Chapter 19 Chapter 19 Forming a New Government

On the evening of June 3, the mass meeting was held in front of the town hall building... I gave a serious, almost melancholy speech, which I did not feel proud of, not at all.I began to see the seriousness of the problem that had to be faced - unemployment.People are eagerly expecting quick results, the Communist Party is ready to move, more subversive activities in trade unions, schools and associations, more strikes, less investment, more unemployment, more embarrassment. Boai sent me a congratulatory message and said: "For more than two years, our negotiations have been conducted in the spirit of understanding and mutual trust. I should let you know that I still stand by what I have said in the past, that is, I am determined to use the same The spirit of dealing with the future between us. This alone will make the new constitution possible. In the same spirit, I will do everything within my power to make the new constitution a success."

In my reply, I said: "The voyage that the self-governing state of Singapore is embarking on now is very risky and few people know it. How successful we will be in the next five years will depend on how well planned, how hard we work, and the joint How well the Crown understands what is going on and why is it depends also on the gods; and on this small island of 220 square miles, there are several different gods. The first factor depends on us; the second depends on For Your Excellency, the third I leave to the people of Singapore to pray for themselves, and let the gods bless us."

Then came a fourth factor - the attitude of the neighbors to the north.The first to publicly congratulate me was the Prime Minister of Malaya."The people of Singapore have made a clear choice and I congratulate the PAP for winning such a large majority," he told the press. But that was not the Tunku, it was Tun Razak.The Tunku is on vacation, and Tun Razak is acting temporarily.The Tunku was less tactful: "Their victory was expected. Other parties were split and could not organize a strong opposition against the PAP. My friend Lim Yew Hock won, I am happy, at least he is one A strong opposition. On the other hand, if the party is to be effective, it must reunite even outside the Legislative Chamber, otherwise the situation will remain unchanged."

On the evening of June 3, a mass meeting was held in front of the town hall building, and the pro-communists did not attend.We have 43 elected members stand on the stage, all wearing white clothes and trousers, to symbolize the integrity of the government - there will be no more corruption and fraud that was prevalent in Singapore and in many other emerging countries in the future.I introduced a new cabinet of nine people, including myself.I gave a serious, almost melancholy speech.I don't feel complacent, I don't feel that way at all.I began to see the seriousness of the problems that had to be faced - unemployment, people's eagerness for quick results, the Communist Party, more subversion in unions, schools and associations, more strikes, less investment, more people Unemployed, more trouble.It was an occasion to celebrate a victory, but I wasn't in the mood for elation.There are about 50,000 people on the grassland. They are very orderly, have high expectations, and are in a good mood.I chose to dilute their hopes on such an occasion, pour cold water on them, and prepare myself for the inevitable Communist offensive.They will certainly press for more freedom in order to overthrow Singapore and use their power on the island to assist the Malayan revolution.

After the speeches of the six ministers, I summed up the government's position: "We have begun a new chapter. The power of the people through an elected government is limited to the management of local internal affairs. This is not what we really want, but it is a step towards A step towards incorporation and independence...good things in life don't fall from the sky, they can only be obtained through long hours of hard work.Government can't produce results unless the people fully support the work of the government...sometimes for the sake of the whole society interests, we may be compelled to take steps that are unpopular with some. At such moments it is important to remember that our actions must be guided by the overriding interests of society as a whole."

first half year in power On the afternoon of Friday, June 5, 1959, my colleagues and I were sworn in at the Government House where Mountbatten accepted the surrender of the Japanese commander in Southeast Asia in 1945. After the swearing-in ceremony, Goode congratulated us as the first Head of State and the last Governor-General of Singapore.I replied, "We have been lucky in the past few days to have had the opportunity to deal with a man who understands the hopes and aspirations of our people and the limitations of our situation... I wish you the best of luck in the next six months of your tenure." , will assist us in taking over the governance of Singapore peacefully, smoothly and effectively."

After the ceremony, things came rushing forward.Everyone wants to hurry up and do their job, and I know from experience that enthusiasm alone is not enough, and ministers must have air-conditioned offices if they are to make the most of their talents.It sounds strange, but modern Singapore cannot function effectively without air-conditioning.In the first year I worked in the Li Jue and Wang Lawyer Office, sitting in the big office, the heat, humidity and noise were unbearable, especially in the afternoon, and my energy was easily exhausted.Clerks work half as fast, typists make typos, and lawyers make more mistakes in correcting and dictating.It was even worse in the High Court, as we had to wear wing collars and button-up tabs, and black jackets under our barristers' robes - clothes that were designed for the wet and cold London winters.

