The PAPPY runs EDB who wooed UNSW for 2 years. The Uni then rushed through the paperwork (reasons??) and rapidly opened here at a makeshift campus.
Even the UNSW is cutting her loses. How shall we cut out the PAPPY?
THE University of NSW rushed through plans for its now collapsed Singapore campus so quickly that the university's governing body was given just 30 seconds to scrutinise the proposal, a senior academic says.
One former member of the governing body said he was so disgusted by the decision in early 2004 that he decided not to stand again for his position on the University of NSW council.
Yesterday the university announced it was abandoning the university's Asia operation in Singapore after losing millions of dollars on the venture.
Fewer than 150 students had enrolled in the offshore campus this year, far short of plans to have it expand to 15,000 students over the next two decades.
It is the latest hitch in the Australian university sector's troubled attempts to exploit the lucrative international student market by setting up offshore campuses. Several Australian universities have closed their operations in recent years, while Monash University's South African campus is said to be losing as much as $6 million a year.
But members of the University of NSW's governing body had warned the university as early as 2004 the project needed further research and its financial estimates did not stand up to scrutiny.
Jeremy Davis, a former dean of the Australian Graduate School of Management, said his own cost analysis of the venture concluded the administration had "wildly underestimated" how expensive it would be.
His chief concern was that the university would not be able to make enough money from student fees alone to conduct research, without support from a body such as the Australian Research Council. "One of the great concerns was that having entered that enterprise the university would then subsidise it by the back door - funds that should be used on the Australian campus."
Peter Primrose, a Labor member of the NSW upper house, said the version of the document he had been asked to consider as a councillor did not even contain the latest figures.
"The finances just didn't seem to make sense to me," said Mr Primrose, who decided not to stand again for the council after the event. "I just didn't want to be part of a cowboy outfit."
John Carmody, a former academic representative on the board, said members of the governing body were given 30 seconds to consider the proposal before they were expected to vote on it. "This is how seriously the university wanted their plans for Singapore to be considered."
A spokeswoman for the University of NSW, Judy Brookman, said it was not interested in events of the past. "We're trying to deal with the situation now."
The vice-chancellor, Fred Hilmer, said the university's Asian collapse would cost tens of millions of dollars by the time redundancies had been paid, but it was too early to judge how much because the university still hoped to find a buyer for it.
Students will be offered places at the university's main campus, and given subsidised air travel to Sydney and housing.
While most staff will be made redundant, some will be offered jobs in Sydney.
Friday, May 25, 2007
Monday, May 21, 2007
JBJ To Form New Political Party
I remember the man who stood outside, straining his vocal chords to alert the other Singaporeans walking by Centerpoint. He was trying to wake them zombies. Zombies who have been so used to their routine, so unaware, so oblivious to what PAP has done to them.
Singapore's veteran opposition politician J.B. Jeyaretnam said on Sunday he plans to form a new political party to push for reform of the city-state's authoritarian political system.
Jeyaretnam, who led the opposition Workers' Party until 2001, was discharged from bankruptcy earlier this month after paying off damages in defamation suits brought by government leaders.
He was declared bankrupt in 2001 after failing to pay S$265,000 ($173,900) in defamation damages to plaintiffs that included then Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong and then Foreign Affairs Minister S. Jayakumar.
Jeyaretnam told a press briefing that he and a handful of supporters had begun work to register the new party and would try to attract support from Singaporeans eager for political reform.
"(This is) a party which will have as its main objective a complete and thorough change in the way this country is run -- no tinkering," Jeyaretnam, 81, said.
"Reform will be the main plank -- reform the system of government, all sectors of society," he said, adding that the group could be named 'The Reform Party'.
Jeyaretnam, who had to have reporters' questions repeated to him because of his poor hearing, said the new party would seek to contest in the next general poll, scheduled in 2011.
"I don't see why not -- unless the government moves against me again. I would like to be there," he said.
Singapore's veteran opposition politician J.B. Jeyaretnam said on Sunday he plans to form a new political party to push for reform of the city-state's authoritarian political system.
