During elections:
“Build compassionate meritocracy : PM”
– Straits Times, Oct 27 2001
After elections:
“CDCs are not welfare agencies: PM”
– Straits Times, Jan 6, 2002
“If these patients want to treat hospitals like a hotel, then they’ll have to be charged hotel rates.”
– Minister Lim Hng Kiang, Straits Times, March 1,2002, on cutting off subsidies for hospital overstayers who “are likely to be older than 60, with no income, or are from families with incomes below $1000.”
“I regret making the decision because, in the end, the baby continued to be in intensive care, and KKH now runs a bill of more than $300,000.”
– Lim Hng Kiang on how he regretted intervening to admit a premature baby into KKH, Straits Times, May 21, 2002
“Family bathes in public toilet because the water supply has been reduced to a trickle and the electricity disconnected. ‘I have no money even to buy candles.'”
– Retrenched worker Mdm Dilaram, Straits Times, Apr 12, 2003
“Power supply is not a welfare organisation.”
– DPM Lee Hsien Loong, Straits Times, Mar 13, 2003
“More than 3000 Singaporeans have applied for a government assistance scheme in the first two weeks of the year …but no one has qualified.”
– Straits Times, Jan 26, 2003