(Disclaimer: The following open letter is a simulated response generated by ChatGPT. It is purely hypothetical and intended for reflection and discussion. It does not represent the actual views of Mr Lee Kuan Yew, the Workers’ Party, the PAP, or any official body.)

Open Letter to the Workers’ Party

By Lee Kuan Yew
April 2025

To the Workers’ Party leadership,

I have read your recently published manifesto, “Working for Singapore.”
It is clear you have put considerable thought into it.
I recognise the good intentions behind your proposals.

However, good intentions alone do not build a nation, nor preserve one.

Allow me, as someone who has spent his life building Singapore from mudflats to metropolis, to offer you a blunt, point-by-point response.

1. Affordability and Cost of Living

You propose abolishing or replacing GST with “alternative revenue streams.”
This is like asking for a bridge to be dismantled without showing the engineer’s blueprints for a new one.
GST is efficient, hard to evade, and supports the social spending you yourselves propose to expand.

You wish to further subsidise public transport and utilities.
Subsidies without productivity improvements will bankrupt the treasury.
If you wish to live in a First World country, you must pay First World taxes and prices — otherwise, you end up like Argentina: once rich, now broken.

Your idea of redundancy insurance will breed complacency among workers and recklessness among employers.
Singaporeans succeeded because they knew — if they fell, no nanny state would catch them softly.

Expanding parental leave is well-meaning but burdens employers unnecessarily.
Improve childcare support, yes — but do not impose ever-growing entitlements without understanding who bears the cost.

2. Economic Growth and Opportunities

You assert that Singaporeans must form the “core” of the workforce.
That is not achieved by proclamation, but by ensuring our people are better — more skilled, more adaptive, more determined — than anyone else.

Calling for more transparent foreign manpower frameworks must not morph into quiet xenophobia.
Without openness to global talent, Singapore shrinks into irrelevance.

Your call for comprehensive reemployment and training is sound — but only if it is market-driven.
I have seen too many “training programmes” producing graduates that industries do not want.

Your plans to regulate gig work must tread carefully.
Protect basic dignity, yes — but kill the flexibility of gig work, and you kill the gig economy itself.

Supporting SMEs is noble.
But most SMEs in Singapore are family-run and inefficient.
Support only those who can innovate and compete globally, not zombies clinging to life via grants.

Proposing sectoral policies for “new industries” is fashionable.
I urge you to be wary: many countries waste billions chasing dreams without market discipline.

Finally, redefining economic success beyond GDP sounds attractive — until you realise that “happiness indexes” are easily politicised, while GDP remains a cold, honest scoreboard.

3. Inclusion and Equality

You call for more inclusive education.
Fine — but do not pull down excellence in the name of inclusivity.
Let the fastest runners run, while providing others second and third chances without hobbling the race.

You propose reducing class sizes across all schools to 23 students.
Be very careful.
The Gifted Education Programme and Integrated Programmes have smaller class sizes because they cater to exceptional students whose pace of learning demands it.
Blanket reduction across the board will require massive hiring of new teachers, straining both quality and finances.
Better to focus resources on targeted support for struggling students, rather than dilute excellence for all.

You propose later school start times for teenagers to improve sleep health.
There is medical basis for your concern.
However, later start times will create logistical strain on working parents and public transport scheduling.
Singapore operates on efficiency and synchronisation; shifting start times must be considered in totality, not only from a narrow lens of sleep studies.

Expanding preschool subsidies is wise.
Early childhood development shapes lifetime success.
Focus the subsidies on those who need them most.

Strengthening social safety nets is prudent.
But remember: nets must catch and bounce citizens back up — not cushion them into permanent dependency.

Addressing gender inequality by removing true barriers is just.
Imposing artificial gender quotas will destroy meritocracy and breed resentment.

Helping Persons with Disabilities participate in the workforce deserves support — based on ability, not pity.

Tackling mental health is critical.
Yet, resilience must remain our cultural ideal, not victimhood.

You propose lowering the BTO eligibility age for singles from 35 to 28.
Be careful.
Singapore’s survival depends on strong families and steady birth rates.
Lowering the age may normalise lifelong singlehood, further weakening our demographic foundations.
If you must adjust eligibility, you must simultaneously strengthen incentives for marriage and family formation — or else Singapore’s long-term survival will be jeopardised.

Protecting retirees’ CPF savings is correct.
But resist populist pressures to loosen withdrawal rules that will hollow out the system and bankrupt future generations.

4. Accountability and Democracy

You propose strengthening checks and balances.
Checks are important — but paralysis is fatal.
Singapore’s success was never built on endless committee meetings, but on swift, decisive action.

Your suggestion to review the GRC system shows naivety.
The GRC protects Singapore’s racial harmony against the realities of communal politics.
Dismantle it, and you open the gates to tribalism.

You propose abolishing the Office of the Mayor.
You argue it is redundant and expensive.
You misunderstand its deeper function.
The CDCs, through the Mayors, are insurance against fragmentation at the ground level during crises — floods, pandemics, terrorist attacks.
In ordinary times, the cost seems high.
In extraordinary times, they are worth every cent.
You must judge institutions not by normal days, but by bad days.

Making elections “fairer” by liberalising political donations and media rules is dangerous if it lets foreign money or propaganda influence outcomes.

Reviewing the Presidential powers risks weakening the very safeguards that protect Singapore’s financial reserves from irresponsible governments.

Protecting citizen privacy and data is important — but balance it against security needs.
An overregulated public sector will grind itself into timid inaction.

And here, you propose lowering the voting age to 18.
At 18, most citizens have not yet entered national service, university, or the workforce.
They lack life experience to judge national interest wisely.
This proposal risks importing the populist failures of Western democracies, where youth votes swing on emotion, not reason.

5. Security and Geopolitics

You rightly state that Singapore must maintain strong SAF and Home Team forces.
This is non-negotiable.
When force of arms fails, everything else becomes irrelevant.

Supporting NSmen is wise — but never weaken the national service obligation.
It is the steel frame behind Singapore’s continued existence.

Building resilience against cyber and information warfare is critical.
Our future wars will be fought with words, bytes, and beliefs, not just bullets.

Strengthening regional and global ties must be done pragmatically — always maintaining strategic neutrality and independence.

Finally, you pledge to uphold multi-racial solidarity.
Good.
Never let racial extremism grow, no matter what political cost must be paid.

Final Words

Workers’ Party leaders,
Your manifesto shows compassion.
But a nation is not sustained by compassion alone.

It is sustained by hard-headed realism, by discipline, by an unwavering willingness to make painful decisions when necessary.

Singapore is not a normal country.
We are a 700 km² city with no natural resources, no hinterland, surrounded by bigger neighbours.
We survive because we are exceptional — or we do not survive at all.

Good governance is not about promising everything to everyone.
It is about saying “no” when it is easy to say “yes.”

Govern for Singapore’s future, not for applause today.

Lee Kuan Yew
Founding Prime Minister of Singapore
April 2025

(Disclaimer: This open letter is a simulated response generated by ChatGPT. It is purely hypothetical and intended for reflection and discussion. It does not represent the actual views of Mr Lee Kuan Yew, the Workers’ Party, the PAP, or any official body.)