Population Policies and Programmes in Singapore is a vastly expanded version of my earlier book published some twenty-five years ago by Oxford University Press under the old title of Population Control for Zero Growth in Singapore. This revised edition of the book has been divided into two distinct sections — Part One: Anti-natalist Period and Part Two: Pronatalist Period. The former deals with the period when the main concern was the need to lower the high and above-replacement fertility in the early years, and the latter covers the more recent period when the focus of attention was centred on preventing fertility from continuing to move forward at a level too low below-replacement fertility. The chapters included in Part One have been reproduced, with some revisions, from my earlier book, while Part Two contains the new chapters and appendices.

The enlarged book has therefore been structured in such a manner as to present a comprehensive account of the initiatives undertaken by the government to influence the course of fertility, and hence the rate of population growth, in the island state of Singapore during the last four decades or so. The book may be viewed as a case study of the public policy of a country in the area of population with regard to fertility and population growth. Hopefully, the book will enable the people of Singapore to comprehend the fundamental population issue of the day and to recognize the rather low below-replacement fertility, coupled with its adverse consequences, that will persist during their whole lifetime. More specifically, the book will be useful to married couples with children or planning to have babies since it constitutes a convenient source of detailed information on all the existing pronatalist incentives, financial or otherwise, that they are entitled to claim.

In the preparation of the two editions of the book, I was fortunate to receive the valuable assistance of many organizations and individuals. My thanks go to the Government Statistics Department, the then Family Planning and Population Board, and the Family Planning Association for supplying me with statistical data and other relevant materials. My research has been enormously facilitated by the conducive facilities offered at the London School of Economics Library, the National University of Singapore Library, and ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute.

Having examined at great length the nature of the population control programme with its various components introduced at different times in response to prevailing demographic trends and economic conditions, we will now proceed to investigate the levels and trends in fertility during the post-war period up to 1977, paying particular attention to the more interesting developments that had taken place in the 1970s. In this task we have been greatly assisted by the availability of accurate and comprehensive birth statistics generated from the efficient vital registration system in Singapore. For one thing, the coverage of birth statistics is known to have attained near 100 per cent completeness, and from 1953, these data have been made available according to the date of occurrence of live-births. Data on live-births by age of mother have been made available progressively in greater detail since 1943, with birth order statistics first published in 1967.

Our study of fertility levels and trends is based largely on the total fertility rate though the crude birth rate is also used. The crude birth rate, defined as the total number of live-births occurring during one calendar year per thousand population living in the middle of the same year, is easy to compute and understand, but it suffers from some inherent defects. It is distorted by differences in population structure and is not suited for assessing fertility differences over time or among various groups of the population. The total fertility rate is the average number of children that would be born per woman in a group of women if all women survived to the end of their reproductive years and bore children at each age in accordance with the age-specific fertility schedule for women of various ages. Computation of this rate requires data on the number of births during the year tabulated by the age of the mother and on the total female population at mid-year of the same year by five-year age groups. The total fertility rate, which is independent of the effect of the sex and age composition of the population, is a satisfactory measure for analysing fertility trends and differentials.

The title of my talk today is, “The Second Long March”. It is inspired by the Long March of the Chinese communists in 1935.

The Long March began in October 1934 at the South-eastern corner of China, and ended one year later, in another corner in the North-west, a distance of about 10,000 kilometres.

The communists, led by Mao Zedong, trekked over endless expanses of very harsh terrain — raging rivers, snow-capped mountains and treacherous marshes. At one point, where there was no water they survived by drinking their own urine.

Of the 90,000 men and women who set out, only 7,000 survived the March. Most of them died through sickness and exhaustion. Only a few were actually killed in battle.

For those who survived, it was a real triumph of human endurance and spirit.

One may disagree with the political ideology of Mao Zedong and his comrades. Yet, one cannot help but marvel at the triumph of their spirit over impossible odds.

I feel that the problems we are facing are so complex and immense that they will require strong qualities like those exhibited by the Long Marchers.

These are physical and moral courage, perseverance, discipline, dedication, resolution and teamwork.

But when I tested the title on some of my colleagues, they were not the least enthusiastic.

They thought the Long March metaphor suggested that I was an admirer of the Chinese communists.

They also pointed out that the Long March was not an all-conquering march, but was, in fact, a hasty retreat of the Red Army.

