Committee of Supply – Head W (Ministry of Transport)

The Land Transport Masterplan 2013 providing more connections and better services is laudable but will take a long time to materialise. There is great urgency to solve the congestion woes in the immediate term as commuters are greatly inconvenienced in the meantime. May I ask the Minister what plans are in place now to better solve the present congestion? Apart from causing public angst, our public transport system is a contributory factor against the productivity growth we aim for. Is MOT looking at all possible ways to have immediate relief for the congestion? Perhaps to incentivise change in behavioural patterns, by giving free public transport one hour before and after peak hours daily?

The Bus Enhancement Programme 2012, with 780 weekly bus trips, has not made any impact upon commuters. Will the additional 800 new buses announced be able to make a difference? How soon will the new buses be operational? Can all the buses be rolled out sooner within the next few years? Could Minister consider other measures or enhancements in the interim to relieve the present congestion such that commuters can see and feel at least some improvement in bus and rail transport in the next few years?

May I suggest that MOT gives priority and makes a targeted approach for the use of the new buses by getting better feedback in identifying the areas where the largest numbers of commuters are inconvenienced? As there is limited immediate resource available, it is best to target such areas that need improvement with the new buses or routes or feeder services. I also hope that MOT can have better communications with residents and try not only to provide the relevant service enhancements, but also to better explain any planned

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improvements and to get the end-users' views and feedback. Also, residents should be acknowledged for their contributions, especially when enhancement services have resulted from such views and feedback.

Bus and train ridership is on the increase, and it will be so with a growing population and the curbing of car ownership. My question is whether the planned service enhancements by MOT will be overtaken by this increase in the ridership in the immediate term as well as long term. Are the projections on the demands upon our public transport system sound? Is there a KPI set for ridership with ease and convenience?

My own concern is that improvements may not be palpable by commuters in the near term. It is important and easier for people to foresee a better tomorrow and to work closely with the Government if there is something at hand to show and to grasp. Communication is key to explain the many pressing constraints that may have hindered faster progress of improvements and yet allow people to visualise that things will get better.

The land here is small and finite. How does MOT plan to improve bus services with more roads while negotiating with other infrastructure needs, such as more housing? How will the extra 800 buses affect the traffic flow on our roads in the next few years?

May I ask the Minister on the situation of taxi availability since LTA's measures to tackle the shortage, especially at peak hours? Will the new measures with more taxis on the road affect traffic flow in the near term?

May I ask the Minister whether our public transport model needs a relook and is it not better to move away from the profit-orientated business model that is answerable to shareholder-interests, which may further add on to the cost of public transport here?

What are the causes for the frequent breakdowns and unacceptable customer service standards? Are problems mainly due to natural wear and tear or due to profit considerations with cost-cutting measures? Are there any intrinsic engineering difficulties rather than operator incompetence that cause the frequent breakdowns? Were there enough considerations for aftercare maintenance, in terms of engineering and costs, made at the stage of formulation and implementation of our public transport infrastructure previously? And do we have a more concerted effort to ensure plans have sustainability and smooth operation of our public transport? Are there synergy

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and consultations amongst stakeholders concerned? I hope it is not a case of passing over and relinquishing all responsibilities from planner to operator once infrastructure is built. Is it better to have the same planner operating and maintaining the infrastructure subsequently?

Will the Minister consider targeted subvention for certain sectors of the population, such as the retirees, students and the lower income? Rather than a blanket subvention for all, subvention in this manner will go to those that need it most. Will MOT at least consider giving more concessions to retirees and the long-overdue concession to polytechnic students?

I hope that MOT will prevent any increase in our public transport fares until public transport service improvements take place. Commuters argue that the public transport operators are making healthy profits and should not require more revenue presently. Perception on the ground is that there is more weightage placed on the interest of shareholders by transport operators. How does MOT regulate operators to ensure that there is better provision and standard of services? Could MOT incentivise our public transport operators to increase their efficiency and productivity?

It was announced last year that Changi Airport's Budget Terminal will be developed. Could the Minister provide an update on the status of the development, as well as some of the design features, of the new Terminal?

Madam, many residents welcome the Walk to Ride scheme whereby LTA would build sheltered walkways within a 400-metre radius from all existing MRT stations. However, I would like to urge the Minister to consider building covered walkways up to 800-metre radius from the MRT stations to provide more conveniences to the residents. This is because many residents, particularly Jurong residents who stay about 800 metres away from the MRT station, still prefer to take a walk to the MRT station as compared to taking a feeder bus. Residents could control walking time better as it is not subjected to traffic conditions. In addition, we notice that the shelter across Lakeside Drive, a minor road with one lane in each direction, near the Lakeside MRT station, has been quite effective in shielding residents from the rain. Hence, I hope LTA could consider building similar shelters at other minor roads as part of the Walk to Ride scheme.

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My next cut, Madam. Before I proceed further, I would like to declare my interest in the public transport industry as I am a staff of SBS Transit. On 7 March last year, I spoke about the need to incentivise commuters who travel before and after the morning peak hours by encouraging organisations to stagger working hours while we expand the train capacity. Thus, I am delighted that Minister of State, Mrs Josephine Teo, eventually launched the Travel Smart pilot programme on 2 October last year. I understand that the pilot programme involves some seven organisations to promote a more even distribution of travel demand during the peak hours. I hope the Minister could update us on the progress of the pilot programme and other related schemes on travel demand management.

In addition, I understand that there are about 11,000 civil servants working in the Central Business District (CBD). Hence, I would like to ask the Minister whether MOT has any plan to include these civil servants as part of the Travel Smart programme.

Given the many residential developments, including condominiums, Housing Development Board estates, landed property as well as schools along the Bukit Timah-Dunearn Road corridor, would the Ministry kindly provide an update on the progress of the Downtown Line 2, especially for the following stations: King Albert Park, Sixth Avenue, Tan Kah Kee, Bukit Panjang, Cashew, Beauty World and Hillview?

Residents I have met have requested for an update on progress. With its completion, the Downtown Line 2 which runs beneath Bukit Timah Road will assist so many students to reach their schools and families to return home while also reducing the need for vehicular traffic along Dunearn and Bukit Timah roads. Hence, its timely and safe completion is a priority to our residents and to me. Would MOT provide an update on the line's progress?

Madam, the Land Use Plan envisages major infrastructure expansion of MRT services and lines. I refer, in particular, to the 50-kilometre Cross Island Line that begins in Changi, moves westwards through Loyang, and cuts through the Central Catchment Nature

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Reserve to Bukit Timah, and ends at the Jurong Industrial estate. Of major concern to me is the fact that it cuts through the Central Catchment Nature Reserve because in these areas are the oldest patches and some of the least affected forests, the green lungs of Singapore, where some species of flora and fauna are found nowhere else in the world. If this proposal pans out, what is of concern to me is that beyond the MRT line and with the plans for housing so close to the vicinity, the forest habitat in the Central Catchment Nature Reserve will deteriorate.

Madam, with respect, I would like to seek clarity on how MOT made the decision to do so in a nature reserve which most people would consider inviolate. In particular, I would like to ask these questions: whether MOT had conducted any environment impact assessment (EIA), no matter how preliminary, to warrant the plan in the first place; if there had been an EIA, no matter how preliminary, whether these studies were made in conjunction with other agencies, and what were the terms of the commission and their preliminary conclusions; and lastly, may the public have access to these studies for the sake of clarity and transparency?

