Debated in Parliament on 16 Oct 2012.
Mrs Lina Chiam asked the Minister for Trade and Industry if he will consider revising and tightening the assessment criteria for EDB's Global Investor Programme to ensure foreigners accepted into this scheme are not involved in criminal embezzlement.
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The assessment criteria for applicants under the Global Investor Programme (GIP) was reviewed and tightened recently. Each applicant is required to submit supporting documents relating to his personal and business background that are certified by a notary public. The applicant is also required to furnish references from financial institutions and declare if he has any criminal conviction under the Immigration Act. Each applicant is required to make a statutory declaration that the information he has provided is true and accurate.
EDB would then verify the information provided by the applicant and forward particulars of the applicant to relevant Government agencies for further screening. While every effort has been made to ensure that the assessment process is rigorous and comprehensive, it is not always possible for all dubious dealings to be detected at the point of application, especially if they have not been surfaced yet. I would like to assure Members that EDB will continue to exercise due care and diligence in evaluating all applicants of the Global Investor Programme.
Sir, I thank the Minister of State for the answer. I have two supplementary questions. First, will a professional audit be done to check on the correctness and adequacy of EDB's systems and assessment criteria to ensure the quality of foreign talent that have been brought into Singapore? Secondly, if the audit has already been conducted, can the audit report be released to the public so that the public can assess the EDB's Global Investor Programme?
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Sir, the objective of making sure that the information provided is accurate, comprehensive and complete, it is important that EDB taps on agencies or international networks to verify those information. It is important that we have a system that is robust and dynamic enough to be able to access all the information provided. Sometimes, the information may not be complete or comprehensive. I think it is needed that every single case is looked into very seriously and considered very carefully. We cannot speed up the process in any way but we must make sure the information provided is complete. After incidents that have happened, EDB has continued to refine its processes and make sure the processes are strengthened. It will use different sources of information and tap on certain intelligence to find out more about certain applications.
Mr Speaker, Sir, I am declaring my interest as a banker. My understanding is that banks here do fairly stringent and rigorous Know Your Clients (KYC) and anti-money laundering (AML) checks when on-boarding their clients. Given the potential for the EDB and the banking sector to work together, is this something that the Ministry would consider in raising the bar for allowing the GIP applicants to qualify to come here?
It is important that EDB considers working with different sectors more closely. This information is needed, and the different background checks for certain cases of applications. It is important for different agencies and operators to come forward to work together to find out more about those applications. We will certainly consider that.
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