t want to go into.
8. Related to the previous point, it was a sly tactic by Vivian B to use the “hawkers can’t be lying, so you must be” line of argument, knowing that nobody would dare suggest such a thing on these folks.
9. I tweeted back in June that the only way to know the whole truth is if the Hawkers Association and ATL come out to clarify publicly (Mr Ng Kok Khim of the HA has subsequently asserted he never asked for the quotation). We must add Mr Tai to that list. Else even after all the parliamentary drama we are still none the wiser.
10. The biggest question — and this is the one Vivian B wants us to focus on — is why does WP not admit that Mr Tai had on more than one occasion insisted payment from the hawkers? It looks like Mr Tai is a root cause of the entire dispute, so why is WP still defending him?
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I think you missed Sylvia’s point that Mr Tai did not insist that the hawkers should pay for the cleaning of the high ceilings on the annual cleaning session. There are spring cleanings (4 times a year) and there are annual cleanings (once a year). For annual cleaning, the town council (TC) is required to clean the high ceilings but there is no set date for when in a calendar year should this annual cleaning take place. Therefore, if the hawkers insist that the high ceilings are cleaned during one of the spring cleanings, I think it makes sense that this Mr Tai will insist that the hawkers should make their own payment.
I have linked here the parliament session made available by our government: http://youtu.be/NiqBLu8XVkA
It was very frustrating for me to watch it because I don’t think Vivian has answered any questions and just made accusations.
Hi heidi,
I’m aware that Sylvia Lim said that, which is in direct contradiction with the dossier. But if WP or Mr Tai doesn’t come out with their version of events, then the public will take the words of the dossier and it will just look bad on WP.
I’m also not convinced there can be any more misunderstanding on whether it’s annual or quarterly cleaning after all the face-to-face meetings between Mr Tai, the HA and NEA, especially when they related specifically to the upcoming cleaning for Blk 511.
If in the meetings they had all agreed that it is a quarterly cleaning, and the hawkers still insisted the ceiling should be cleaned, then WP should come out and say that it was agreed as a quarterly cleaning. But they left it vague without stating what kind of cleaning had been agreed.
Hi voiddecker,
After reading your response, I went through the “dossier” for the first time. I didn’t realise before that the “meeting notes” VB mentioned were just NEA’s internal notes and therefore never verified by other attendees of those meetings.
On the assumption that the notes are reflective of the statements and intentions of this Mr Tai, you can see that the internal emails still refer to “spring cleaning” in March and April although the April notes mentioned “major spring cleaning” which apparently should happen in June or expected to happen in June. Also, more importantly, no conclusion was made to the scope of works to be done and whether the June cleaning should be a standard 1-day spring cleaning or a major 5-day spring cleaning.
Did the hawkers insist that the ceiling should be cleaned? If they did, why did they need to email Tai and ask if it was going to be 1-day or 5-day spring cleaning? It does seem to me that Tai was being unapproachable and dare I say rude to those who asked about the June cleaning. Having said that being rude is not a crime. And it does seem like the hawkers then are aware that it is within the TC’s right to not make it a major spring cleaning in June? If only Tai replied and explained that it would be a 1-day spring cleaning and if the HA wanted to have a major cleaning, he was willing to sort it out with the contractor with a quotation or something to that effect.
To be honest, after reading the dossier, I still am not sure if we are given all relevant information (or we ever will). If we look at evidence 4, the internal notes stated in the last sentence of first paragraph under Background that the Block 538 stallholders “were told to close for 5 days but the TC only carried out cleaning for 1 day” – who told the stallholders? It does not make sense if it was TC who told the hawkers it was 5-days and did only 1 day. And if it was someone else, who is it? The PA? The NEA?
Anyway, nothing in Mr Tai’s emails suggest he asked for money or payments. Where he was mentioned to suggest certain costs should be borne by HA is in NEA’s internal notes. I am not very persuaded by the evidence set out in the dossier and to send these out in a pack during a debate is very bad form and that sent me to be on WP’s side a bit more.
I think there’s a lot of confusion over the term “spring cleaning”, which is why in my post I stuck to “annual” or “quarterly” cleaning.
Also bear in mind that everything I’m writing is on assumption the dossier is true, even if it’s just NEA’s internal notes.
Yes, you’re right that, as noted in the chronology, in the meeting on 26 April, there was no conclusion on the scope of work between Mr Tai and HA/NEA. But this was not due to a disagreement on whether it’s annual or quarterly cleaning. If you refer to page 12 of the dossier:
[Begin quote]
On the scope for the fore coming spring cleaning Mr Tai informed the meeting that they will carry out cleaning only up to areas reachable by the cleaners, i.e. similar or equal to the wall fans height or 2.5m. NEA then informed the TC that for the major spring cleaning they are required to clean areas beyond 2.5m and up to the ceiling area. Mr Tai however disagreed and replied that it is MOM’s rule that no works beyond height of 2.5m be carried out without scaffoldings.
