Commentary: Ministers can be paid more, but link their salary to performance - CNA
Linking pay to performance will become more important if the current difficulty with getting top people in the private and public sector continues, says veteran newspaper editor Han Fook Kwang.
Prime Minister Lawrence Wong speaking in parliament at the close of the three-day Budget debate on Feb 26, 2026.
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Han Fook Kwang 14 Sep 2026 06:00AM Bookmark Bookmark Share WhatsApp Telegram Facebook Twitter Email LinkedIn Set CNA as your preferred source on Google Add CNA as a trusted source to help Google better understand and surface our content in search results. Read a summary of this article on FAST. Get bite-sized news via a newcards interface. Give it a try. Click here to return to FAST Tap here to return to FAST FAST SINGAPORE: The debate over ministerial salaries in parliament last week can sound like a broken record player, repeatedly playing the same line in a song.
I heard no new arguments for or against.
It isnβt surprising since this discussion is more than 30 years old, starting when a White Paper on the issue was introduced in parliament and debated in 1994. It is an unusually long time for the merits or otherwise of a policy to be still so actively in play even as the world, and Singapore, have changed substantially.
All the usual questions have been asked and re-asked over the last three decades: Will increased pay actually result in quality candidates stepping forward? Will it not entice the wrong people, motivated by money? Isnβt a million dollars a year more than enough when Singapore ministers are already the best paid in the world?