I looked for alternative titles, like “The Tasks Ahead” and “Certainties and Uncertainties”.

In the end I felt “The Second Long March” was still the most apt. It captures the spirit of determination and toughness of purpose most vividly.

SINGAPORE'S FIRST LONG MARCH

My Long March metaphor may be inspired by the Chinese communists but the numerical order is not.

I use the word “Second” not after the Long March in China but after a Long March in Singapore.

For, in my view, the struggle for survival of Singapore as an independent nation, is also a triumph of the human spirit, a victory of conviction and determination, over impossible odds.

INTRODUCTION

Singapore is one of the few countries where the government has always assumed an active role in attempting to influence the course of population trends with the view of resolving any adverse consequences that may emerge. From the very beginning when the country achieved independence from the British in 1965, the Singapore Government has put in place a population control programme that offered contraceptive services in its clinics, legalized abortion, and voluntary sterilization. The programme was so comprehensive and successful that fertility was induced to tumble rapidly to replacement level in 1975.

The somewhat low fertility recorded a few years before 1975 should have been taken as a clear signal that it would not take too long for fertility to reach replacement level. It was quite obvious that the continuation of the antinatalist policies would sustain fertility at well below-replacement level, and indeed that was what actually happened. These measures were essentially left untouched for more than a decade until the mid-1980s. Moreover, the eventual implementation of the pronatalist policies was not quite decisive, with the various incentives introduced gradually at different stages over a period of thirty years. In the meantime, the group of social and economic factors favouring small family norms continued to exert a powerful influence on the reproductive behaviour of married couples.

The demographic history of Singapore had indeed reached a critical stage where fertility had consistently remained well below the replacement level. This must necessarily imply that the annual number of births produced by our women was no longer adequate to replenish the population. It was widely recognized that the only solution to this predicament was to rely on the continuous inflow of new immigrants to prevent the population from declining in the years ahead. With the inflow of newcomers under its direct management, the government was now entrusted with the important responsibility of ensuring a correct supply of newcomers to sustain economic growth as well as to enlarge the resident population.

DEMOGRAPHIC TRENDS

The total population of Singapore has been divided into resident population and non-resident population, with the former consisting of persons who are citizens and permanent residents.

All countries are shaped by demography. Few, however, are as aware in which demography shapes their destiny as Singapore has been at every phase of its independent existence. Initially, Singapore's leaders focused on reducing fertility as a key element in its development strategy. A comprehensive population control programme was introduced and effectively administered, as described in the second edition of the authoritative book on Population Policies and Programmes in Singapore, by Saw Swee-Hock. Indeed, so effective was the population control effort that within a few decades, Singapore switched to being concerned about low fertility and began to introduce some of the world's strongest pronatalist policies.

Few, if any, other countries have moved as rapidly from efforts to limit fertility to pronatalism. That Singapore did so is testimony not only to the success of its early efforts, but also to the success of economic development itself. For family size and fertility behaviour change not only in response to policy but also to economic conditions. And fertility behaviour becomes a part of the broader culture and social structures. This is one of the reasons Singapore has found it harder to increase fertility in recent years than it did to reduce it earlier. Singapore achieved very positive increase in gender equality that affected everything from marriage patterns to women's work. It developed a culture of conscious choice about fertility and of high investments seeking high achievements from small numbers of offspring.

All this is especially interesting because Singapore was among the global pioneers in integrating family planning into the pursuit of economic growth. It became a model for the later, larger-scale and more draconian policies of the People's Republic of China.

In this book, Professor Saw reproduces a 1986 speech from Goh Chok Tong that uses the metaphor of a “long march” drawn from modern Chinese history. Singapore has seen two long marches. The first began with a struggle for survival and became a struggle for prosperity as an independent nation. The second was to determine what kind of “mature” country Singapore wanted to be, shifting gears from managing the challenges of pure necessity to making choices based on values.

I have one last subject. It's very late, but I think I will talk about it all the same and this is babies. It's a very serious problem for us and for all the developed countries. Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Europe. Even the Catholic countries in Europe, Italy has a very low fertility rate, Spain too. The only exception is America where immigration is very high and somehow, the culture is completely different. It's a national problem for us, but it's also an intensely personal business. I asked when did previous Prime Ministers raise such delicate matters? My people tell me, Mr Lee raised it in his 18th National Day Rally. What about Goh Chok Tong? He waited for his tenth National Day Rally. This is my first one. So, new baby, please be understanding.