I took over the mayor's office on the second floor of the government building, sharing a main office, a reception room and a conference room with Deputy Prime Minister Du Jincai.In order to facilitate communication, my secretary uses the office between the two of us. Wu Qingrui took charge of the Ministry of Finance and moved into the Fullerton Building.He is very familiar with the operation of the civil service, and the work started quickly.The Treasury Department is our most important department, and I let him pick the best of the government.He selected Han Ruisheng as permanent secretary.Han Ruisheng is a friend I have known since the Japanese occupation period, when he was the director of the Land Bureau.He later proved himself to be a formidable force,

It is very lucky to find someone like Han Ruisheng.We have a lot to do, time is tight, and resources are few.The reason why there is not much time is that I expect the "honeymoon period" to be only a year at most, after which the communists will reorganize and put pressure on us.The shortage of resources is due to the small public reserves.A few days later, Goh Keng Swee reported that the previous government had spent as much as 200 million yuan from reserves.He predicted that the fiscal expenditure deficit in 1959 would exceed 14 million yuan, and he could save some money, but he predicted that it would not exceed 5 million yuan at most.Ministers should therefore be warned not to provide any funding for development projects other than the approved development funds, and even those already approved should be reduced as much as possible.The steps that must be taken to balance the books will be unpopular not only with the public, but also with ministers.But in the first year of forming a government, we cannot run a deficit.

Minister leads by example on pay cuts I agree with Goh Keng Swee and tell him that we are better off taking unpopular measures early in our tenure. On June 12, various newspapers reported that the Ministry of Finance ordered that no additional expenditures be allowed without the consent of Goh Keng Swee.Potentially affected are government funding for charitable events, car loans for public servants and spending on scholarships, fellowships and training courses abroad.But not much can be saved in these areas.Goh Keng Swee suggested that the ministers set an example by reducing the monthly salary from 2,600 yuan to 2,000 yuan, and at the same time cut the variable allowances of civil servants, and I agreed.We held a general affairs group meeting of the Civil Service Joint Council, but the employees were not authorized by the union to accept the proposal.In Cabinet we discussed the matter and decided that it would be okay to do so.The government has announced cuts to allowances from July 1, but will accept comments from workers' organizations on the topic.