Thank you, Madam. Given the significant investment in rail projects announced by the Government recently, what is the role of the public transport operators (PTOs) in ensuring that there is sufficient capacity to meet travel demands of commuters, especially in the short to medium term? With the recent fire at Newton Station and train disruption incidence, has there been an upward trend in service delays? What are the LTA and PTOs doing to improve train reliability? Are there targets set both for the short term as well as for the long term? Given the long lead time to bring about additional train capacity, what is the Ministry doing in the meantime to improve the crowding situation?

Madam, my second cut. Deputy Prime Minister Tharman announced a $1.1 billion Bus Service Enhancement Programme (BSEP) that would put 550 more buses on the road. Since the programme started last September, I understand that bus operators have already added some 90 buses, improved over 50 bus services, and opened five new routes.

Can the Minister update us on the progress of the BSEP and whether there is any scope to accelerate the implementation so that more Singaporeans get to benefit from the programme? The Minister also mentioned recently that there is an intention to involve more private operators in providing more bus services, especially during the morning peak, express services and the shorter bus routes will feed into the MRT stations. Can Minister please elaborate on how this will be done?

It was announced a few weeks ago that there is a need to look into improving en route reliability and also to ensure more regular waiting times. Can the Minister further elaborate on how this will be implemented?

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Mdm Chair, MOT recently said that it was exploring private bus operators' interest in new, shorter services that feed to MRT stations, and that these new feeder services could be outside of the current Bus Service Enhancement Programme (BSEP)

During last year's Budget, it was announced that of the $1.1 billion budgeted for the BSEP, $280 million had been budgeted for the purchase of 550 buses over the next five years, and $820 million was budgeted to cover the net operating costs of these buses for 10 years. My understanding then was that the BSEP budget was to supply additional buses and drivers to the current two public transport operators (PTOs). How do these new bus services, contracted out to private bus operators, fit into this budget?

Can the Minister share what is the estimated cost of this latest initiative? Is this latest move being undertaken because the two current PTOs are unable or unwilling to ramp up bus service coverage?

While I welcome additional buses and bus routes to ease congestion and reduce waiting and travelling time for commuters, do these new bus service contracts amount to a further Government subsidy of the two PTOs? And could the Minister share more details about how these new contracts are structured? I understand that the private bus operators would be paid a fixed contract price, and the fares collected will go to the Government. Hence, the operators will not bear any revenue risk.

Will there be any penalties for not meeting quality of service standards, or bonus payments for exceeding the standards? If so, what will these penalties and bonuses be like, and how will the Ministry ensure that service standards will meet the expectations of commuters?

The Bus Service Enhancement Programme (BSEP) was introduced to increase bus capacity and enhance bus service levels to benefit commuters. May I ask the Minister to update us on the progress of BSEP? How many new services and how many new buses have been added by now and by end of this year?

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With the shortage of bus drivers and other constraints faced by the public transport industry and the operators, how do we ensure that the new bus services can be rolled out progressively and service levels enhanced over the next five years?

The Minister also disclosed that LTA would put up some new routes under BSEP for tender. What are the kinds of routes to be tendered out and what is the response so far?

(In Mandarin): [Please refer to Vernacular Speech.] It is said that roads are generated by men. I would like to say that bus routes are also generated by men. Bus routes should go to where most people go. I want to share one experience. A few years ago, residents in our constituency asked for a change of the bus route. LTA was worried then because re-directing the route would mean longer journey on the bus. On the other hand, the old route meant more bus changes and some residents had to cross the road to catch the bus. With the concerted effort of the residents, grassroots leaders and LTA, the bus route was finally changed, to the convenience of the residents. What I want to say is that the residents would rather spend an extra 10 minutes or so on the bus, than wait at the bus stop gazing at the sky. We hope BSEP can be ASAP.

Madam, the 2030 vision of a high-quality public transport system shared by the Minister for Transport in support of the Population White Paper is something that many are looking forward to. But as the Minister acknowledged, we are in urgent need of nearer term solutions to improve Singaporeans' daily travel experience. Improving bus connectivity will make a big difference to the lives of many commuters, and should be achievable with better bus route planning and deployment.

Let me illustrate using bus services in my constituency as an example. Pandan Gardens and Teban Gardens are only about 2.6 kilometres to 3.2 kilometres away from the nearest MRT station at Jurong East. Many residents take a bus to connect to the MRT station before they go to their final destinations. Despite the relatively short distance, residents would regularly take up to 45 minutes to get to the station and they still have their MRT journey to look forward to.

The key issue is that, instead of feeder services, these residents only have trunk services to ride on, such as bus services 51 and 143 that begin their journey a long distance away. These buses may leave their depots at regular intervals, but after coping with irregular traffic and passenger activities along the way, they arrive at irregular intervals later in the bus route. In effect, they tend to "bunch" together, so that commuters find themselves waiting for a long time for the bus to arrive, before seeing two or three of them coming one after another. So, the first bus ends up being crowded with anxious commuters, the second bus would then be partly filled by the remainder of commuters waiting that could not squeeze into the first bus, whilst the third bus would then follow on relatively empty. This vicious cycle then repeats with the next set of commuters.

Madam, as you can see, not only does the reliability of the bus timings become an issue with trunk services, but bus capacities also become poorly utilised. I have made repeated appeals to LTA to provide a feeder service that allows for quicker bus turnaround and better predictability of arrival times at bus stops. Instead, LTA has added more capacity to the existing trunk services, which does little to improve the commuters' travel experience.

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I would like to ask the Minister if he would consider providing feeder services to MRT stations as a key priority under the BSEP to improve connectivity, so as to achieve better predictability and connectivity. Alternatively, would he consider directing some trunk service capacity to ply shorter routes, such as creating service "51A" or "143A"?

On the subject of more reliable arrival times, I would like to ask the Minister how the bus operators could be held accountable for timeliness of bus arrivals. Like in London and Seoul, operators should have robust fleet management capabilities to adjust their bus arrival times, so as to even out the regularity along the entire route.

Finally, I hope the Minister will direct the planning of transport infrastructure in tandem with the population growth in any one area. Over the last six months, we witnessed a 30% surge in commuters at Teban Gardens Road resulting from the relocation of households to the new SERS development at Teban Vista. Yet, our requests for bus services to be re-routed or expanded to meet increased demand were unsuccessful. Madam, I hope the Minister can look into these issues.

Madam, what is the right fare to charge commuters? This is a question that continues to be asked. Let me make an attempt to frame it. There are three principal stakeholders in this equation − the Government, public transport operators and the commuters. Let us take the perspective of each of these stakeholders in turn.

The Government recognises that it needs to subsidise public transport infrastructure, especially the MRT network, as all governments do for the reason that it is a very long payback investment and the private sector will not take it up. In fact, the Singapore Government does subsidise the public transport network, which some in the public are still unaware of. It builds tracks, tunnels, trains, train stations at its own cost. The reason why it does so is because these investments bring with it positive externalities for the economy and enhances the well-being of its citizenry. However, good governments, especially our Government, loathe the idea of "unfunded liability", a term Deputy Prime Minister Tharman used in his Budget speech. It would be irresponsible for the present Government to commit future generations of Singaporeans to fund current expenses in public transport more than it is necessary. So, it requires commuters to pay a fare when using public transport. The Government funds

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the infrastructure and the commuters pay a fare.