Our approach is, let's put it like this — this is a matter of values, not of incentives. It's values and priorities, not the financial grants and subsidies, which count. We want people to have babies because you want them and you love them. It's part of a happy family life. It's fulfilling to bring up a child. You can have the most successful career, you can be the richest man on Earth or the most powerful man or woman on Earth, but if you don't have a family and don't have children, I think you're missing something. It starts off with missing changing nappies when you have a child, but then you miss watching a child learning to walk, learning to talk, going to school, getting sick, depending on you, walking with you, playing with you. You are teaching him, doing homework with him or her. Then you'll find that he's got his own temperament, character, personality, he's different from you. He's got his own ideas and after a while, one day, you are helping him or her do homework and he says, “No, no, you do it like this” and I look puzzled and I don't quite know what he is talking about, but he does and you know he's taken a step forward and he's on his own.

We have observed the quick reaction of the government in confronting the population problems facing the country during the early postindependence period. The wide range of strong antinatalist measures proved to be very effective in rapidly pushing down fertility to replacement level within a decade or so. In sharp contrast, the government was rather slow in recognizing the necessity of removing completely the antinatalist policies. Even when the policy changes were finally put in place, they were implemented very gradually in different stages over a period of some thirty-five years.

The postnatalist era will be the focus of our attention in the remaining part of the book, with chapters dealing with the loosening of the antinatalist policies, the introduction of limited pronatalist incentives, the reinforcing of the limited pronatalist incentives, the implementation of new pronatalist measures for mothers without any restriction on the birth order of the babies and below-replacement fertility. This will be followed by a chapter on the hot button topic of immigration policies and programmes. The concluding chapter will discuss the complex demographic issues and challenges that must be tackled by the people and the nation.

NEED FOR POLICY CHANGES

It may be recalled that the population control programme was implemented in the mid-1960s. Its specific objective was to lower the level of fertility so as to reduce the rate of population growth. This was part of the national development strategy to raise the standard of living of the people. As it became increasingly obvious that this objective would be achieved by the mid-1970s, attention was focused on the wider issue of the maximum size of the population that Singapore could accommodate in the future. The extremely small land area with no endowed natural resources must necessarily imply that Singapore cannot allow the population to grow indefinitely into an unmanageable size that can threaten the very existence of the island Republic. This led to the government declaring in 1974 that the national demographic goal thereafter was to stabilize the population in the future.

In order to achieve this long-term demographic goal, it was essential to fulfil two conditions concerning fertility in accordance with stationary population theory.

FORMATION OF THE FAMILY PLANNING ASSOCIATION (FPA)

Birth control as a means of spacing children and limiting family size has long been practised by couples in Singapore on an individual basis, sometimes with the advice of doctors and friends and the use of family planning literature. However, this practice was confined only to a small group of persons belonging mainly to the more educated and wealthier classes. The idea of providing family planning services to the general public was first discussed by a major correspondent in the Straits Times in January 1935, and this attracted some public comments from various interested groups about the pros and cons of family planning. Public interest in this subject was revived during the visit of Mrs Margaret Sanger, a world authority on birth control, to Singapore in February 1936 when she advocated that, among other things, family planning should be an essential part of the official public health programme. In December 1936, the Chinese Christian Association debated the matter and voted, with only three against, that birth control clinics should be established in Singapore. Some time before World War II, the establishment of a private family planning society was in fact recommended by a leading article in an English newspaper published on 21 September 1938. This suggestion did not result in any positive action and it was not until a decade later that such a society was formed.

The idea of providing family planning services for the general public on a large and organized scale was debated again during the post-war years when the country was faced with serious social and economic dislocations. Apart from housing and educational problems, the government was confronted with the problem of feeding a large number of undernourished persons, especially children roaming the streets, because of rampant food shortages. The Social Welfare Department set up numerous centres to feed the hungry children, but it soon became apparent to the group of voluntary workers assisting in this scheme that, instead of feeding the children, the parents should be given family planning advice to plan their family size according to their means.

At the invitation of the YWCA International Club, a series of lectures on birth control was delivered in April 1949 by the Head of the Social Welfare Department, the Municipal Lady Health Officer, and the wife of a senior missionary to some sixty women.