The number of salary cuts is not small, but it is not a big cut. It only affects 6,000 of the 1,400O civil servants.Employees whose monthly salary is not less than 220 yuan will lose part of the variable allowance.Only 10% of the people reduced the amount by more than 250 yuan per month, and only a small number of people reached the maximum salary reduction of 400 yuan. 8000 low-income employees were not affected at all.But the measure is still a powerful shock.To set the tone for saving and money management from the start, we had to act fast.There are plenty of people who are unhappy, especially senior officials.English-educated people think we're starting to punish them because they voted against us.That's not our motivation.We want to show all Singaporeans, especially the Chinese-educated majority, that the English-educated are prepared to make sacrifices led by ministers for the public good.To help convey the message that in this new era we all have to share weal and woe, I don't think it's unreasonable to ask them to make sacrifices. There is also a good reason for the pay cut.Since 1952 I have represented the unions and Goh and Beth have pressured the government on behalf of the civil servants and succeeded in getting more and more salaries and allowances, with no regard for the economy at the time.If the union keeps doing this, we're in trouble.There is no better way than to send a signal that such days are over.The pay cuts will save $12 million a year.The newspaper estimated that it could save 20-25 million yuan. Wu Qingrui refuted it and reminded the newspapers that in the remaining six months of 1959, only 6 million yuan could be saved, reducing the projected deficit from 14 million yuan to 8 million yuan. A few days later he announced a freeze on the appointment of new officials.That is to say, vacancies in government posts cannot be filled without the approval of the Minister. Civil servants unions are vehemently opposed.Just like we used to fight against the British colonial government, they organized a joint action committee to fight us and fight for the full restoration of subsidies.But we are not a colonial government on the defensive, since the Chinese majority is at least temporarily behind us with all its might, and the Joint Action Committee has never been organized.Still, their reaction pissed me off.They don't understand the serious challenges we face, or that the power of Mandarin-speaking or dialect-speaking voters is now decisive, and we must prevent communists from exploiting their grievances.Some senior officials have had to stop employing maids -- that's unfortunate; but the country is facing greater difficulties and dangers, and we must show them that the government will govern for the good of the whole.Only by doing this, and by acting carefully, can we deal with the lack of Malayan consciousness among the Chinese and make them dedicate themselves to the new country of their choice and be loyal to it.This was most important because they had to change their attitude before the Malay leaders in Kuala Lumpur would agree to the merger so that Singapore could gain independence by becoming part of Malaya. On July 22 I made my first speech as Prime Minister in the Legislative Assembly.I warned: "If the PAP government fails, it will not be the opposition that will be elected to power, and the opposition will run for their lives. Because behind us, there is no alternative bloc ready to implement democracy. At the end of the day, if we fail, ruthless forces will engulf the people." Do it all over again." So we need civil servants to cooperate with us so that we can keep our promise to the people. "The people who have to work with us, are we going to hurt them? In a democracy, public servants must do what is dictated by a party empowered by the people...if nothing worse than loss of allowances does not happen...public servants should kneel down in thanks God, thank them for surviving." Locally, English-educated people have historically had to play an important role: "They can help us bridge the gap between our colonial past and our equal future." If we can't eliminate speaking Mandarin or dialects The rift between those who are educated in English and those who are educated in English, the latter may be ill-fated.If the Chinese gain power, more and more government affairs will be conducted in Chinese, and the English-educated people will suddenly become a group of no money and no power. From time to time, I chastise them, push them, and ask them to change in order to cope with the future.We - Goh Keng Swee, To Chin Choy, Beth, Rajaratnam and I - were English educated and were their natural leaders.We don't want them to be the losing bunch.If people who speak Chinese or dialect don't kill us, we must work together to win the support of at least half of them.But English-educated people are so depoliticized that they don't realize the danger they're in.Although the wage cuts had been fully reinstated by 1961, the affected civil servants remained chronically aggrieved.If it hadn't been for the chaos that followed, which was completely unexpected, they would have voted unitedly against the PAP in the 1963 election.The threat from the Communists was so obvious at the time that they had no choice but to support us. Looking back, I have no regrets about agreeing with Goh Keng Swee.At the end of the year, we balanced our fiscal revenue and expenditure, and the tax revenue did not decrease as we feared.If I had to rephrase all this, I'd still be in favor, but with cuts to a third of what they were back then.That is enough to convince people who speak Chinese or dialects, and although English-educated civil servants will be offended, they will not be shocked as much.On the other hand, this incident exposed their ignorance of the political situation, and it is necessary for them to re-acquaint themselves with the direction and see the dangers and difficulties they are facing.Before coming to power, Wu Qingduan, Bain and I decided to set up a political research institute to guide senior civil servants to understand the threat of the Communist Party and let them see our social and economic problems clearly, which proves that our past decisions were correct.But to be successful, we must win