PQ: Update on Enhancements to Single Room Shared Facilities Initiative

Parliamentary questions raised during the 5 July 2023 sitting on an update on enhancements to single room shared facilities initiative, with responses from Minister for National Development, Mr Desmond Lee.

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Ms Denise Phua Lay Peng asked the Minister for National Development (a) whether he can provide a status update on the Single Room Shared Facilities initiative; and (b) what suggestions are received to enhance the said initiative.

The Minister for National Development (Mr Desmond Lee): Mr Deputy Speaker, we are launching a pilot of a new type of rental housing, which we call the Single Room Shared Facilities (SRSF), to provide more options for lower-income individuals under the Public Rental Scheme. With the SRSF, we aim to provide more privacy for tenants while making good use of limited space, and the shared facilities and communal spaces will enable social interaction and reduce the risk of social isolation. HDB is currently refurbishing the premises at the former Anderson Junior College hostel to prepare for the pilot and applications will open in December 2023. 

Since the announcement, we have received feedback of interest in applying for the pilot. We have also received suggestions about the amenities to be provided for the shared facilities, such as the kitchens and laundry rooms; received suggestions on the measures that we could take to tackle social isolation; received suggestions on the manner of facilities, management and upkeep; suggestions on the types of social interventions and community services that may be provided, and we will adopt these where possible. As this is a pilot, we will work alongside the appointed social service agency operator to refine the model as we gain experience.

Mr Deputy Speaker: Ms Denise Phua.

Ms Denise Phua Lay Peng (Jalan Besar): Mr Deputy Speaker, I want to thank the Minister for the HDB rental units, especially for all the good work and helpful work that they have rendered to me and my residents. I also to compliment HDB and MND for this Single Room Shared Facilities initiative, which I thought was very important because it addresses the gaps for the homeless and also tenants who cannot get along well with each other. So, if designed well, it will reduce many of the appeals that we are receiving at our Meet-the-People Sessions (MPS) each week. 

Sir, I want to find out what is the timeframe to take in all the improvements or suggestions that the Minister has mentioned and also what is the plan to scale this initiative. This because every week, we are still receiving a lot of feedback on rental tenants who just cannot get along with each other; and the need for just more privacy for rental tenants of HDB flats is still there. The demand is there. So, I would like to ask the Minister about the scalability. 

Mr Desmond Lee: I would just like to thank the Member for being a very passionate advocate for the needs of the lower-income, especially those who are residing in rental housing, transitional shelters and so on. 

The various suggestions came to us first in the course of our consultation before we launched the pilot in March of this year. Before we launched the pilot, we had, last year, engaged social work professionals, social service agencies, academics, researchers, community workers and so on. Some of these ideas have actually been incorporated in this pilot and you will see some of these in place when we launch the first round of applications for tenants in December of this year.

The other ideas will be studied and some of these ideas include the kinds of social interventions that can take place for the residents of this pilot project. When the social service agency comes on board, we will work with the operator to see whether some of these can be trialed. 

The second question that the Member asked is when can this be scaled up. This pilot will allow us to accommodate up to a maximum of some 480 single rooms, that is, 480 individuals. So, there will be some capacity there. But as to when this can be scaled up, I think let the pilot run its course first. Let us assess how the tenants interact with each other with the social service agency operator in the shared facilities and let us learn from this pilot. 

Having said that, I think it is important to contextualise this pilot, given the other things that we are doing. For example, we have been putting partitions in rental flats – both retrofitting existing ones as well as building new rental flats that come with partitions for individuals under the Joint Singles Scheme (JSS). We have been piloting the JSS Operator-Run pilot (JSS-OR). And we have earlier announced this year that we will extend the pilot to more sites. This involves two individuals sharing under the JSS rental flat with a social service agency coming in to match tenants, to address disputes and, of course, to provide social support.

This Single Room Shared Facilities pilot tests the viability of giving each individual privacy in a room of his or her own. But to prevent and tackle the risk of social isolation, you have facilities that are shared on every floor as well as on the ground floor and a social service agency with professionals coming in to provide programming, community interventions as well as social work interventions. So, let this pilot run. Let it run for some time and if it is feasible, it may go into the design of future rental flats.

Source: https://sprs.parl.gov.sg/search/#/sprs3topic?reportid=oral-answer-3287