OVERVIEW

In providing every possible support, financial or otherwise, to the Family Planning Association in its attempt to assist women to plan their births and avoid having unwanted babies and to check the rapid rate of population increase in the early 1960s, the Singapore Government was aware of the conflicting nature of some government policies with respect to the general concept of family planning and the promotion of a small family norm in particular. In his opening address at the Seventh Conference of International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) held in Singapore on 10 February 1963, the Prime Minister, Lee Kuan Yew, referred to the anomalies in certain government policies, carried over from the colonial period, seen from the point of view of population control. He stated,

However, these contradictory rules were not altered then as the Prime Minister felt that humanitarian values and sentiments had prevented the government from making any change.

It would appear that in the next few years, the problem of these contradictory rules was constantly occupying the minds of the government leaders as the Prime Minister brought up this question once again in his National Day message on 9 August 1967. He said,

INTRODUCTION

While the previous chapter presents an account of the changes relating to the partial reversal of the old antinatalist policies introduced during the years 1987–2000, this chapter focuses on limited pronatalist measures implemented during the same period. Apart from recommending the loosening of some of the old antinatalist policies, the Inter-Ministerial Population Committee suggested the introduction of some pronatalist measures. But these pronatalist measures, together with those implemented later, were based on the same principle of giving incentives up to at most the fourth child.

The second major group of pronatalist measures were introduced in the new millennium following the traditional address by the Prime Minister, Goh Chok Tong, in the National Day Rally held on 20 August 2000. Among other things, he said, “We must create a total environment conducive to raising a family. Our policy is to have three children or more if you can afford it.” It is important to emphasize that the somewhat restricted pronatalist policies were quite different from those completely pronatalist policies adopted in many European countries to raise the level of their below-replacement fertility.

The limited nature of the pronatalist policies would result in some additional births, but certainly not to the maximum as in the case of those with no restrictions at all. For one thing, the pronatalist benefits were not given to parents producing the fifth and subsequent children. It would appear that there still existed the concern that too many children were being produced by certain segments of the population. It was therefore not surprising that fertility had not been given the maximum possible boost and had continued to proceed well below replacement level after 2000.

LEAVE FOR PUBLIC SECTOR EMPLOYEES

A limited pronatalist measure was related to the leave of employees in the public sector, which was easier to change since government had the authority to alter the working conditions of civil servants. Soon after the National Day Rally speech by the Prime Minister, it was announced on 28 August 2000 by the Chairman of the Working Committee on Marriage and Procreation, Eddie Teo, that a government employee would be permitted to take three days' paid marriage leave when he married for the first time.

Until 1970, the performance of abortion in Singapore, like many other members of the British Commonwealth, was governed by laws based on legislation passed in the nineteenth century in Victorian England. It constituted a criminal act punishable under sections 312–316 of the Penal Code and could only be defended on the plea that the abortion was caused in good faith to safeguard the life of the woman concerned. Under such prohibitive laws, some pregnant women had no alternative but to resort to back-lane illegal abortions as a means of terminating unwanted pregnancies. Though the incidence of such criminally induced abortions performed during any period of time will always remain a mystery, the existence of such abortions is common knowledge among the public and has been confirmed by cases clinically diagnosed as “abortions with sepsis” in Kandang Kerbau Hospital. Moreover, there were numerous occasions when pregnant women approached the Family Planning Association for an abortion but were turned down.

During the early days of the national programme, some embarrassment was caused by women patients who approached the clinic staff of the Singapore Family Planning and Population Board (SFPPB) to terminate their pregnancies on account of contraceptive failure, especially from intrauterine devices (IUDs). This was particularly so in the case of women who had adopted family planning with IUD as a method of preventing further childbirth rather than spacing their children. Nothing could be done to alleviate the suffering of the women and they were persuaded to continue with their pregnancies. It was felt that this category of contraceptive failure should merit sympathetic consideration for induced abortion had the law permitted such termination of pregnancies.

MOVE TOWARDS LEGAL ABORTION

The review of the government policy concerning induced abortion was undertaken by the SFPPB soon after its establishment in January 1966. The role of induced abortion in the context of the family planning programme within the overall population control policy was discussed in some detail by the Board. It was generally agreed that induced abortion should be made available as a complement to this programme but not as an alternative to the other less drastic and preventive methods of family planning. By 1967, the Medical Committee of the SFPPB had resolved by a simple majority decision that failed sterilization and failed contraception could be accepted as criteria for legally induced abortion.