their confidence that we are not brainwashing them. We selected the Director of the News Department, Thompson, to preside over the Institute.Thompson was over 40 years old at the time, quick-witted, well-read, and very serious in speaking, with a strong Scottish accent.A former history lecturer, he is good at teaching and is passionate about whatever he teaches.He understood our needs and quickly understood the role he had to play. As finance minister, Goh Keng Swee, who was in charge of civil servants, chose a colonial-era government villa in Liangmu Hill as the research institute. On August 15th, I presided over the opening of the Institute, describing its purpose as "not only to stimulate your wisdom, but also to let you understand the sharp problems that democratically elected governments will encounter in a revolutionary situation... Once these issues are raised to you problems, you can enable the government to quickly understand the needs and sentiments of the people, and at the same time respond positively, so that you can better assist us in adopting solutions to problems." Thomson began to give lectures and organize seminars. Some ministers and I went to the Institute to discuss the actual situation that we had to deal with immediately, and let everyone study the problem through practice.Civil servants were skeptical at first, but the lecturers were clearly not Communists, so their initial misgivings that this was a method of Marxist indoctrination were quickly dispelled.Because the lecturers have the same mentality as them, they agree: the government is sincere, the problem is real and it is not easy to solve; we really hope that they will work with us and implement the solution.Townsend did a good job of teaching senior civil servants over the next four or five years how to understand communism theory, what democratic solutions to the social ills that fostered communism, and guerrilla insurgency.They learned about what was happening in the wider world, about the reasons for the revolutions in Southeast Asia, and about the fundamental changes that must be made in attitudes and policies in order to meet the challenges. But for other reasons, our relationship with civil servants remained uncomfortable for a long time.During the transition from opposition to government, one of the big issues I expected was how to fit in with power.I warn ministers, parliamentary secretaries and MPs assigned to assist with public complaints not to let power get carried away and abuse it.But it's easy to talk about, we still often offend civil servants. Strike while the iron is hot to promote the movement We are taking advantage of our post-election popularity and are determined to strike while the iron is hot.We launched a series of high-profile campaigns, sweeping city streets, picking up litter from beaches, and mowing weeds from wastelands.This is modeled on what the Communists do - to mobilize everyone, including ministers, to work with their hands and soil their clothes in an attention-grabbing way in order to serve the people.We see no reason why the MCP should have a monopoly on these techniques.We create campaigns to interest the masses in establishing high standards of conduct for goodwill, cleanliness, and preservation of public property.One Sunday Ong Yong Yuen would mobilize civil servants to clean up Changi Beach, and the next Sunday I would pick up a broom and join community leaders to sweep the streets. We still had a lot to do at the time.Goh Keng Swee and I planned and organized the People's Association, a statutory body for all the major voluntary social organizations in Singapore.These organizations teach skills and engage in rewarding activities, ranging from chess clubs and sports clubs to music, ballet, painting and cooking classes and more.We want people to do something useful that puts them on the side of the law. We have built more than 100 community centers, large ones in urban areas and cabins in the countryside, educational and recreational centers - where people play ping pong, basketball, badminton, chess and listen to the radio And refrigerator repair class, craft class.Each center is managed by a full-time organizational secretary who takes care of the needs of nearby residents.For oversight purposes, the Ministry of Social Welfare was changed to the Ministry of Community Development. We plan to organize a nation-building team to accept unemployed young men and women, let them wear uniforms similar to military uniforms, live in dormitories built with wooden boards, and teach them farming, road repair, bricklaying, and construction. The most important thing is to keep them off the streets. But we also have to discipline people who are already employed, because we desperately need to rein in the unions that are controlled by the Communists and stop them from going on political strikes.So we need to set up an arbitration tribunal as soon as possible.Labor relations in Australia were good in the 1950s, largely due to the introduction of mandatory arbitration, which kept industrial unrest at bay.So we approached the Australian government, and they sent the permanent secretary of the Ministry of Labor to help us.Once the tribunal is established, our Minister can order that any serious strike be referred to arbitration, especially in sectors providing essential services such as transport and utilities.Once submitted, while waiting for arbitration, if the trade union continues to call for workers to stop working, it will be considered illegal and the trade union registration may be revoked.In addition, a secret vote must be held before the strike, rather than a show of hands following a inflammatory speech.I've seen a lot of shows of hands. On the other hand, we share the same view as the Communists: the backwardness of China and the rest of Asia, except Japan, is due to the fact that women have not been emancipated; women must be equal to men, educated the same, and able to contribute fully to society. contribution.During the campaign, we had used our allotted party broadcasts in four languages ​​(English, Malay, Mandarin and Tamil) to propose policies on women's rights, but could not find a single PAP woman. Party members can deliver speeches in English.After Zhi interviewed the wives