Mr Deputy Speaker,
The government’s move to tighten enforcement and penalties for traffic offences under today’s Bill is welcome. These are urgent and life-saving legislative moves. As MHA itself noted, the road safety situation is worsening significantly, with the traffic fatality rate increasing 24% between 2021 and 2025, while traffic violations rose by about 38%. I also noted that generally, the Singapore situation is also worse than some other comparable cities, with our traffic fatality rate in 2025 at 2.44 per 100,000 population. This is more than 150% higher than in Tokyo, and almost double Hong Kong’s. Road-related deaths are a leading non-health-related cause of death in Singapore.
Perhaps it would also help to start avoiding using the word “accidents”, which may in a way imply inevitability and helplessness, weaken accountability, and also reduce needed attention to root causes, which ultimately can be tackled through public policy and infrastructure design.
Broadly speaking, the tools added or amended before this House operate to tackle road traffic incidents via four mechanisms:
First, boosting certainty, that is, the chance of getting caught.
Two, severity of consequences.
Three, removing the ability to offend.
Four, norm-signalling.
Each of these areas have room for improvement or greater clarity both in the legislation and in the public policy being effected on the ground.
First, on enforcement certainty. Clause 10 changes section 65B from an offence requiring both the holding and operation of a mobile communication device to an offence based on holding the device while the vehicle is in motion. This should make the offence more straightforward to enforce.
However, the clause also makes clear that merely touching a phone secured in a properly affixed holder does not amount to holding it. Repeating the call by my colleague Dennis Tan, could the Minister clarify how the law will address drivers who interact extensively with a mounted phone or even system. This could include typing messages, scrolling through social media, watching videos or taking video calls. What rules will apply where the same activities are carried out through an in-vehicle display, including through systems such as Apple CarPlay? At what point will such conduct be enforced as careless or dangerous driving under sections 65 or 64?
The other point on enforcement relates to enforcement cameras. While the Bill touches on cameras, my question relates to a broader point. Enforcement camera locations these days are publicly disclosed and flagged out in bright colours, as it was noted that this is important for deterrence. Yet in 2024, the Traffic Police released statistics that showed that motorists would speed where there are no cameras. In other words, they may slow down to ensure they are not caught, and then go back to speeding again after they have cleared the stretch. Given that vehicle velocity is the most important determinant of crash deaths, I am concerned that this behaviour not only fails to reduce speeding or dangerous driving. It may instead cause drivers to drive more dangerously when they believe there is no chance of being caught. In this regard, what is the evidence that the current format of disclosed camera and ad-hoc Traffic Police enforcement is sufficient to tackle excessive speeds and dangerous driving?
Next, on deterrence and proportionality. Clause 7 raises the imprisonment ceilings for reckless or dangerous driving causing grievous hurt under section 64, including for repeat, serious and serious repeat offenders. It does not raise the corresponding fines. Clause 8 likewise raises certain additional imprisonment ceilings for serious and serious repeat offenders convicted of careless driving causing grievous hurt, while leaving the existing fines unchanged.
Could the Minister explain what evidence and methodology used to assess whether the Act’s statutory dollar-denominated fine limits remain sufficiently deterrent for motorists of very different means? Does MHA examine sentencing outcomes, repeat offending and the relative burden of fines across offenders’ financial circumstances?
While penalties like jail terms and suspensions ultimately remove the ability to re-offend, a crime-punishment model alone is not enough. We need to bring down offending in the first place by rethinking our road infrastructure. Some positive steps have been taken recently with initiatives to calm traffic, improve pedestrian use and access. Local data backs this up: the Silver Road Scheme was found to have resulted in the reduction of incidents involving elderly pedestrians by 80%.
It is worth reiterating that alongside intelligent design with direct input from behavioural science, traffic calming results in lower speed limits. And lower speed limits result in lower casualties: a pedestrian hit by vehicle travelling at 50km/h has a 40% chance of dying, compared with 13% when the vehicle is travelling at 30km/h. Recent meta-analysis studies from different cities show that a 30km/h speed limit in urban areas causes an average 40% reduction in crashes, fatalities and injuries, with added benefits in improving active mobility and health. A 30km/h speed limit may also not need to mean longer travel times, if we design our roads to improve traffic flow by reducing stopping times, allowing closer spacing, and making lane-merging easier.
In this regard, while we already have the GLIDE system determining our traffic light junctions, could we not upgrade this further to improve safety? In order to do so, we also need to pay attention to the end-user experience: that is, to ensure that traffic light timings do not end up making motorists even more impatient and likely to speed.
A recent MIT Mobility Initiative study noted that adjusting traffic signals so that only drivers obeying the speed limits will come across green lights was, I quote ‘99% effective’, to reliably induce speed reductions, and was such that most drivers do not even notice them. Can the Minister clarify if or how our traffic lights control system takes similar measures into account.
Other traffic calming measures, especially for new roads, should also be rolled out quicker, and there should be better centralisation of efforts with input from road users and experts. This would also provide more learning points from where existing roads and silver zones can and should be improved.
During our regular Sengkang Town Hall a couple of years back, residents shared their candid views and thoughts about already worsening road safety standards, increased congestion. What became clear to many of us then, was the sense that relief and deterrence measures were important, but only a part of the puzzle. We wanted to know why motorists were acting the way they did, that is, to get to the root cause of the problem. Why are we speeding more and driving more recklessly? What is the impact on road safety of increased stress, population density and crowding on the way we drive, react and act on our roads? Are there studies looking into this, what does the data show, and how do we tackle these root causes of poor road safety beyond throwing more people in jail or impounding vehicles and revoking licenses?
Lastly, on new norms. The reduced alcohol limits introduced by Clause 19 signal new norms in another way to change the culture of driving in Singapore. The new limits are that permissible alcohol levels are equivalent to 1,5 standard drinks for men and 1 standard drink for women, consumed within three hours of driving. My Workers’ Party colleague Andre Low will speak more on this, but hopefully this is a start to shift the needle away from the attitude that a motorist can drink they can “handle their alcohol”.
Another new norm we need to move towards, is a policy call that introduces a Vision Zero movement for our road safety. This takes a leaf from global aviation industry efforts to eliminate fatalities from incidents, and akin to what we are aiming to do for workplace health and safety.
Sweden, Norway and Finland work on efforts across policymakers, enforcement agencies and all sectors of society to find and implement ways to virtually eliminate all traffic fatalities, buttressed by the ultimate belief that loss of life on roads is both preventable and unacceptable. This is not an easy task, especially as individual failings account for many deaths, but we must work continuously to ensure that our roads and their design keep up with innovation and technology for vehicles, and to more holistically regulate and encourage road safety. After all, Helsinki achieved a full year without road deaths across 2024 and 2025 through lower speed limits, safer street designs, strong enforcement and improved pedestrian infrastructure. It is time for us to set our own north star in our own attempt to do so.
Thank you.