The Government also does not want to run the public transport network itself because it believes that this is best left to the private sector since having a "profit objective" drives efficiency. But when applied to Singapore's current public transport landscape, this is where the argument fails. The "profit objective" alone does not drive efficiency. It is "competition" that drives efficiency. Unfortunately, our two public transport operators (PTOs) are not subject to competition, the way we know it, except for the taxi sector.

If the two PTOs were subject to competition, they would not be able to raise fares or lower customer service because they risk losing market share. They would also do their utmost to reduce costs and improve productivity. We see this in many industries – the telecom industry, the airlines − whenever they are subject to competition, they become more efficient. Unfortunately, our two PTOs are two monopolies.

To the Government's credit, recognising that there is no competition to SMRT and SBS Transit, it formed the Public Transport Council (PTC) to regulate fare revisions. And the fact speaks for itself. Indeed, over the last eight years, from 2006 to 2012, the net cumulative fare increase, not annual, but the total increase has totalled only 0.3%. Singapore transport fares are also competitive against other major cities.

Let me move on to discuss the commuter's perspective. The average commuter is prepared to pay his fair share for transport, but he feels that price and service must go hand-in-hand. He also has sympathy for many others in the needy groups and he would look to the Government to help.

To answer the question of the right fare, I think the Land Transport Master Plan (LTMP) published in 2008 contains an answer, which is to cause the transport operators to "compete for the market". Since Singapore is too small to have two parallel MRT lines, competing for the market would result in competition. So, every five years, the PTOs will compete, and the one with the lowest fare will win the bid. I think, this way, commuters will come to understand that the fare is fair and transparent. I would like, Mdm Chair, for the Minister to comment on whether or not he will bring forward the implementation of the Land Transport Master Plan.

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Mdm Chair, despite all the rumblings about our public transport system, Singapore has come a long way from the days of the Hock Lee bus and the Singapore Traction Company and the private taxis that plied between Tanglin Halt and Capitol cinema.

Indeed, I can understand the unhappiness voiced by the public when they read about our public transport companies making millions whilst the commuters are asked, from time to time, to pay more for their fares. Hence, the question pops up why the commuters have to pay more when these companies are already making $200 million to $300 million a year.

I know the Minister has defended the decision not to nationalise these operators as he believes they are more efficiently run because they are public companies. But where has the profits gone to? Why is the maintenance not up to speed, resulting in regular disruptions in services?

I would like to ask the Minister if he could then direct the Public Transport Council to take into consideration, amongst the various factors when reviewing fare increases to recognise the overall profitability of these companies and the dividends paid out to shareholders. This will, I believe, be a more equitable way in evaluating any request for fare revisions. In fact, for the next few years, I do not wish to see any fare increase as the standard of service is not satisfactory and the PTOs are still profitable and are paying good dividends.

Secondly, I would again like to ask the Minister to consider reviewing the fares of Polytechnic students. Polytechnic students should enjoy the same concessions as Junior Colleges students do. Refusing to grant Polytechnic

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students the concession is an anomaly which should be corrected. Sympathy alone is not sufficient.

Lastly is the evening ERP on our public roads. I feel that this ERP during the evening peak should be scrapped as it is not in line with our policy to be more family-oriented. Office workers are going home later so that they can avoid paying the ERP and by the time they get home, it is 8.30 pm or beyond. For residents in Yishun who work in city area, they have contributed towards ERP in the morning along CTE, not once, but many times. Moreover, the ERP is taking a toll on businesses in areas within the city. If there is a jam, the motorists will know how to bypass the route and they do not need a nanny to shoo them around. I hope evening ERP can be scrapped totally.

Madam, the Ministry's roadmap for a more geographically connected public transport infrastructure is to be welcomed. We can build on this and make public transport connected to, and accessible by, our disabled Singaporeans. This is in line with calls by the disabled community for fare concessions.

Given last year's depiction of the Budget as an "inclusive" one, with the Government pumping $1.1 billion into the operation of new buses, it is once more timely to ask if the Ministry would consider specially discounted public transport fares for disabled Singaporeans who apply.

Of course, should a disabled person not want a concessionary fare, then that decision would also be respected. But my view is that there are some with disabilities who would indeed find such a concessionary rate helpful, especially in getting to and from work. We should bear in mind that the disabled community is by no means asking for entitlements with these concessionary fares, but for some basic help. It is important to take into account several differentiating factors that set the disabled person apart from an able-bodied one.

Fare concessions for the disabled are a commonly implemented practice in many other countries. It is simple and compassionate, and the Government would do well to demonstrate its "inclusivity" by implementing such a concessionary scheme for the welfare of Singapore's disabled community – our community.

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Ms Lee Li Lian (Punggol East): Madam, my colleague, Mr Yee Jenn Jong, had during the COS debate last year stated that it was an opportune time to review the need for concessionary travel to be extended for the physically disabled as well as for Polytechnic students. I would like to take this opportunity to echo the call by Mr Yee as well as other Members in the House who had spoken in the past for fare concessions to be extended to the disabled.

The disabled community has been calling for concessions for over 13 years to no avail. I hope that the concession to be given to the disabled will be significant and will ease the financial burden on this group of individuals who tend to have lower incomes and higher expenses due to their disabilities. I also hope that the Fare Review Mechanism Committee would also consider giving the same travel concessions not just to those who have physical disabilities, but to those with special needs, such as Down Syndrome.

My next point is on the affordability of taxi services. While taxis continue to be viewed as private transport, they, in fact, fall mid-way between vehicle ownership and public transport, and it is a service used by many Singaporeans.

While it is the Government's position that taxi services should be left to the free market, the free market is constrained by quotas on taxis as well as taxi driver

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licenses. What further affects the competitiveness of the industry is that it is currently led by one major player, ComfortDelgro and several much smaller companies. This leaves the smaller players with less room to set competitive fares or rentals. According to a report from Asiaone.com, the National Taxi Association urged all other players to follow ComfortDelgro's upward revisions to surcharge and fares in 2011. Following these revisions, the Consumers Association of Singapore (CASE) raised concerns, asking ComfortDelGro to justify its taxi fare revision.

This points to a need to relook at how this industry is regulated, to strike a better balance, in terms of benefits for both commuters and drivers. I would like to ask the Ministry to call for a review of taxi service provision, taking into deeper consideration the following two points.

One, we must ensure that taxi services continue to be priced reasonably for the consumer. Taxi fares have, of late, increased significantly, not just due to increments in ERP, but also the extension of taxi surcharges to the point where commuters have to pay surcharges from 6.00 pm in the evening all the way till 9.30 am the next morning, including the midnight surcharge.

The next one, a report in The Business Times on 15 December 2012 analysed ComfortDelgro and SMRT's financials. It concluded that both transport operators can actually afford to raise salaries internally, without having to pass costs on to the commuters. Taxi companies should be obligated to demonstrate how fare increases correspond with benefits for taxi drivers, should there be any in order to justify fare increments. This review should also look into alternative ways to reduce the cost to drivers, such as lowering taxi rentals, instead of just increasing fares for commuters.

My last point, unlike Ms Foo and Mr Yam, Rivervale Crescent in Punggol East do not have any trunk or feeder services.

Mr Chairman, first, let me express my appreciation to hon Members for the many thoughtful and thought-provoking speeches and suggestions both during COS and Budget debate.

As Mr Liang Eng Hwa had so eloquently reminded us, Members have also favoured us, MOT, with the most cuts and allocated time at this COS. Let me thank Members for that. Fortunately, it is only 50 cuts and not the proverbial 1,000 cuts.

