Paper: Business Times, The (Singapore)
Title: Passports will not be cheaper
Author: Leong Sze Hian, Singapore
Date: March 31, 2005
I REFER to media reports that the Immigration and Checkpoints
Authority
(ICA) will lower the passport fee from $70 to $60 or $50 (for
applications online or by post), for passports that are issued on
or after April 1.
However, passports will have their validity slashed from 10 years
to five. The reason given was 'to incorporate new technologies into
the Singapore passport more rapidly and deter errant persons or
syndicates from forging or abusing our passports'.
If the 10-year passport fee was $70, then logically the five-year
fee should be half, which is $35. The new fees are proportional
increases of 71 and 43 per cent respectively.
If three million Singaporeans apply or renew their passports, the
additional revenue to the ICA is $45 million (3 million x $15),
that is assuming everyone does so online or by post.
I would like to ask whether the ICA operates at a profit, and if
so, what were its profits for previous years?
If every time a public agency decides to increase fees by such a
large margin, 'to incorporate new technologies more rapidly', then
the cost of
living and inflation in Singapore may go up even more.
Is there a process or panel to scrutinise how the quantum of public
fee
increases are determined and whether they are justified?
Perhaps the headline for this report should read as 'More
expensive
passports' rather than 'Cheaper passports'.
Author: Leong Sze Hian, Singapore
Copyright, 2005, Singapore Press Holdings Limited