of the two candidates at Lee & Lee Law Firm, she came to my office and said their speeches were too soft and not strong enough.I was discussing things with Keng Swee and Rajah at the time.After Zhi left, Qingrui and Rajah suggested that Zhi should speak.I asked for her opinion, she hesitated for a while, and finally agreed.Raja drew up the first draft and asked her to rewrite it so it sounded like her own.She revised it and translated it into other languages ​​with the approval of the Central Committee.She delivered the speech in English on Radio Malaya. Launch of five female candidates There is a very important passage: "Our society is still built on the belief that women are socially, politically and economically inferior to men. This myth is used to justify labor that exploits women. Many women work with men Same job but not same pay...in this election we put forward five female candidates...let's show them (other political parties) that women in Singapore are deaf and gag about them Tired. I urge women to vote for the PAP. PAP is the only party with ideals, sincerity and ability to deliver on its platform." It's a serious commitment, otherwise I wouldn't have my wife broadcasting on the radio.I want to implement this commitment sooner rather than later, which means that the legal drafters in the Attorney-General's Chambers will have to work as soon as possible.They looked for precedents in other countries and created a women's charter, which was passed and became law within a year.The charter states that monogamy is the only legal form of marriage, making polygamy, which was accepted in the past, illegal except for Muslims.Islam allows Muslims to have four wives.The content of the charter is comprehensive. It has changed the status of women, but it cannot change the cultural prejudice that parents do not want to have daughters and hope to have sons. In addition, there are many measures that can easily win people's hearts without much planning, including a series of "anti-pornographic culture" bans issued by Wang Bangwen as the Minister of the Interior. "Yellow culture" refers to the moral depravity and social injustice that humiliated China in the 19th century: gambling, opium smoking, pornography, polygamy, prostitution, corruption and nepotism.The spirit against "yellow culture" was brought in by teachers from China who instilled the spirit of national revival in our students and parents.The textbooks they brought with them, whether they were literature, history or geography, showed this spirit in every chapter.Journalists for left-leaning Chinese newspapers were fascinated by reports that enthusiastically praised the honesty, incorruptibility, and vitality of revolutionary China, and writing articles reinforced this spirit. Wang Bangwen acted quickly, showing more Puritan zeal than Communists.He ordered the eradication of gangsters from the Chinese secret society, and announced a ban on pornography, striptease, pinball casinos and even nasty songs.There is little downside to doing so, other than a slightly higher unemployment rate and Singapore being less attractive to tourists.But the sailors and seamen, who had been visitors to Singapore, soon found such services offered in more secluded spots on the island, and we ignored them.Prostitution is still going on in the dark and we leave it alone because it cannot be stopped unless we take stupid actions that are mostly ineffective. One of our most meaningful initiatives is to give all children the opportunity to go to school within one year.My brother-in-law Yang Wulin served as Minister of Education, and his performance made us proud: he split the school into two, let all schools open at the same time, and doubled the number of students enrolled in 12 months, making the school building Usage rate doubled.He launched a crash program to train teachers and promoted many senior teachers to become principals.He also opened adult education classes to teach Malay (now the national language), launched a Chinese literacy campaign, and used Mandarin as the common language of all Chinese dialect groups.People want to improve themselves and their prospects are getting better and better, and we provide them with the necessary means.Psychologically this is a good thing.The communists have done this before, and we are back to working methods that have been proven effective by our opponents.As with mass movements, we see no reason for the MCP to have a monopoly on these techniques. 35-year-old uneasy in power Taking power at the age of 35, I feel uneasy.I have no administrative experience, and even my own lawyer's office is managed by Zhi and Jin Yao, so I decided that I must understand the structure of the government and the situation of various departments.I need to have a good idea of ​​the nature, attitude and style of work of senior officials, so that I can know how much change needs to be made when solving political, economic and social problems; I also need to estimate the human resources of various departments and redeploy them , in order to strengthen the most important sectors. The first thing I visited was the Ministry of Finance, because without financial resources, nothing can be done.Next is the Ministry of the Interior.We must have reliable intelligence on the Communists, be able to deal with them sensitively and effectively, and be able to strike first when necessary.I want to know if there are competent officials running the job who can provide the intelligence, analysis, ideas, and planning necessary for us to devise a strategy to defeat the Communists.In terms of social order, I want the police to be disciplined, to be steadfast, decisive, and tough once we decide to disperse the demonstrators or quell the riots that have just emerged. After four months in power, I visited the Home Office in October.I spoke first to the senior officials to boost morale, told them that I expected riots in a year or so after the reorganization of the communists, and asked them to be fully prepared for future unrest.The Superintendent of Police, named Blaise, was a tall, bespectacled man with a white goatee and a taciturn man.He had been the head of the Political Department and hadn't done much work subduing police officers.He was fully aware of the threat