Return telcos, MRT fines to the people?

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October 16, 2017

Why should all the fines imposed on telco and transport operators be keep by the Government?

I refer to the article “Singtel fined $500,000 for massive 24-hour fibre broadband disruption last December” (Straits Times, Oct 16).

It states that “Singtel has been fined $500,000 – the largest in three years – for an islandwide fibre broadband outage last year that left some 490,000 users cut off from the Web.

The outage on Dec 3 that lasted for nearly 24 hours affected close to 90 per cent of Singtel’s fibre broadband user base.

Announcing the fine on Monday (Oct 16), the Info-communications Media Development Authority (IMDA) said its investigations showed that the disruption was triggered by a planned maintenance.

The largest telco fine of $6 million was meted out in May 2014 to Singtel over a fire at its Bukit Panjang Internet exchange in 2013 that took down phone lines, banking payment and Internet services across Singapore.”

As A matter of principle – why should all the fines imposed on telcos, transport  operators, be keep by the Government?

After all, it is already having large Budget surpluses and Cash Budget surpluses (under IMF fiscal reporting guidelines) almost every year.

Why not return all the fines collected to the people?

Leong Sze Hian

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About the Author

Leong
Leong Sze Hian has served as the president of 4 professional bodies, honorary consul of 2 countries, an alumnus of Harvard University, authored 4 books, quoted over 1500 times in the media , has been a radio talkshow host, a newspaper daily columnist, Wharton Fellow, SEACeM Fellow, columnist for theonlinecitizen and Malaysiakini, executive producer of Ilo Ilo (40 international awards), Hotel Mumbai (associate producer), invited to speak more than 200 times in about 40 countries, CIFA advisory board member, founding advisor to the Financial Planning Associations of 2 countries. He has 3 Masters, 2 Bachelors degrees and 13 professional  qualifications.