The Minister of Finance and Deputy Prime Minister, Lawrence Wong, delivered his 2023 Budget speech in parliament on 14 February and announced several one-off support measures under the Assurance Package (AP).
Snippets from MOF’s press release
The enhanced Assurance Package (AP) and the enhanced permanent GST Voucher (GSTV) scheme aim to help Singaporeans tide through this period of higher inflation and cushion the impact of the GST rate increases.
(A) Enhancements to the Permanent GSTV Scheme
GSTV – Cash
The enhanced permanent GSTV scheme will continue to provide help for lower- to middle-income Singaporean households to defray GST expenses, beyond the transitional support covered by the AP.
At Budget 2022, the permanent GSTV scheme was enhanced by (i) raising the Assessable Income (AI) threshold from $28,000 to $34,000, (ii) increasing the GSTV – Cash quantum by up to $200, and (iii) making the Service and Conservancy Charges (S&CC) Rebate a component of the permanent GSTV scheme.
The GSTV – Cash quantum will be further increased, by up to $350. This increase will be implemented over 2023 and 2024.
a) Those residing in homes with an Annual Value (AV) of $13,000 and below will receive
$200 more in 2023, followed by an additional $150 from 2024 onwards.
b) Those residing in homes with an AV above $13,000 and up to $21,000 will receive $100
more in 2023, followed by an additional $100 from 2024 onwards.
Refer to Table 1 for the scheme details.
The enhanced GSTV – Cash will benefit about 1.5 million adult Singaporeans in August every year.
(C) Enhancements to the Assurance Package
At Budget 2022, the Government enhanced the AP from $6.0 billion to $6.6 billion to cushion the impact of the planned GST increases for all Singaporeans.
As announced at Budget 2023, the Government will further enhance the AP from $6.6 billion to $9.6 billion, to account for higher inflation, as well as provide additional one-off support to Singaporeans in 2023 to address immediate cost-of-living (COL) concerns.
All eligible adult Singaporeans (i) aged 21 years and above (ii) with AI of not more than $100,000 and (iii) who do not own more than one property will receive additional AP Cash of between $300 and $650 over the remaining years of the AP, in December every year. This will bring the total AP Cash payments received by adult Singaporeans to between $700 and $2,250 over five years. Refer to Table 5 for details.
AP Cash will benefit about 2.9 million adult Singaporeans.
2023 COL Special Payment
All eligible adult Singaporean citizens (i) who are aged 21 years and above in 2023, (ii) with AI of not more than $100,000, and (iii) who do not own more than one property, will receive one-off cash between $200 and $400 in June 2023. Refer to Table 7 for the scheme details.
The COL Special Payment will benefit about 2.5 million adult Singaporeans.
Lawrence Wong’s Facebook post
In #SGBudget2023, I announced comprehensive measures to help Singaporeans tide through the immediate cost of living pressures. We are also taking decisive steps to secure our future in a more uncertain and troubled world.
We are pursuing new strategies in several key areas through the #ForwardSG exercise, which will be completed in the second half of this year. But in this Budget, we are making several significant moves, including:
- Assurance Package top-up to $9.6 billion to help with cost of living
- More support for first-timer families to get a BTO or resale flat
- More help for parents to raise your children
- Equipping workers to find good jobs and developing our local enterprises
- More support for the lower-income and vulnerable communities
- Building up our resilience to future shocks, including climate change and future crises
The road ahead will not be easy. But we have braved many hardships before as a country, and always emerged stronger. So long as we stand as one people and keep alive the #SingaporeSpirit, we can move forward together with confidence!
Check out my speech here: https://www.mof.gov.sg/singapor…/budget-2023/budget-speech.