The Republic of Singapore comprises the main island of Singapore and some fifty-four small islets within its territorial waters and jurisdiction. The country has a total land area of only 716.1 square kilometres, 500 of which are taken up by the diamond-shaped main island which is 41.8 kilometres in length and 22.5 kilometres in breadth. Singapore is situated at the southern extremity of Peninsular Malaysia, to which it is linked by the 1,056-metre rail-and-road causeway spanning the Straits of Johor. In its wider context, the Republic occupies a strategic position in the principal sea, air, and trade routes between Europe and the Far East and Oceania. Singapore, being only 136.8 kilometres north of the Equator, has an equatorial climate with uniform and high temperatures of about 28°C, high humidity of about 70 per cent, and fairly abundant rainfall of some 2,400 millimetres per year. There is an absence of marked seasonal changes though December is often the wettest and coolest month.

The topography of Singapore is one lacking in contrast as the whole country is of very low elevation with a few small hills no higher than 166 metres. There are many rivers, with the larger ones such as the Kranji and Seletar Rivers used as catchment areas for reservoirs and, of course, the Singapore River which is the traditional busy waterway for small boats in the very heart of the city. The lowland forests that used to cover the island in the early days have retreated with the advance of roads, houses, factories, and cultivated vegetation. What remain are some small pockets of protected reserves, such as the Bukit Timah Nature Reserve and the Kranji Nature Reserve, totalling some 2,797 hectares. The built-up area is dominated by public housing high-rise apartments and factories which are concentrated mainly in the industrial town of Jurong on the western side of the main island.

The early history of Singapore prior to the nineteenth century remains largely uncharted, being interwoven with that of the various Buddhist, Hindu, and Islamic empires that existed in the Southeast Asian region. The British, led by Stamford Raffles, landed on the island on 29 January 1819 and soon signed a treaty with the Malay ruler, Sultan Hussein Mohamed Shah of Johor, and established a trading post.

INTRODUCTION

This chapter examines the salient features of the fertility movement below the level of replacement during a span of some thirty-seven years since 1975. In studying this long-term trend, we should bear in mind three broad groups of factors that could affect the level of fertility in Singapore. Firstly, there were the important social and economic factors that would always continue to assert a strong influence on the level of fertility. Secondly, there were the government policies and programmes that were introduced to change the course of fertility. Thirdly, there was the special influence of the Tiger Year and the Dragon Year in the twelve animal-zodiac signs of the Chinese lunar calendar.

The analysis of the fertility trend would be carried out in terms of the total fertility rate (TFR), the computation of which requires some explanation. The base female population used in the computation was derived from the distribution of the female resident population rather than the total female population, classified by five-year age groups from age 15 to 49. This is because figures for the intercensal and past censal years were only available for the resident population. Furthermore, the figures for the female resident population for the years 1991–99 were obtained from the revised estimates prepared after the 1990 Census. Another point to note was that the distribution of births by five-year age group of mothers from age 15 to 49 referred to births borne by the total female population and not by the female resident population. Birth statistics for the latter only were not available.

OVERALL FERTILITY TRENDS

After the unprecedented decline during the years up to 1975, the overall fertility in Singapore had continued to proceed downwards below the replacement level. The figures revealed that from the slightly below-replacement level of 2.08 in 1975, the total fertility rate edged up to 2.11 in the very next year but after that it moved down continuously to touch the low of 1.42 in 1986. Thereafter, the rate fluctuated somewhat but — on account of the influence of the Tiger and Dragon Years in the Chinese calendar and the effect of the population policy changes — was still below the replacement level.

2011 was a significant year for Singapore. Singaporeans went to the polls twice, and elected a new government and President. Having made a significant political transition, we are all now adjusting to new norms in a changed environment.

We achieved steady growth of 4.8% this year. The external environment is uncertain. Debt problems in Europe are far from solved. Next year looks like being difficult for the global economy. As a small, open country, Singapore will inevitably be affected.

Amid this flux, we need to be confident of our position, and clear about our priorities and plans to build a better Singapore. We are working hard to tackle our immediate challenges.

The Government is committed to keeping homes affordable to all Singaporeans. We launched 25,000 BTO [Build-To-Order] flats this year, enabling many first timers to book their HDB flats. In 2012 we are launching another 25,000 BTO flats. In the private property market, the Additional Buyer's Stamp Duty will moderate capital inflows and foreign demand, and help to stabilise prices.