Jeyaretnam, who led the opposition Workers' Party until 2001, was discharged from bankruptcy earlier this month after paying off damages in defamation suits brought by government leaders.
He was declared bankrupt in 2001 after failing to pay S$265,000 ($173,900) in defamation damages to plaintiffs that included then Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong and then Foreign Affairs Minister S. Jayakumar.
Jeyaretnam told a press briefing that he and a handful of supporters had begun work to register the new party and would try to attract support from Singaporeans eager for political reform.
"(This is) a party which will have as its main objective a complete and thorough change in the way this country is run -- no tinkering," Jeyaretnam, 81, said.
"Reform will be the main plank -- reform the system of government, all sectors of society," he said, adding that the group could be named 'The Reform Party'.
Jeyaretnam, who had to have reporters' questions repeated to him because of his poor hearing, said the new party would seek to contest in the next general poll, scheduled in 2011.
"I don't see why not -- unless the government moves against me again. I would like to be there," he said.
Technorati Tags: JBJ, PoliticalParty, Politics and Singapore.
Friday, May 18, 2007
Champs Chumps Chimps
Friday May 11, 4:17 PM
Law Society on 'champs, chumps and chimps'
SINGAPORE: The recent debate over ministerial pay has left Law Society president Philip Jeyaretnam somewhat concerned whether private sector professionals, especially lawyers, will start viewing "national service" with disdain.He’s not talking about the military kind, but the various unpaid posts that people take on for a public cause.
“Given the materialist spirit of the times, people urged to do their part by way of such ‘national service’ will be forgiven if they sometimes wonder whether they are being taken for chumps,” he wrote in his president’s message for the May edition of his society’s publication, the Law Gazette.
The principle of benchmarking ministers’ pay to what they would otherwise have earned in the public sector may be realistic and assists transparency by disassociating political office with hidden perks.
“But, it can hardly be doubted that one effect of the emphasis on money is to undercut volunteerism and the spirit of public service,” wrote Mr Jeyaretnam, who serves on three statutory boards.
Sharp words indeed from a man who once told this newspaper that he would “speak truth to power”.
In 1986, a certain Francis Seow — Law Society president then, Opposition figure in exile now — publicly opposed the Government on laws curbing foreign publications, a move which led to legislation limiting the Law Society’s ambit to comment.
However, as Mr Jeyaretnam told TODAY, his message “was very much for lawyers to reflect on and was not intended for the general public”.
He established how the ministerial pay issue has a bearing on the profession in his message, Of Champs, Chumps and Chimps, which can be found on the society’s website.
“The public is told that top lawyers earn astronomical amounts. And that top engineers to the image and standing of the two professions?
For sure, the law faculties at (the local universities) will be even more oversubscribed than they are at present,” he wrote. “It is unfortunate that the public may be getting a rather skewed idea of the two professions - there is much less of a gap once one looks below the rung of top earners.”
Given the hype generated, clients would be left wondering “how to square lawyers’ complaints about the very real squeeze on legal fees with the apparent exuberance of top lawyers’ pay”.
He added: “Will they understand that the headline numbers don’t tell the whole story?”
The only way to redress the “misleading glimpse of what it really means to be a lawyer (or doctor or accountant or engineer)”, he said, would be for the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore to reveal the average income levels at different stages of a legal, medical, accounting and engineering career.
Lawyer Gopalan Raman applauded Mr Jeyaretnam for “walking the tightrope” between two groups in the profession: “The big-time lawyers who work for corporate clients that can be money machines … the group that harkens after money, and smaller firms doddering between survival and failure.
“Philip has treated the latter kindly because he’s saying money isn’t the be all and end all.”
Lawyer Peter Cuthbert Low, who was Law Society president when a salary benchmark for ministers was first established in 1994, shared Mr Jeyaretnam’s concerns.
“I don’t want the kind of lawyers who come out of law school thinking: ‘Now, I want to make money’,” said Mr Low. “We have a long, proud tradition of public spiritedness.”
