Speaking during his annual May Day rally at D’Marquee, Downtown East; Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong addressed the leadership renewal of Singapore and Lawrence Wong taking up the leadership of the 4G team.

Here is what he said

Tripartism is the result of our long history of collaborative trade unionism, and the deep bonds of trust that we have forged through successive crises. Tripartism must always be a stabilising and anchoring force for Singapore. We must continually reaffirm the bonds, and sustain them from one generation to the next.

Leadership renewal is crucial to this. At the national level, in the political leadership, our succession preparations recently took a major step forward. This issue has been on my mind ever since my timeline for succession was disrupted by the virus.

Last year, after DPM Heng Swee Keat decided to step aside, the 4G team asked me for more time to reach a consensus on the matter. I said, “don’t take too long”. Once the COVID-19 situation started coming under control, I resumed the process.

I asked Mr Khaw Boon Wan to help facilitate it, and I am very happy and relieved that the process has been successful. As you know, Brother Lawrence Wong emerged as the overwhelming consensus choice, and has been unanimously endorsed by all his Cabinet colleagues and then by all the PAP MPs as the leader of the 4G team.

I congratulated Brother Lawrence, I told him you will be in the hot seat. He is taking on a very heavy responsibility. He will have to lead Singapore in a very different and uncertain world.

He will need the full support of his Cabinet colleagues, and also must be able to rely on all our brothers and sisters to work with him and his team, and to continue partnering them to take Singapore forward.

Brothers and Sisters, this is your team, I ask you to give Brother Lawrence Wong and his team your fullest support.

Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong spoke during his annual May Day rally earlier today at D’Marquee @ Downtown East.

Among the points that he addressed, he said that the government is doing all it can to cushion the impact of rising food prices on Singaporeans and alleviate the cost of living pressures.

Here is (a snippet) of what he said during his speech

The Government is doing all it can to cushion the impact on Singaporeans and alleviate the cost-of-living pressures. This year’s Budget included the Household Support Package which contained many direct measures to help households.

There are U-Save rebates, there are CDC vouchers, there are S&CC rebates; these will reduce the out-of-pocket expenses for nearly all households. Lower- and middle-income households, who need more help, will get more.

MAS has tightened our monetary policy to reduce imported inflation. That is why the Singapore dollar has appreciated, and that is why when you go overseas for weekend shopping trips, you find that it is attractive because the Singapore dollar has gone up.

Fairprice is also making special efforts, I see they are having eggs at a discount so as to make a difference to the cost of living. And we are taking steps to secure our food and energy supplies, just in case the supplies are disrupted by the ongoing war.

All this will help, but we must be prepared for more economic challenges in the year ahead. Inflation will remain high. Central banks in the developed countries are tightening their monetary policies, raising interest rates. Global growth will be weaker, and there may be a recession within the next two years.

We have to face up to these realities. Singapore is tightly integrated into the global economy. Given our small size, in world markets, we are always a price taker, we have very little bargaining power. If the prices go up, our prices go up; if supplies are short, we are squeezed. We cannot avoid these global headwinds.

Take energy for example. We import nearly all the energy we use, except for the solar electricity that we generate ourselves. HDB rooftops and other buildings, but that is maybe 5% of our electricity consumption at most. When oil prices were around US$50 per barrel, every year our annual imports of crude oil and natural gas cost us about S$30 bn.

When the oil prices doubled to US$100 per barrel, which they have done since the beginning of last year, we have to pay double too – which means we all have to pay an extra S$30 bn a year for our crude oil and gas. We can recover part of this because some of it is transformed, we refine the oil, we make petrochemicals, we sell it overseas, and we charge more. But the rest we consume, we turn on the lights, we turn on the air conditioner, we drive our cares, we have to bear that cost –Singapore households, businesses, and the government.

How much is that part which we have to swallow? MTI’s estimate is our hit is about S$8 bn a year. That is 1.5% of our GDP. That means that in Singapore, we have become collectively S$8 bn poorer off every year. There is no escape from this.

In the short term, government support schemes will help to share the burden fairly, and ease the hardship on households but in the long term, this does not really solve the problem. We can share the burden, but the burden is still upon us.

We must address the fundamental issue: which is that higher energy and food prices have made us collectively worse off. And the fundamental solution to this is to make ourselves more productive, to transform our businesses, to grow our economy, to uplift everyone. Then our incomes can go up, and that can more than make up for higher prices of energy and food. Then we can all become better off, in real terms.

There are limits to what Singapore can do to influence broader international trends. We will push back against deglobalisation, we will speak up to encourage the US and China to constructively engage each other. But ultimately all these matters depend on the major powers themselves, and the relations between them, and how the war in Ukraine unfolds. We have speaking rights, but we are a small voice. Singapore has to take the world as it is, and develop a strategy that works for us in this troubled environment. Bigger countries can turn inwards, they can rely more heavily on their domestic markets, and produce more things onshore.

The Chinese talk about double circulation (双循环) – circulation within their country, circulation doing business overseas. We only have the overseas part, but they can do it because it will cost them economically, but it is a viable strategy for them. However, that is not a choice open to Singapore.

Our strategy can only be one – and that is to stay open, to make our economy stronger, more resilient, and to keep on seizing opportunities for growth, developing new capabilities and becoming a more competitive economy. Because if we do that, then despite the uncertain climate, despite the pressures against globalisation, investors will still find it worthwhile to put their projects in Singapore, our exports will still find foreign markets, and we can still earn a living for ourselves in the world.

But economic success alone is not enough. Our growth must be matched by social and political cohesion. There is war in Europe, there are major troubles in the world, and great power rivalry in our region. Facing all these external troubles, if Singaporeans are not strong and united, if we allow ourselves to be split and divided, we will be done for.