Public transport is, obviously, a topic that is close to the hearts of many of our Members as well as Singaporeans, and I will try my best to sketch out some of the priorities and key objectives in the coming years, as well as respond to as many of the questions and issues raised as possible.

Before I do so, I thought it would be useful to take stock of what we have been doing for the past five years since we announced the 2008 Land Transport Master Plan (LTMP 2008). With Mr Chairman's permission, may I request for a summary of the key initiatives undertaken since LTMP 2008 to be circulated to

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Members for reference? [A handout was distributed to Members.]

I do not intend to run through the handout. I hope Members will take time to look at it. I would like to thank Members like Mr Alex Yam for their concerns over the progress of the Master Plan and I believe that this summary should give the House an overall perspective of the commitment that we have undertaken to enhance the overall land transport system.

I appreciate and understand Members' very real concerns about the public transport system. This reflects the feedback that Members hear from your residents and your constituents. We take these seriously, and one of the ways we try to understand these concerns better is through the annual Public Transport Customer Satisfaction Survey (PTCSS), which UniSIM conducts every year.

The latest PTCSS was conducted in October 2012 – as usual – and it shows that Singaporeans' overall satisfaction with the public transport system has dipped from 90.3% in 2011 to 88.8% last year. Satisfaction levels for bus and rail reliability also fell, by around one and three percentage points respectively. On the other hand, satisfaction on bus travel times rose by three percentage points to 79% from the year before and about 64% of respondents, when asked a direct question on whether public transport had improved in 2012 compared to the previous year, about 64% had indicated so and it was a yes and no question. So, about 64% had said yes and I hope that we will continue to see further improvements as we embark on some of the measures that I will talk about a little later on.

The general drop in commuter satisfaction stems largely from crowdedness and reliability issues. From commuter feedback as well as my own experiences taking public transport, I know that it can be congested on the buses and trains along certain stretches during the morning peak hours.

With your permission, Mr Chairman, may I display some slides on the LCD screens? [Some Slides were shown to hon Members.] If we take a look at the screens, we will recognise that peak hour crowdedness is not a phenomenon that only happens in Singapore; we see it in all major cities with mature metro systems. I have divided it into two groups – one that sets a standard of about four to five passengers per square metre, as we see in Singapore, Hong Kong, Taipei, London and so on. Currently, our crowding level during the most

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crowded periods in the morning peak hours is about four to five passengers per square metre, similar to cities like Hong Kong, Taipei and London. London is a little bit more crowded perhaps because their people are generally of a larger build and size, but these are the cities in this ballpark.

The next slide shows Members what the situation is in Tokyo, Beijing and Shanghai. I want to assure Members that we certainly do not intend to move in this direction. In fact, we want to do more in order to reduce the level of crowdedness that we currently face, and I will speak more on this later on.

In addition, I know that for commuters, uncertain waiting times for buses means that the journey is less predictable, and more stressful. When service disruptions or even short delays happen, commuters are inconvenienced.

I want to state unequivocally that the Government will spare no effort to address these problems. Over the last two months, I have announced our long-term plans on increasing public transport capacity. During the debate on the Population White Paper, I also covered the improvements over the next five years. I would like to assure Singaporeans that dealing with the needs of our commuters "here-and-now" is the key focus for my Ministry, even as we roll out our longer-term infrastructure plans. Let me now take Members through our plans to improve public transport in the near term, before moving on to talk briefly about the medium- and longer-term initiatives.

First, we will do whatever is within our means and capability to increase our public transport capacity in the short term. We will further speed up our bus service improvements, beyond what we had earlier stated and promised under the Bus Service Enhancement Programme (BSEP). This should make for more frequent and less crowded buses, as well as more bus routes. We will also run more train trips where possible, so that commuters have shorter waiting times.

Second, we will make sure that our buses and trains adhere more closely to their schedules and are more reliable. We will do this through stronger regulation, as well as incentive and penalty frameworks.

Third, we will more actively manage peak travel demand on our public transportation network, so that we can spread out and reduce the peak hour loads. Let me elaborate.

Mr Cedric Foo asked about how the increase in demand matches up with supply. The journeys have generally increased by about three percentage

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points each year. So, I hope Members bear that in mind as I talk about some of the improvements that we are making – journeys are increasing at three percentage points each year.

At last year's Committee of Supply debate, I spoke extensively about the BSEP. This intends to increase the public bus fleet by 20% over the next five years, or about 800 new buses, with 550 funded by the Government and another 250 by the public transport operators (PTOs).

I would like to update the House that progress has, generally, been good. We launched the BSEP in September last year. And as some Members have pointed out, we have injected around 90 new buses until the end of last year, to improve about 50 bus services that are currently running, as well as to implement five new routes. By the end of this year, I would add another 190 buses or so, to make up about 280, or about half of the 550 buses that have been committed by the Government under the BSEP, to be delivered by the end of the year.

The feedback I am getting on the ground from those who have already benefited from the BSEP is actually very positive. But many are asking me, when is my turn, and can you implement the programme faster? Members like Ms Foo Mee Har and Dr Lily Neo asked if we could do more to benefit our commuters. I have directed LTA to work with the PTOs to accelerate the BSEP. And given the good progress that we have been able to make so far, we will try to complete the bulk of the BSEP service improvements by the end of 2014, instead of 2016, as we originally envisaged. Of course, this is contingent on SBST and SMRT being able to raise salaries and recruit as well as retain enough bus drivers in a tightening labour market, but I think with some effort on all sides, we can do it. So, for those who are already benefiting from the 90 new buses introduced last year, they have indeed given very positive feedback. More will be able to benefit this year, including from Members' constituencies, and certainly by the end of 2014, we hope to have introduced the bulk of the 550 buses.

As I mentioned last month, I have also asked LTA to see how we can tap on the resources of private bus operators, given that the two PTOs' resources are already very stretched. In response to questions by, for example, Mr Gerald Giam, Mrs Lina Chiam, Mr Liang Eng Hwa, Mr Seng Han Thong and Mr Gan Thiam Poh, one of the things that we will do is to design and contract out six more City Direct bus services, which will run during the morning peak hours along the expressways into the city as well as during the evening back to the homes. The proposed new City Direct services will connect towns that are closer

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to the city area such as Ang Mo Kio and Bedok, to provide their residents with an alternative to the city other than the MRT. So, in addition to the towns that are further away, we will also include some of the towns that are nearer – Ang Mo Kio, Bedok and around the Clementi area, for instance. We will put up these six new routes for tender by private bus operators from as early as next quarter, and start rolling them out early next year. This will bring the total number of parallel bus services up from eight previously announced under BSEP to 14, and of the 14, we hope that nine will be operated by private operators. I do not yet know how they will respond, because we have just started this. In terms of pricing, in terms of the amount of competition that we will face, we will see, we do not know. But the intent is not for the two PTOs to participate. It is for the private service operators with their existing capacity to be able to service these routes.

Ms Foo Mee Har asked whether bus feeder services can be improved. Apart from the City Direct-type of services, we will also work with the private operators to see if it is also possible for them to run other shorter services during peak hours, such as localised routes in estates that bring residents to the MRT stations. We intend to invite tenders for these short services from the third quarter of this year, and to implement them progressively from next year onwards, provided the response from these private operators is good. Such services will add to the existing bus feeders already run by the PTOs and help us to more quickly address the problem of crowded feeder services during peak periods. So, we will push out more BSEP buses and have the PTOs run them and they will augment either the existing trunk or feeder routes as well as introduce new routes. But at the same time, we will want to try and maximise the resource from the private operators who may have some spare capacity, depending on their routings to be able to support us in these areas.

