Yours Toothfully by Dr Chan Joon Yee

I was dozing off while watching the news last night. I wasn’t paying much attention to stories being reported but vaguely, I heard somebody say: “We need immigrants to make up for the children we are not having. That’s a very hard fact of life. Between age 25 and 40, more than 30 per cent are unmarried – that means single and childless.

“Without immigration, the ageing problem will be too heavy a burden for the young.”

Straight after that sentence, I dozed off completely. I was in dreamland, or more precisely, on a dream island, sitting on a beach chair, sipping my favourite Gentleman Jack from Duty Free Shop (the one in Singapore and not in Bangkok, of course). A couple of Balinese ladies were fanning me, one from the front and one from the back as one Thai lady massaged my shoulders while the other massaged my feet. The third Thai lady held that glass of Gentleman Jack to my lips.

How about that for retirement? And who is paying for all this? All our young, virile and hardworking immigrants! Yes, these folks who are making up for the children we’re not having. These folks without whom we can never do because without immigration, the ageing problem will be too heavy a burden for the young. My own 2 kids would never be able to afford the 2 Balinese ladies, let alone the 3 Thai ladies and the Gentleman Jack.

How wonderful it would be if we can import lots of young, virile individuals who are willing to work their asses off to keep my Gentleman Jack flowing.

Then, I jolted. The third Thai lady turned out to be my wife and the other other ladies all disappeared. No beach. No massage. No fanning. Just a grumpy wife throwing a stack of bills in front of me. Outside my office at Lucky Plaza, the remittance offices were seeing long queues of young and virile foreigners, sending money back to their real homes.

More on dozing off and dreaming after I watch the National Day Rally.

Somehow, I expected this. To others, it may be shocking. The numbers are out. The “arrest rate” amongst foreign workers is lower than that amongst residents in Singapore.

The Minstry of Home Affairs tells us that “the arrest rate for foreigners was 286, much lower than that for Singapore residents, which came to 435.”

Wait a minute. They said “arrest rate” and not crime rate. Now going by my non-expert understanding, “arrest rate” is not equal to crime rate. And going by common sense alone, if no arrests were made for a certain unsolved crime, there would be no sure way of telling whether the crime was committed by a Singaporean or a foreigner.

If I row into Singapore on a sampan, blow up the Merlion at Sentosa and then somehow manage to row back to Indonesia after getting some tips from Mas Selamat, I would contribute to the crime rate and not the arrest rate.

In order for arrest rate to be a meaningful reflection of the propensity to commit crimes, we must make the following assumptions:
1. Singaporean offenders are as good at evading arrest as foreign workers.
2. A negligible number of unsolved crimes are attributable to foreigners.
3. There are very few unsolved crimes.
4. The nature of crimes committed by Singaporeans and foreign workers is the same.

Take the common scenario of a family that employs a maid. Valuable items go missing. They search the maid’s bags. Nothing found. A crime has been committed, but no arrest can be made as there is no evidence against the foreigner. It’s only after the maid has left that the family finds out that she had hidden the stolen items in the bathroom and lowered them to her waiting accomplice downstairs through a window without grilles. If Singaporeans were a more cohesive, cooperative bunch, maybe our arrest rate can go down a bit.

Let’s look at a few other scenarios from my own personal observations. Someone breaks into a pharmacy, cracks the safe, sweep up the controlled drugs and disappears without a trace. No arrest. Foreigner or local? Someone smashes a car and steals the briefcase. No arrest. Foreigner or local? Someone walks into a clinic, snatches the lady doctor’s handbag and disappears. No arrest. Foreigner or local? Pools of urine on the stairway of a shopping centre. No arrest. Foreigner or local? Hordes of women prostitute themselves illegally at Geylang and Joo Chiat then disappear. No arrests. Foreigner or local?

Whether crime pays or not depends on whether the culprit is caught. If you’re a law-breaking local who hadn’t read “Took Leng How’s Secret Escape Manual” or Mas Selamat’s “Selamat Jalan Manual”, you’re basically a sitting duck waiting to be added to the numbers which prove that foreigners are better behaved than Singaporeans. Reminds me of the poor boy who stole candy but couldn’t run fast enough to avoid a spanking. The arrest rate for fat candy thieves must be very high. Beware of fat people. They steal candy - or at least that’s the Ministry of Home Affairs’ logic.