In his message, Mr Jeyaretnam also shared a lesson he learnt during an overseas trip.
“When I was in India last year, I asked the daughter of a former Supreme Court Judge whether there was any difficulty posed by the gap that exists there between judicial salaries and private sector salaries.
“She looked at me as if I was mad, and patiently, as if to a small child, explained the tremendous respect in which she and her family had been held.
“As far as she knew, no one turned down a higher court appointment, as the opportunity to make and interpret law authoritatively was of incalculable reward for anyone who loved the law.”
Law Society on 'champs, chumps and chimps'
SINGAPORE: The recent debate over ministerial pay has left Law Society president Philip Jeyaretnam somewhat concerned whether private sector professionals, especially lawyers, will start viewing "national service" with disdain.He’s not talking about the military kind, but the various unpaid posts that people take on for a public cause.
“Given the materialist spirit of the times, people urged to do their part by way of such ‘national service’ will be forgiven if they sometimes wonder whether they are being taken for chumps,” he wrote in his president’s message for the May edition of his society’s publication, the Law Gazette.
The principle of benchmarking ministers’ pay to what they would otherwise have earned in the public sector may be realistic and assists transparency by disassociating political office with hidden perks.
“But, it can hardly be doubted that one effect of the emphasis on money is to undercut volunteerism and the spirit of public service,” wrote Mr Jeyaretnam, who serves on three statutory boards.
Sharp words indeed from a man who once told this newspaper that he would “speak truth to power”.
In 1986, a certain Francis Seow — Law Society president then, Opposition figure in exile now — publicly opposed the Government on laws curbing foreign publications, a move which led to legislation limiting the Law Society’s ambit to comment.
However, as Mr Jeyaretnam told TODAY, his message “was very much for lawyers to reflect on and was not intended for the general public”.
He established how the ministerial pay issue has a bearing on the profession in his message, Of Champs, Chumps and Chimps, which can be found on the society’s website.
“The public is told that top lawyers earn astronomical amounts. And that top engineers to the image and standing of the two professions?
For sure, the law faculties at (the local universities) will be even more oversubscribed than they are at present,” he wrote. “It is unfortunate that the public may be getting a rather skewed idea of the two professions - there is much less of a gap once one looks below the rung of top earners.”
Given the hype generated, clients would be left wondering “how to square lawyers’ complaints about the very real squeeze on legal fees with the apparent exuberance of top lawyers’ pay”.
He added: “Will they understand that the headline numbers don’t tell the whole story?”
The only way to redress the “misleading glimpse of what it really means to be a lawyer (or doctor or accountant or engineer)”, he said, would be for the Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore to reveal the average income levels at different stages of a legal, medical, accounting and engineering career.
Lawyer Gopalan Raman applauded Mr Jeyaretnam for “walking the tightrope” between two groups in the profession: “The big-time lawyers who work for corporate clients that can be money machines … the group that harkens after money, and smaller firms doddering between survival and failure.
“Philip has treated the latter kindly because he’s saying money isn’t the be all and end all.”
Lawyer Peter Cuthbert Low, who was Law Society president when a salary benchmark for ministers was first established in 1994, shared Mr Jeyaretnam’s concerns.
“I don’t want the kind of lawyers who come out of law school thinking: ‘Now, I want to make money’,” said Mr Low. “We have a long, proud tradition of public spiritedness.”
In his message, Mr Jeyaretnam also shared a lesson he learnt during an overseas trip.
“When I was in India last year, I asked the daughter of a former Supreme Court Judge whether there was any difficulty posed by the gap that exists there between judicial salaries and private sector salaries.
“She looked at me as if I was mad, and patiently, as if to a small child, explained the tremendous respect in which she and her family had been held.
“As far as she knew, no one turned down a higher court appointment, as the opportunity to make and interpret law authoritatively was of incalculable reward for anyone who loved the law.”
Technorati Tags: MinisterialPay and Singapore.
Tuesday, May 1, 2007
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