The HA reps commented that the ceiling and beams were dirty, and were covered with bird droppings. However, TC commented that they will not be bearing any costs for the erecting of staging/machinery for cleaning of areas beyond height of 2.5m. Mr Tai mentioned that the costs of erecting the staging/machinery for cleaning of areas beyond 2.5m shall be borne by HA instead of Town Council. Following queries from the HA, Mr Tai said that he is following their SOP for all their works to be carried out.
[End quote]
You see that according to the above, Mr Tai insisted that HA pays for the scaffolding even after NEA specifically said that it’s a “major spring cleaning”. He seemed to be insisting on some height restriction by MOM that forbids the TC from being involved.
I think because of this disagreement, the HA weren’t sure if they should proceed with a 5 day cleaning or 1 day. Because if the ceiling is not going to be cleaned, it would be silly for them to close for 5 days. That’s why they emailed Mr Tai again on 1 and 14 May to ask if the scope has been agreed. Just my guess though.
On the point of who decided if Blk 538’s cleaning is 5 days or 1, if you refer to the separate email chain (other link), the first email from Ms Chin said the HA proposed the 5 days. Therefore I can only guessed that the HA proposed the dates, then told the stallholders to close for 5 days.
I do agree that it’s bad form to suddenly produce this in parliament and put WP in a spot, and then hold them to their words that were forced out of them in parliament when they didn’t even have a chance to go through the dossier.
Do we really need to look so deeply or try to figure how each event had happened? To me all WP party really should have done was just discuss directly with the hawker about their complain and thus address any dispute or miscommunication with the hawker. Instead all I hear was just denial that this a misunderstanding and lacks any apology to the hawker. WP wanted to act as the voice for the people and yet here they failed to hear the hawkers out. Is this how WP would serve the people?
That’s what happens when there’s lack of info — people like us try to make sense of it
Now that PM has sensed blood and upped the ante, let’s see if WP finally relents with some clarification!
For the me the bottom line is WP has already handled the hawker dispute poorly which really is not that complex at all. WP should really come clean, clarify and acknowledge any shortcomings found. I am somewhat disappointed with PAP especially with the foreign influx but I am not impress at all with WP performance especially with Slyvia since WP’s victory during the last election.
All this hassle over a bloody hawker centre cleaning. Our politicians are paid too much money till they are too free issit?
EXPOSED: PAP GRASSROOTS’ LEADER CAUSED THE ATTACK ON AHPETC
http://therealsingapore.com/content/exposed-pap-grassroots-leader-caused-attack-ahpetc
Exposed PAP member Ng Kok Khim: ‘I have no political motive’ in AHPETC saga
http://www.tremeritus.com/2013/06/14/exposed-pap-member-ng-kok-khim-i-have-no-political-motive-in-ahpetc-saga/
A GOOD SUMMARY OF THE NEA-AHPETC SAGA
http://therealsingapore.com/content/good-summary-nea-ahpetc-saga
Spring Cleaning at 538 Bedok North
Please refer to the email correspondence between NEA and AHPETC below.
Original Message
From: Peiyun CHIN (NEA)
Sent: Thursday, February 07, 2013 6:45 PM
To: Pradeep
Cc: Tai VS; Peng Siang LIM (NEA); Sze Wei TAN (NEA); Jian Sheng YAP (NEA); Andy
Phua Son Kok
Subject: RE: Next Spring Cleaning date at 538 Bedok North Street 3 FC
Hi Mr Predeep
Sorry for the delay as I was on course for the past few days, pl note that the Hawkers Association will make the necessary arrangements with their contractors on the scaffold erection/ dismantling during the spring cleaning period from 4-8 March 2013 for the above food centre.
Thank You.
Regards
According to the subject of the email, the issue was about spring cleaning. The NEA officer also wrote in the email message, “the Hawkers Association will make the necessary arrangement…during the spring cleaning period from 4-8 March 2013 for the above food centre.”
Please also refer to Today online article “Workers’ Party lying about hawker centre cleaning: Govt” dated 10 July 2013. It was reported that the minister, Dr Vivian Balakrishnan, said “spring cleaning was done by hawkers once every three months while town councils are responsible for conducting and paying for an annual cleaning, including for high areas such as ceilings, beams and exhaust ducts.”
As the issue raised by NEA is about spring cleaning, I believe that the Town Council should not be expected to do or answer to anything with regard to spring cleaning because – as Dr Balakrishnan had mentioned – town councils are only responsible for annual cleaning, not spring cleaning.
It appears that NEA has confused spring cleaning with annual cleaning duties. Did NEA make a mistake?
Did the civil service cooperate with the political leadership by making a mistake to create an issue to attack the WP?
The email correspondence between NEA and AHPETC was taken fromhttp://www.ahpetc.sg/wp-co