FEWER applications for S(PR) will be granted this year

6penny

with the tightening of the immigration criteria introduced since late last year, said Deputy Prime Minister Wong Kan Seng in Parliament on Thursday.
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FEWER applications for Singapore Permanent Residence (PR) will be granted this year with the tightening of the immigration criteria introduced since late last year, said Deputy Prime Minister Wong Kan Seng in Parliament on Thursday.

The number 'will be noticeably less than that in 2009,' he said in reply to a question from Nominated MP Professor Paulin Tay Straughan, who asked for the number of applications for PR in 2009 and this year, and how many were successful.

Mr Wong said the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) received a total of 132,200 applications for PR last year. Of these, 115,900 applications were processed , and 59,500 or 51 per cent were successful.

Asked for the profile of the successful applicants, he said the majority of them qualified under the Professional, Technical and Skilled Workers Scheme. Others were dependants of Singapore Citizens or dependants of the e economic PRs.

'We will continue to be stringent in our requirements for PR. PR will be granted to those of suitable quality, are able to contribute to Singapore and integrate well into our society,' pledged Mr Wong, who is also the Home Affair Minister.

Making a case for allowing immigrants into Singapore, he said they help to improve the old-age support ratio by increasing the number of economically active residents.

He told the House that in 1970, when Singapore's Total Fertility Rate was above the replacement rate of 2.1, each elderly person was supported by 17 working adults.

'Currently, we have about 8.2 working adults in the resident population supporting one elderly person. If there were no PRs, we would have slightly fewer adults, at 7.2 working adults supporting 1 elderly person,' he said.

'If we were to close our doors to immigrants tomorrow, we can expect the old-age support ratio to fall very fast. In short, we would still need immigration to make up for the shortfall of babies and help ease the pressure of an ageing population. We will carefully manage the numbers to ensure quality of immigrants.

He added that declining population is a long term issue and it requires to be tackled well ahead - 'several decades ahead, of the problems manifesting themselves.'

两片叶子

就是要收紧PR，这是老调子了。

crazystone

大选前的冷饭不停的翻炒