Number of Cases of Dengue Inspection Officers being Refused Entry into Homes and Penalties Meted Out

The Senior Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Sustainability and the Environment (Mr Baey Yam Keng) (for the Minister for Sustainability and the Environment): Mr Speaker, most residents allow the National Environment Agency's (NEA) officers to inspect their premises after the officers have explained the need to conduct checks for mosquito breeding and stem dengue transmission. In the past three years, NEA has encountered about six instances of refused entry for every 100 inspection attempts at residential premises. In such instances, NEA would offer to reschedule the inspection to another time. Eventually, most of them will comply and facilitate our inspections.

Under the Control of Vectors and Pesticides Act 1998 (CVPA), notices to require residents to make their premises available for inspection may be served to those who repeatedly refuse entry to NEA inspection officers. Individuals who fail to comply with the notice can be charged under section 45 of CVPA for obstructing or hindering NEA officers from performing their duties. Offenders are liable on conviction to a fine not exceeding $5,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three months, or to both. We have not had the need to charge anyone under section 45 for repeated refusal to entry in the past three years and we do not have any plans to increase the penalties at this point in time.

In light of the increasing number of dengue cases, I urge all individuals and premises managers to take urgent action to break the disease transmission by adopting good housekeeping habits to prevent mosquito breeding.

Mr Speaker, I thank the Senior Parliamentary Secretary for his answer. I note from the Senior Parliamentary Secretary's reply that the number of people who refused entry to NEA officers are relatively small. I would like to ask the profiles of such people who refused entry to NEA inspection officers. Are they predominantly the elderly? This is because, in my constituency, I have a large proportion of the elderly and, during my visits, I commonly hear from my elderly residents that they are very wary about opening their doors to strangers, even to those who seemingly wear uniforms because there are afraid of scams. So, my question is: how does NEA plan to create awareness of the role of the NEA inspection officers and to assuage elderly residents that these officers and their inspections are actually legitimate?

People who refused entry for NEA inspections span across a wide spectrum and there is no predominance of senior citizens. As mentioned in my reply, most of them do eventually allow access to their premises after engagement and explanation, and NEA has not had the right to take harsher action against them. These residents also find that after they have allowed the officers to enter their premises, they also learned from the officers about potential breeding grounds for mosquitoes and how they could prevent such habitats from building up and invading their homes.

Besides the NEA polo t-shirts that the officers wear, they also carry an authority card that residents can check against. They can verify the identity of the officers by calling the NEA contact centre at 6225 5632. So, perhaps the Member can also help us to provide the number to his residents so that they can call by phone to check the authority card number against NEA records or, for those who can use the Internet, they can also check using the NEA website.

Our officers will also share these verification methods with residents who raise any concerns about their authenticity, and we will continue to raise awareness of our dengue officers' work through periodic outreach. We could also look at, for example, in dengue cluster areas, perhaps putting up posters, with the support of local advisors, using their notice boards, to assure residents that NEA is doing the inspection to contain the spread of dengue and also how they may verify the identity of these officers.