SINGAPORE —  More individuals received financial assistance from the Government between April last year and March this year compared to the previous financial year, as the amount disbursed under ComCare reached an all-time high of S$116 million. 

Today (Dec 17), the Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) published the annual report for ComCare — a Government programme which provides financial assistance for those  in need via various schemes. For the first time, the report published data on the number of unique households and beneficiaries assisted to “provide a better picture of those helped”. 

In financial year 2014, 91,093 individuals and 41,920 households benefited from ComCare, compared to 89,339 and 41,086, respectively, in FY2013. In particular, the number of households helped under ComCare’s Short-to-Medium Term Assistance (SMTA) scheme increased by 13 per cent, from about 24,300 to 27,500 households. This was the highest percentage spike among the different ComCare schemes. 

Apart from SMTA, the other ComCare schemes are the Long Term Assistance scheme as well as subsidies for kindergarten, childcare and student care. Interim assistance is also provided to tide over families with urgent needs. The report also noted that the number of households which benefited from SMTA grew by 1.4 times between FY2010 (11,602) and FY2014. 

The total ComCare amount disbursed in FY2014 was almost 14 per cent higher than the S$102 million given out in FY2013, and Minister for Social and Family Development Tan Chuan-Jin said the increase was “not too surprising” given the Government’s efforts in the last few years. 

He said: “We have built a network of Social Service Offices across the island — one in every major HDB town ... This has made help more accessible than before. We have also adjusted some of our income criteria thresholds so that more can be assisted.”

MSF also released a separate report on the profile and trends of households assisted under ComCare between FY2012 and FY2014. It showed that the typical profile of households requiring short- and medium-term assistance remained largely unchanged.

Households on SMTA were mostly headed by persons who were married and in their 40s or 50s. Almost 65 per cent of SMTA households had main applicants with below N- or O-Level education, and about a quarter were employed. Mr Tan said: “What we need to understand further is the group where the main applicants are employed, and yet still require financial assistance.” Households on long-term assistance were mostly elderly singles aged 65 and above who were staying in one- or two-room flats. 

National University of Singapore Associate Professor Irene Ng, who researches on social welfare policy among other areas, said the increasing amount of financial assistance provided to the needy reflected the Government’s response to the “increasing economic vulnerability of low-income households”.

Assoc Prof Ng said: “Although economic disparity has improved somewhat over the past two years, we are still not past the problems of high income inequality, bottom wage stagnation, high costs of living, and fast pace of growth that makes it harder for the less-able to catch up.”

Social spending is expected to increase, with an ageing population and employment affected by a weak global economy,  said Assistant Professor Woo Jun Jie from the Nanyang Technological University’s School of Humanities and Social Sciences. 

He added that the challenge for policymakers is to maintain fiscal health amid growing social expenditures. To ensure self-reliance, there could be stricter means-testing and closer regulation of welfare disbursements”, he said. 

Political analyst Eugene Tan, who is a law don at the Singapore Management University, said: “We should not fear increases in social spending. We have moved away from looking at social assistance merely as social expenditures but as social investments.”