limweech
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« Reply #1 on: July 18, 2007, 06:11:38 AM » |
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transcripts for speech made by Penny Low
(incomplete, and not accurate. please refer to video for actual speech)
....... this year, much to the delight of Punggol North grassroot leaders, Ambassador
Belen from the Philippines Embassy has very very kindly also organised a contigent to
participate in our street parade. she was here with us last year, she was very excited
and this year, she's decided to come back again with a contingent, fortunately not
competing, so can we also thank her for her good gesture, and of course we hope the
rest may follow suit next year.
i would like to take this opportunity to share the various efforts that the grassroot
leaders as well as the advisors have been putting in to realise the vision of Punggol
21. Since the announcement of the masterplan in 2003, URA and SLA has also put out land
parcels for F&B, recreation, and sports facilities within Punggol as well as Sengkang.
However, in the last few years, the bidding of the land has not been extremely fierce
for the reason that we went through some economic downturn which was also met with
incidients like SARS in 2003. The uncertain environment affected the demand but going
forward has been the good announcement of a last quarter growth of more than 8%. I
think the demand seems to be coming back up again and I'm glad to say that the Punggol
North Town Development "parcels?" has been also working the ground as well as all the
other agencies to make the Punggol 21 Plan a better one and one that also incorporates
many new ideas and I think we will hear about some of these new developments in the
months to come. The basic needs of Punggol North since 2001 has been much improved. The
transportation system, the amenities, the basic amentities like coffeeshops, schools,
PCFs, kindergartens, and so on, have all been put in place. However, there is still
alot of room for improvement. Lately, I have been going around door to door, to ask, if
our residents would prefer a much relaxed atmosphere as Punggol 21 town seems to boast
of today or a much more intense type of development, with big shopping centres, and
bigger sports stadiums and amenities. and I seem to be receiving pretty mixed signals
from the ground. Some, said that this is a sanctuary where they can retreat into, so
they like it as it is, with some improvements; and I think the good news is, the banks
of Sungei Punggol as well as Sungei Serangoon would be developed into a sort of a
esplanade, like a connected park, where you can then bring your families there, for a
jog, for a evening walk, or even for a picnic. I think these plans are all in place.
The road infrastructure would also be better developed over the years, especially once
the KPE, which is the Kallang Paya Lebar Expressway is completed, and I think, with a
few of these developments, plus some of the new and very innovative ideas that should
be announced in the months to come, this will be an exciting thing, which you will
always call Punggol Town or Punggol 21, My Home, Our Kampong.
but, for us to look to the authorities to build Punggol North, we would only be
building the hardware. What we need to do is to build the software or the heartware, H
-E-A-R-T, heartware of this community, and one good way of doing so, is obviously
through our CC building. I have made some announcements regarding building a new CC,
and I'm glad to say that we have done successfully some fund raising activities and
today, we will be receiving or will be fund raising to the tune of a quarter million
dollars for our CC. Now, is that exciting ? it is still far from the target of 2
million, but the patience, well wishes, would certainly, be able to help us to work
towards there. But as I said, it is not good enough to depend on a small group of
people but if this CC is ours, then we should all come in together, put in the effort,
whether it is to give ideas, or to give a dollar, to contribute to our building of our
CC, which is a community club, and I certainly hope that you would participate in the
building of the CC in one way or another. I believe that the progress would be much
faster from now on.
However, we must also guard against certain lesser issues. for example, lately, we have
been notified about the dengue clusters. Punggol has been relatively free of the dengue
clusters until lately. There is an epidemic situation in Singapore and we are not
spared from it. We love our children, we love our parents, we love our family, and we
love our neighbours. So I hope that you would help us to keep dengue out of Punggol
North, out of Singapore. because this is a war that we have to fight together as a
team, team Singapore and not just depend on the agencies to do so. So, please do the
necessary to ensure that we can prevent dengue from striking and causing misery to our
families.
Last but not least, I would like to also make an announcement. For many of my speeches,
I have spoken about life long learning, that in a world that is always changing and
changing very very quickly, there is a need to continually upgrade ourselves, and very
recently, I have accepted an award from the Yale University as a Yale world fellow.
What this entails, is for me to continue to learn, and also spend some time in Yale
University. With the blessings from our top leaders, especially Minister Teo Chee Hean,
who has very very kindly encouraged me to go on the course and also assured me that
this constituency will also be well looked after by the Pasir Ris - Punggol GRC MPs. I
have accepted the award, and will be departing sometime Mid-August. I will be back
though, at the end of this year. I have spoken long, with my grassroot leaders, and
also seek, should I say, their endorsement, and they have given me their very very
strong support. What I would like to assure everyone, in the midst of that period of
time, this consitutency would be well taken care of, both by our grassroot leaders, as
well as the various advisors from the Pasir Ris - Punggol GRC. On my return, I hope to
be able to serve you better and perhaps, come up with better and more innovative ideas
so that we can all learn and grow together. With that, may I wish everybody a most
happy, joyous Punggol North Racial and Religious Harmony Day. Thank you very much.
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