We will redouble efforts to improve our public transport system and expand the train and bus network. We will identify and put right the causes of the recent MRT disruptions. The Circle Line, completed in October, now transports 300,000 commuters daily. More MRT lines are on the way. We will also continue to enhance bus services to improve the daily commuting experience. However, these improvements will take time, so meanwhile please bear with us.

Beyond these pressing concerns, we are attending to long-term issues to improve Singaporeans' lives.

Healthcare must stay affordable and accessible to give Singaporeans peace of mind. We are enhancing our education system to give young Singaporeans the best possible start in life. We must uphold inclusive growth and social mobility as pillars of a united Singapore. This calls both for upgrading our skills and productivity to improve wages, and for strengthening our social safety nets.

Population is a particularly complex and critical challenges. Like most other developed societies, Singaporeans are having too few babies, and our population is ageing. We must find workable solutions to keep our society vibrant and forward-looking, maintain our economic vitality and strengthen our Singapore core.

This concluding chapter has been designed to provide a brief discussion of the population policy changes that were introduced after the manuscript was completed and submitted for publication. The inclusion of the latest changes will render the book more up-to-date when it is finally made available to prospective readers. Most of the changes were announced in the budget statement delivered by the Minister for Finance in Parliament in April 2016. The policy changes deal mainly with the strengthening of existing pronatalist measures, and only a few completely new measures were presented.

It was announced that the paternity leave, first implemented in 2013, would be enhanced by giving a second week of compulsory paternity leave paid for by the government. Currently, only one week of paid paternity leave is compulsory, though employers may offer a second week on a voluntary basis. Under the new scheme, the government is required to to pay for the second week of compulsory leave, capped at $2,500 per week, plus CPF contributions. This is meant to ease the financial burden of employers. Furthermore, employers will be given sufficient time to make all the necessary adjustments, particularly the work schedule of their workforce, as the new measure will only be provided to fathers with babies born from 1 January 2017.

An additional perk for the fathers is that they will be permitted to share up to four weeks, instead of the present one week, of their wives' sixteen weeks of paid maternity leave with effect from 1 June 2016. Combined with one week of childcare leave and one week of infant care leave, fathers will be able to receive a total of eight weeks off work within one year of the birth of the child. This, coupled with the longer paternity leave, will allow fathers to play a bigger role in parenting and to help the parents to achieve a much better work-family balance in their home when both parents are working.

Another policy change concerns the amount of maternity leave accorded to unwed mothers. It was announced that from early 2017, unwed mothers will be able to receive the same sixteen-week paid maternity leave as that given to married mothers.

FORMATION OF THE SINGAPORE FAMILY PLANNING AND POPULATION BOARD (SFPPB)

It was noted in the preceding chapter that since 1957, the Family Planning Association (FPA) had, on numerous occasions, requested that the Ministry of Health take over all the family planning activities it conducted in government institutions, but the government had consistently turned down the request. It was in response to the request submitted by the Association in January 1965 that the government finally announced, on 13 March 1965, the appointment of a three-man Review Committee to look into this matter. The terms of reference were to determine which of the family planning activities were to be transferred from the Association to the Health Ministry, to fix the quantum of annual grant for 1965 and subsequent years for the Association, and to resolve the disposition of the staff employed by the Association. The Review Committee held a total of seven meetings between 8 April 1965 and 9 June 1965 and submitted its unanimous report to the Minister for Health on 29 June 1965. Briefly, the report recommended that all except three of the clinics should be transferred to the government and a grant of S$100,000 for 1965 and S$10,000 for 1966 and subsequent years be given to the Association.

Some three months later, on 27 September 1965, a White Paper on Family Planning was tabled in Parliament, generally endorsing the recommendations of the Review Committee. In addition to including the report of the Review Committee as an appendix, the 25-page White Paper spelled out in considerable detail the various aspects of a national population policy which the Singapore Government proposed to implement. It announced, among other things, a five-year plan to recruit 180,000 new acceptors during the period 1966 to 1970 and the establishment of a statutory authority to take charge of the proposed government family planning programme. The aim of the plan was “to liberate our women from the burden of bearing and raising an unnecessarily large number of children and as a consequence to increase human happiness for all”.

Thus in December 1965, the Singapore Family Planning and Population Board Act 1965 was passed by Parliament without any debate and came into force on 7 January 1966.