Let me now talk about trains and what we are doing in that regard. Mr Liang Eng Hwa said that he "saw light at the end of the tunnel." Let me assure him that this light at the end of the tunnel is not coming from an approaching train, even though we will have many more of such trains running in the system, because we intend to increase train capacity over the next five years, as we receive new trains and complete the re-signalling in phases from 2016.

SMRT has also shared with us their plans to buy another six trains on top of the 13 new trains that are coming in next year and the 22 trains that will be coming in 2016 – six more trains on top of those already announced plans, and this will increase the train fleet that we have today by about 30%. The train fleets for the North East Line and the Circle Line will also increase by about 70% and 60% respectively in 2015, when the trains that we ordered last year will be

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delivered.

I know many Members, like Mr Cedric Foo, Dr Lily Neo and Mr Gan Thiam Poh, remain concerned about what we can do about rail capacity in the short term. To improve the daily commuting experience on the rail network, we will be running more trains wherever possible, so that commuters will have shorter waits generally. We intend to improve train frequencies so that commuters will not need to wait more than five minutes for the next train other than during the first and the last hour or so of train operations each day when the ridership is very low. Currently, commuters sometimes have to wait as long as seven minutes, and we would like to bring that down, as I said, to about five minutes. We will also step up the frequencies of the trains during the shoulder peak periods, so that on average, each train will arrive at an interval of about three minutes. So, during the very peak periods, it is coming in now at two minutes, which is what the limit of the signalling system allows, but at the shoulders, we will step up the frequency or the headways of the trains, so that on average they will come in at about three minutes.

All these improvements will require the train operators to run, we estimate, about 10% more train trips than what they are currently doing today. Commuters on the North-South and East-West Lines will benefit starting from the second half of this year. Those on the North-East and Circle Lines will benefit when the new trains are progressively delivered starting from 2015. Let me assure Members therefore that there will be more train trips during heavy-loading periods to cope with growing ridership in the coming years.

I have talked about capacity improvements in the short term that will help us cope with high ridership. But many Members like Mr Gan Thiam Poh and Dr Lily Neo have rightly pointed out that what also matters is that the buses and trains come regularly. I share this sentiment. Even with more buses from the BSEP, commuters tell me that waiting times for buses at their bus stops can be irregular. Sometimes, they wait a long time for their bus and then two or three buses come all together, especially during peak hours, like what Ms Foo Mee Har has so eloquently described.

Let me first touch on bus speeds and reliability. We will give even more priority to buses on our roads. Today, we have about 180 kilometres of bus lanes and the Mandatory Give Way to Buses Scheme at over 200 locations. Over the next two years, we will spend around $50 million to enhance bus priority. We will add about 30 kilometres more of bus lanes, increase the Mandatory Give Way to Buses Scheme by another 150 bus stops, and quadruple the number of bus hubs, where several buses can come in and pick up passengers

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or discharge them all at the same time. Currently, we have about 10 and we will quadruple that to about 40. We will also have to step up enforcement of bus priority schemes, as infringements by motorists result in delays for buses and their commuters.

Over and above the existing Quality of Service standards, we will also introduce a Quality Incentive Framework to improve the regularity of bus waiting times for commuters. Under this new framework, operators will need to enhance their enroute management of their bus operations to earn incentives and to avoid penalties. This means making appropriate interventions and giving guidance to the bus drivers even as the buses are running on the roads. In effect, what it means is that the operations centre will have to be a lot busier, will have to be a lot more proactive and prescriptive, to help buses reduce the incidence of bus bunching or the long gaps between consecutive buses. They will have to ask the buses to speed up or to slow down where appropriate and, where necessary, introduce some buses mid-stream when this is warranted.

This is something that London has implemented a number of years ago and through their experience and revisions over a number of years, they have a system that runs pretty well today, and I am keen to take a step forward to try this out. Hopefully, this is something that, over time, will address Ms Foo Mee Har's pertinent concerns about the timeliness of bus arrivals. We aim to trial and refine this scheme on some 25 services, or about 10% of the bus services that we have today, starting in the second half of this year.

For trains, reliability is an even bigger issue because a disruption or service delay affects many more commuters. I agree with Mr Cedric Foo, who spoke about the importance of train maintenance as increasing ridership puts even greater pressure on an ageing rail system. While our rail operators fare reasonably well as compared to other metro systems around the world in reliability, train withdrawals and service delays do adversely affect the travel experience.

We have therefore been working closely with the PTOs to arrest the number of train withdrawals and delays. Here, I would like to share with Members a number of slides to show you what has been happening [Slides were shown to hon Members]. This is also data that we have put onto the website on a quarterly basis, in fact, in even more detail than this so that riders and

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commuters can go in and take a closer look.

Since the commencement of the LTA-SMRT Joint Team in June 2012, train withdrawals for the North-South and East-West lines have been reduced from about 4.5 per 100,000 train-km in the second quarter of 2012, to about 2.8 train withdrawals per 100,000 train-km in the fourth quarter of 2012, and then now to about 2.7 in the first two months. What does it mean? It means that for every 1,000 trips that the trains make, we should see one withdrawal – or roughly about 99.9% success rate of not having a train withdrawal.

We cannot stop at this, and in fact, we need to do more because the target we have set for ourselves is 2.1 for 2013. We believe that it is stretched but achievable. Over the longer term, we intend to reduce the number of train withdrawals to one for every 2,000 train trips.

The North-East Line and the Circle Line have actually relatively healthier train withdrawal rates, and they are stable at around 0.7 and 1.2 withdrawals per 100,000 kilometres respectively, compared to the 2.7 that we see for the Compass Line. Their health is not something to be taken for granted. The Joint Teams that LTA has with SBST and SMRT will also look into the reliability of these lines. Generally, they are doing good work there.

The Joint Teams are working to rectify the Overhead Catenary System for the North-East Line which had been problematic between HarbourFront and Outram on three occasions over the past 12 months as well as changing out the power cables for the Circle Line. We should aim to complete that by the end of this year.

I have also asked LTA and SBST to start planning for mid-life upgrades for the North-East Line and trains because they are now entering its second decade of operation. We have learnt useful lessons on what has been done or not done for the North-South and East-West Lines and also from our counterparts overseas, and we will apply them to the North-East Line and then to the Circle Line.

Let me talk about LRT because I think some Members are particularly interested in this aspect. LRT withdrawal rates are generally low because, basically, the driver in the loop is sometimes able to continue to drive the train even in a degraded mode. What we track instead are the trends of service delays on our LRT systems as we are mindful that even service delays without train withdrawals also cause inconvenience to commuters. The Joint Teams are

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studying the main faults causing these delays on our LRT systems, as well as ways to shorten recovery time when incidents happen. So, let me share with Members a slide on what is happening there [A slide was shown to hon Members].

Today, we see more stable levels of service delays for the Sengkang-Punggol LRT, and trends of improvement for the Bukit Panjang LRT. As Mr Liang Eng Hwa said, we visited that on two occasions, the BPLRT last year. We had LTA work very closely with the operator and they promised over a three-year programme to try to significantly improve the service delays for BPLRT, so we are seeing some improvement there and we have to continue to work even more of them on that in the coming years.

Members can see for yourselves that we have about 2.08 and 1.28 delays of more than five minutes for every 100,000 train-km on the BPLRT and SPLRT respectively. What it means is that on average, for those two systems, you should see a service delay of five minutes or more, roughly about once a week. These are systems that operate through most of the day and it is about once a week that you should see a service delay of more than five minutes.

With sustained Joint Teams' efforts to rectify these system problems and to actively carry out preventive maintenance, we do expect to see further improvements over the coming months and years.

Even as we partner the operators to refresh our MRT system and enhance train reliability, it is the Government's responsibility to set the correct standards in line with reasonable expectations of a high-quality public transport system.

We are close to completing our review of our rail regulatory and penalty frameworks, which will take effect from the second half of this year. We will be enforcing more stringent maintenance and service reliability requirements by increasing the prescribed penalties that operators will face for breaching them. We are raising the standards. We are also raising the penalties that they will face for breaching these standards.

In this regard, we are considering pegging the revised maximum penalty to a percentage of the affected MRT line's total annual fare revenue. Today, it is a cap of $1 million but we think that the more appropriate thing to do is to raise it to a percentage of the affected lines' total annual fare revenue, as a stronger deterrent against service disruptions and regulatory breaches. We will continue to review this over the next few months but we are close to finalising the

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frameworks that we want to implement.

The tightened regulatory and penalty frameworks reflect the importance that we place on a safe and reliable MRT system, but particularly on the impact that serious regulatory breaches can have on commuters. I have also asked LTA to strengthen its existing auditing capabilities so that we can more closely monitor the service quality and reliability of both the train as well as our bus services, and to be more responsive to any lapses that we face.

Let me move on now to talk about this new subject of spreading out peak hour travel demand that so many of you have spoken on. Even as we work towards increasing capacity and improving reliability, we need to better optimise our public transport capacity, particularly during the peak hours, and especially since the significant improvements to peak hour train capacity will only happen from around 2015 to 2016 onwards, with the re-signalling programme and so on on the North-South Line.

Today, the commuters who face peak hour congestion on trains are predominantly the ones who are trying to reach the city area to get to work. For example, if we take a look at the exit data for Raffles Place station, the large majority of commuters travelling to this station every morning make their exit between the 8.30 am to the 9.00 am window [A slide was shown to hon Members]. At the bottom, it is on the "X" axis, 15-minute intervals; on the "Y" axis, it is exiting passengers. This gives Members an idea of the spread of passengers exiting Raffles Place MRT station during the morning hours up to about 11 o'clock in the morning. The very high peak in commuter loading on our train system is obviously something that we should try to spread out, or what we call in technical jargon, demand management. If we can get 10%, 15% to 20% of commuters in the peak period to travel, say, up to an hour earlier, we would achieve a very perceptible improvement in commuters' daily travel experience to get to work. This will also help us to run a more efficient transport system and better optimise the capacity that we have.

Hence, over the last year, we had made our travel discount schemes more attractive to get commuters who are able to shift their travel patterns to do so. Today, under the SMRT's Early Travel Discount scheme, commuters who enter the SMRT network can enjoy a discount of up to fifty cents for the train journey if they exit at any of the 14 designated city area stations before 7.45 am. Commuters travelling off-peak, both before or after the peak period, can also accumulate more points to win cash prizes of up to $200 under another scheme, called the Incentives for Singapore's Commuters, or the INSINC scheme for short. Both schemes have had some effect in reducing peak crowding – the

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SMRT scheme has seen a three to four per cent shift to the desired level outside of the peak hours to before 7.45 am, while INSINC has seen significant growth in its membership, with more than 68,000 members since its launch in January of last year.

Shifting the peak hour demand into the pre-peak period, where there is excess capacity, benefits both pre-peak and peak hour travellers. Therefore, we are prepared to significantly increase the incentives to encourage travellers who are able to do so, to shift their travel in this manner. Over the past week, there has been a lot of discussion on Dr Janil's idea to allow commuters to travel free on public transport before the peak hours. Many other Members like Mr Liang Eng Hwa, Er Dr Lee Bee Wah, Mr Cedric Foo have chimed in, in support of his idea. Certainly, this is an idea that we will not dismiss off-hand and I have asked my staff to consider it seriously. What we are still studying is whether we should simply increase the current fifty-cent discount substantially to say, $1, or to go all the way to make it free for commuters travelling before a certain cut-off time in the morning. But rest assured that we certainly want to do more to encourage more commuters to shift out of the peak hour.

I should, first, qualify that we are not planning to shift every commuter out of the peak period. As some members of the public have since pointed out, after Dr Janil's suggestion came out, if that were to happen, we would simply be creating a new peak but earlier in the morning, and that is not our intent. So, the fact that there have been mixed views over whether commuters are prepared to shift their travel times should they be offered free travel, is actually quite reassuring and certainly no bad thing.

More importantly, even as we are studying how to enhance the Early Travel Discount scheme for the city area, we also need to work with employers in the CBD. There is simply no point if people get to work early but are unable to start and leave work early. Let me share with Members some Straits Times comics which I found quite interesting. Otherwise, what we see here if they really cannot start and end earlier is that this cartoon may very well come true – you wake up early so that you can get on the MRT in time to, say, travel for free, but because you woke up earlier than usual, you end up sleeping at your workplace. As my former military counterpart would tell me, this is exactly what is meant by "hurry up and wait".

I recall Ms Irene Ng highlighting during the Budget Debate the need for employers to consider and improve flexi-work arrangements for their employees who wish to travel outside the peak hours. I fully support this. If employees adjust their travel times to come earlier to the office, we hope their

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companies will allow them to adjust their working hours and to leave office earlier.

The travel demand management workgroup that is co-chaired by Ministers of State Mrs Josephine Teo and Dr Amy Khor will continue to work with employers on flexi-work arrangements. Through the Travel Smart pilot launched in October last year, the LTA is already working with 12 organisations to put in place the necessary workplace practices to facilitate off-peak travel for their employees. In response to Mr Ang Wei Neng's question, the pilot includes both public and private sector organisations. To date, three of these organisations have already obtained management approval to put in place flexi-work measures for their employees, such as staggering work hours, introducing IT facilities to enable employees to work remotely, and even providing shower and locker facilities. These include, for example, Rajah and Tann, and BP Singapore.

The public sector will also continue to take the lead in enhancing flexi-work arrangements and in encouraging it to enable its officers to take advantage of the current pre-peak travel schemes and the enhanced schemes that will follow. In fact, most public sector agencies already offer flexible hours to their officers. And depending on the nature of work, officers in these agencies can choose the time they prefer to start work within a time-band, and leave office at a time corresponding to their start-time, as long as they perform 42 hours of work a week. For instance, if they come in at 7.30 am in the morning, they can leave work at 5.00 pm to have an early dinner with their families.

I would like to end off this part of my speech on travel demand management by saying that we are committed to spreading out travel demand outside the peak hour. If we achieve a more even travel distribution, it will be a win-win situation for all. For those who have supportive employers and are able to travel earlier, then they get to enjoy the enhanced benefits that we will introduce and have a less congested ride to work in the morning. I know that there will be some commuters who will still need to travel during peak hours, for example, because of family routines like sending their children to childcare or to their parents' place before they can go to work, and so they are unable to shift their travel times even if their employers were to be very supportive of the arrangement. While these commuters may not enjoy the discounted travel, I believe that the travel demand management schemes will benefit them also because they will have a less congested and stressful ride during peak hours if

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other commuters have shifted their travel behaviour.

As we work towards faster and more reliable bus and rail journeys, let me also update Mr Cedric Foo and all Members on our plans to make it easier and faster for commuters to get to our train and bus stations.

I had earlier announced plans to build 200 kilometres more of sheltered walkways around train stations and bus interchanges under what we call the "Walk2Ride" programme. This comprehensive programme will greatly improve connectivity around such transport nodes and other amenities. To put this in perspective, 200 kilometres of shelter is like being able to cross the entire length of Singapore five times without going under the sun.

Commuters have asked me – what if I need to walk more than 400 metres because my walking route to the station is not a straight line but weaves in and out of HDB blocks? Mr Ang Wei Neng, too, holds these concerns and he would like it to be extended even further. Let me assure these commuters that we do take a flexible and pragmatic approach in building these walkways. In rolling out the "Walk2Ride" programme, we consider straight line rather than walking distance of 400 metres. So, it is a straight-line distance, we draw a radius around it, and therefore, actually, the linkways may eventually end up being longer than 400 metres, depending on the route that is chosen because we want to make sure that we make our public transport services as convenient and as accessible for as many commuters as we possibly can.

About 90 existing MRT stations and 43 LRT stations, as well as 25 bus interchanges and 100 major bus stops, will be connected. LTA is working with the local communities to plan where, how far and when the walkways should be built. The tender for the first batch of about 20 MRT stations will be called this quarter and subsequent tenders will be called every quarter. The list of stations in the first two batches of tenders will be posted on the LTA website later today. So, rather than me trying to run through the list, please refer to the website and see if you are one of the lucky ones.

A more comfortable walk to train stations and bus stops matters. So, too, does less intrusion into the lives of Singaporeans, particularly for residents whose homes are near elevated MRT tracks.

While we work with SMRT to step up maintenance for tracks and trains to minimise railway noise, we are also building some 20 kilometres of noise barriers along MRT tracks where the noise levels exceed the NEA's guidelines.

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We expect to begin works later this year and aim to complete them in phases by around 2020. And so, certainly, residents living close to MRT viaducts like those along certain stretches of Ang Mo Kio station, as mentioned by Mr Ang Hin Kee, can look forward to a noticeable reduction in noise levels once the barriers are installed.

Why does it take so long? The installation of noise barriers will need to be coordinated with ongoing renewal works on the North-South and East-West Lines, such as re-signalling as well the replacement of sleepers that are used to hold the MRT tracks in place and the regular maintenance works that needs to be done. No point putting up a barrier and then when we do the re-sleepering works, we have to take the barrier out because we need access to the space to change the sleepers and thereafter to put it back again. I think it is probably duplication of effort for which we will be held accountable. So, it needs to be coordinated with the other works that is ongoing. And, certainly, I want to assure Mr Ang Hin Kee and all Members that we will try to speed up these installation works as much as possible but there are also technical challenges like limited engineering hours available.

The next point I would like to make is that it is likely, therefore, that we would have to carry out regular service disruptions – planned regular service disruptions – during some revenue hours, so that more time is available for these works to be carried out and so that the overall improvements to residents and commuters can be completed earlier. This is something similar to what we have announced for the Circle Line when we changed the cable. We will try to, for instance, on that occasion – for some Sundays – revenue service may start several hours later than usual for segments of our rail network. For Circle Line, we announced that it was between, I think, Mountbatten and Paya Lebar, and certainly for elevated tracks, we will also have to do likewise. And we will give advanced notice and try to reduce the inconvenience to commuters as much as we possibly can. So, I ask for patience from Singaporeans as we try our best to do these works in the shortest time possible.

These numerous improvements to our public transport system entail massive investments. The Government has committed to the expansion of our public transport network for the medium to long term. The operators, too, need to fulfil their roles to ramp up capacity and ensure higher levels of reliability. As the system ages, the responsibilities of the operators on the rail system become even more important.

I thank Mr Gan Thiam Poh for his concern over the role of the PTOs in bringing out greater capacity to meet the expected increase in travel demand.

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Under the existing rail licences, the train operators are indeed responsible for replacing and adding capacity to meet ridership needs. On its part, the SMRT has committed $750 million over the next few years to purchase more trains for the North-South and East-West Lines, the Circle Line and the Bukit Panjang LRT, under plans to meet increased ridership. I believe I have made that point clear in reply to a PQ that was filed by Er Dr Lee Bee Wah. For the North-South and East-West Lines, the SMRT is also replacing the signalling system, and earlier this year, they had announced the commitment to overhaul the first and second generation trains for the North-South and East-West Lines – this is by SMRT.

These are necessary investments to enhance and renew the ageing rail system and improve the resilience of the network. We will work with operators to ensure that they set aside sufficient funds to meet their commitments to these investments where necessary.

The cost of these investments would have to be properly shared between the Government, the operators and the public. We must seek a balance where the public transport system remains financially viable for our PTOs, but fares kept affordable for all commuters.

As privatised operators, and let me share with Members a slide on the average fares [A slide was shown to hon Members]. As mentioned by Mr Cedric Foo, our PTOs are incentivised to keep costs down and improve productivity, and also to develop new revenue sources, such as rental and advertising, which help to defray operating costs. But more importantly, non-fare revenue helps to reduce the need for fare increases, and this has allowed commuters in Singapore to continue to pay fares that are among the lowest across major cities. So, regardless of whether you are talking about privatised models, nationalised model, whatever it is, the most important thing is what is the end outcome for commuters. Do you have a good, reliable system? Do you have fares that are affordable? I think, therefore, when we compare against some of the major cities around the world, our fares, generally, are quite affordable. In fact, the percentage of household expenditure that is spent on public transportation has fallen over the years.

But we know also that the reality is that operating costs have gone up. Diesel prices went up by about 55%, national wages by over 25% from the 2006 to 2011 periods, while as Mr Foo has reminded us, our fares increased cumulatively by 0.3% over the same period. So, this has put the financials of the PTOs under some amount of pressure, and I think if you were to recall from reading the press coverage, this is especially so for the bus industry. We are monitoring the financials of the bus sector very closely and we will have to

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explore assistive measures if they are indeed needed. Against the backdrop of worsening bus industry financials, I expect that it will be a challenge for the PTOs to do more to expand and enhance bus services without additional assistance.

What form this revenue assistance will take is to be decided. I am mindful of the calls from a number of Members, led by the redoubtable Mr Liang Eng Hwa and Er Dr Lee Bee Wah, Dr Lily Neo, Mr Cedric Foo, amongst many others, to freeze transport fares. This has to be considered together with the additional task of studying the affordability of public transport fares, which I had recently asked the Fare Review Mechanism Committee to undertake. Whatever fare formula is proposed, we must safeguard commuter interest in affordable public transport fares, while balancing against the very real financial pressures faced by the PTOs.

In this regard, I share the concerns that have been expressed over the affordability of fares for various groups of commuters, such as the disabled, the low-income and the Polytechnic students. Members like Ms Denise Phua – during Budget debate – Dr Lily Neo, Er Dr Lee Bee Wah, Ms Jessica Tan, Ms Lee Li Lian, all the ladies, as well as gentlemen like Mr Lim Biow Chuan, Mr Faisal Abdul Manap, Mr Christopher de Souza, Dr Teo Ho Pin, and during the Budget debate, Mr Cedric Foo, asked how we can better support them in public transport fares. And also, I thank Mr Lim Biow Chuan for not only raising the needs of these groups but also suggesting that the Government should take on the burden and the responsibility of paying for these concessions.

I thank Members for their interest in the recommendations of the FRMC, but let us be patient, let us give them a bit more time, and I think we will be better able to address questions on fares when the report is released, likely around the middle of this year. And, meanwhile, the Chairman of the FRMC, Mr Richard Magnus, has already shared some of his views on concession schemes through his blog, indicating some of his own preliminary thoughts on how fares policy can ease some of life's pressures for some of these groups who may need help. This aspect of our fares policy I know is something that we hold dear to our hearts and I believe in doing more wherever possible. So, I have changed from being sympathetic to doing more wherever possible.

When we launched our Land Transport Master Plan 2008, we were confronted with a declining public transport mode share and it was a worrying trend. However, we appear to have turned the corner five years on. According to the interim results from the Household Interview Travel Survey for 2012, about 62% of all trips during the peak periods are made on public transport, up

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from 59% in 2008. So, in 2008 it was 59%, 2012 it was about 62%. And so that partly accounts for why journeys have increased about three percentage points each year. Also, we find that more car-owning households are using public transport for daily commute compared to four years ago. Now there are more people, who despite owning a car, find that it is preferable for them whether for cost, convenience or other reasons to be using public transport instead of their cars.

Much of this shift could perhaps be due to the rail expansion programme that we have put in place over the last few years. Our rail network has increased by about 30% since 2008 – it was about 140 kilometres then, now it is about 180 kilometres today – and we have plans to further expand the rail network to 360 kilometres by 2030. And what we will hope to achieve in terms of public transport mode share during the peak periods is, as we have mentioned before, 70% in 2020 and 75% by 2030.

But we still have much to do to make public transport a choice mode. Our system and policies must be more commuter-centric and responsive to fundamental demographic changes, such as an ageing population. Commuters must be convinced that public transport can serve their needs, and get them to their destinations reliably and comfortably.

As part of the process for our Land Transport Master Plan (LTMP) 2013, we conversed with a wide range of stakeholders on the land transport system, through Our Singapore Conversation, focus group discussions, and online forums. Public transport commuters, motorists, cyclists, taxi drivers and customers, as well as environmentalists and academics, have shared their views. And I thank all stakeholders who have contributed to the formulation of LTMP 2013 which we would formally launch probably in the second quarter.

Let me assure Singaporeans, including Ms Faizah Jamal, that our partnership will not end there. For instance, as part of our preliminary planning for the Cross Island Line later this year, we will be engaging citizens, like yourself, who are concerned about the impact of the Cross Island Line on the Central Catchment Nature Reserve, which is also a natural heritage that we must share and safeguard as a nation. We will continue to converse with stakeholders as we implement the Master Plan. The diverse and sometimes conflicting views of commuters and stakeholders have helped to sharpen our focus as well as better understand the tradeoffs in addressing the key issues

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before us.

Over the last two months, I have shared some of our plans for the longer term and many Singaporeans have asked whether the plans are indeed sufficient to cope with a higher population in 2030. Given the exceptionally high level of ridership growth on our public transport system of 35% in the last five years, and the day-to-day experience of crowded public transport, many Singaporeans were concerned whether we could cope.

We can cope. First, the nation is expecting the rate of population growth to slow down, and the Government is resolute on this. Ridership will continue to increase, even as the shift mode share and the population growth in the most extreme case by some 20% to 30% from what it is today, based on the population scenario of 6.5 million to 6.9 million. So, if it is 6.5 million, it will be about 20% increase from what it is today. If it is 6.9 million, it will be 30% from what it is today. On the other hand, by 2030, we will double our rail network to about 360 kilometres, and more than double the overall MRT capacity delivering commuters into the CBD. So, I am confident that we will have enough capacity to meet demand over the long term.

More importantly, with our new rail lines like the Cross Island Line and Jurong Region Line, Singaporeans will be more connected to their destinations than ever before. I said that in time to come, eight in 10 homes will be within a 10-minute walk of a train station, and therefore it really means that many commuters will no longer need to rely on bus feeders to get to the MRT station or they will have a much shorter period than what it is today. Therefore, with shorter, more direct train routes from more parts of the island, journey times will also come down.

These new rail lines may seem very far in the future. But Singaporeans will not have to wait that long for more connections and shorter journeys. Commuters can already look forward to benefiting from the rail lines that are close to completion. Starting with Stage 1 of the Downtown Line later this year, new lines or extensions will continue to open almost every year for the next five years.

Mr Christopher de Souza will be pleased to note that the Downtown Line project is on track to serve residents previously not directly connected to our MRT lines, such as those living in HDB estates in Hillview or private estates around the Hillview area, and along Jalan Jurong Kechil. The Downtown Line will also effectively add 50% more carrying capacity in the eastern corridor.

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Residents in Ubi, Kaki Bukit and Geylang Bahru will have a choice of two MRT lines to get to the city centre. It is on track and we are watching this very closely for a variety of reasons. We have encountered some problems with conditions, sometimes marine clay and sometimes, very huge bounders that we have had difficulties tunnelling through. We have also been slowed somewhat because of the number of complaints have made regarding noise. So, as much as it is reasonably possible and with all due consideration to safety, we will make sure that we try and keep to the schedule that we have promised for the Downtown Line.

Beyond the Downtown Line is the Thomson Line and that will be completed in phases from 2019, and this will allow commuters to transfer to the five MRT lines by then with six interchange stations when fully opened. If I can show Members what the map would look like – very complicated, very congested. Today, we have about 15 interchange stations, including the LRT interchange stations, to provide connections and transfers for commuters. When the Thomson Line is completed, we will have 30 interchanges. What this means is that we think it will help achieve a better spread of morning peak commuters across the entire rail network, and it will also improve our network resilience, so that commuters have alternative routes in the event of a delay or disruption.

In the longer term, we will also facilitate more connections and integration between transport modes – bus, rail and other forms of travel like cycling. I will speak tomorrow on private transport and later on, Parliamentary Secretary Assoc Prof Muhammad Faishal will also elaborate on the extensive plans that we have for cycling and an inclusive public transport system.

So, we are planning ahead, expanding capacity, extending reach, and opening up more public transport travel options for commuters. There will be more people taking buses and trains in the long term, but I believe that they will be experiencing faster journeys on a more integrated network, which is much more extensive with many more connections. It will be a different public transport system, which will meet our nation's transport needs.

Sir, let me conclude. At MOT, we are not just focused on planning for the long term. We are actively seeking solutions to the real problems that commuters face today.

Increasing bus and rail capacity is one prong of our efforts. We are also improving bus and rail reliability, so that overall, we can reach high service levels that we should expect of a quality public transport system. We are also

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exploring ways to optimise existing capacities in our public transport system, be it through tighter regulation of operators, or encouraging shifts in commuter travel patterns.

So, let me assure Members of this House that the Government remains as committed as ever to realise the vision that was first set out in the Land Transport Master Plan of 2008. However, the public transport landscape today has changed from what it was five years ago, and we will respond to meet commuters' changing travel needs even as we refresh the Master Plan. We will spare no effort to strive towards meaningful improvements in commuters' travel experience.