posed by the communists, and probably felt that I was too close to the communists for my benefit - as did several of his senior police officers.I don't know how long it took him to conclude that I understood what I was doing.When I say that the Communists must be dealt with without losing the support of the large Chinese-speaking or dialect-speaking population, I mean it absolutely. Visited the Pearl Hill Police Headquarters, followed by the Criminal Investigations Bureau, and then went to the Political Department to meet Lindsay, the newly appointed Chief of the Political Department.Lindsay, who had been a uniformed officer for a long time, was better at riot control than intelligence gathering, and gave me the impression that he wasn't smart enough to understand communist tactics and strategies.Therefore, I decided to meet with his senior officials at the same time in the regular meeting every week, so as to ensure that I heard the reports of his public security experts directly, so as not to miss important and subtle information through his relay.The arrangement worked.Later, the work of the two officers, Curryton and Ahmad Khan, proved to be the most able experts, experienced, able to deftly deal with various situations and provide thorough analysis of the intelligence collected on the Communists.Without them, the government would be in a much more difficult position. Goode's report What was Goode's view of the developments in the first six months of the new government? He summarized them in three reports to the Colonial Secretary. The first, June 26, begins on an upbeat note: "The new ministers are very intelligent and think a lot about their political platform. Their political platform is presented to voters through carefully written speeches. They are radical socialists in terms of their beliefs, but they are aware that Singapore's international Trade Center, in a special situation, is very limited in practice. They also realize that in a city that wins business through fierce competition, the population is rapidly increasing, and it is expected to improve the standard of living, which creates serious economic problems. The most important Unfortunately, they cannot escape the threat of communism. "To be successful, they have to keep the Chinese working class and students behind them. This is where their weakness lies. Because of this, they have to put on a winning stance against the business class on which their economic progress depends. Their obsession with engaging in a political and ideological struggle to win the people over to democratic socialism over communism may prevent them from effectively dealing with other issues that have made Singapore's economy successful. "Ministers have also decided to limit their attendance at social events. They want to give the general impression of solemn dedication to the task of governing the country for the good of the masses. "They (therefore) call themselves non-communists, trying to show that they are not puppets of the West. They are also sensitive to praise from the West, because they believe that they must firmly maintain the support of Singapore's left-wing Chinese population in the face of alternative leadership from the Communists, And Western praise will only damage this support. The government is undoubtedly gaining the enthusiastic support of the Chinese-speaking or dialect-speaking people in the population. The Malayan Communist Party is unlikely to challenge it for some time to come. According to Mr. Lee Kuan Yew's own estimation, This period will likely last a year or more." Two and a half months later, on September 7, Goode presented a report that was still upbeat, though this time he listed my administration's shortcomings: "To recognize in all these developments that this party has been infiltrated by the Communists over the past four years, and has taken advantage of the support it gained from the discontent of workers, peasants, Chinese school students and young intellectuals, and has come to power with such force and power. PAP, that's hard. But it would be a mistake to think that the responsibility to govern has changed these young people. "Every Thursday afternoon, I have a regular meeting with Mr Lee Kuan Yew at the Agong, talking freely and frankly. I find him much more mature. He still has his prejudices and attachments, but generally speaking is very sensible and always responds Quick and sensible. I repeatedly blamed him for the actions of his government and told him frankly about the consequences I could foresee. Sometimes he was able to correct my information, or put it differently. The government usually does what is reasonable, the problem The way things are done. He agrees with my criticisms in general, especially how he treats civil servants. His reply is that ministers have to see the consequences of their mistakes and that learning is costly, but he shouldn't be policing them, They absorb experience. In big things they are okay and responsible, in small things they are sentimental and tiresome. Working with them, we are constantly confronted with difficulties and fears, and our capacity for tolerance and understanding is tested. But They have potential, they can achieve a lot. Right now there is no choice but to work with them. The opposition is discredited and may even be dying." On November 23, Goode wrote his last report, the so-called "Flag Lowering" report.The British Governor-General usually delivers his final report when he withdraws from the colonies and the Union Jack is lowered. The report reads: "The present leadership of the PAP appears never to be openly anti-communist. Yet the government's approach to communism is largely sound, and we have every reason to be grateful to it. I remain convinced that , it is completely wrong to see PAP leaders as covert communists, describing them as covert anti-communists is much closer to the truth... "Despite the best efforts of Singaporean ministers to get federal ministers to accept them, the federal attitude remains one of distrust. The Prime Minister now realizes that under the current federal government, mergers are hopeless. He also understands that public Emphasizing that merger would cause political embarrassment and public refutation by the Federation. But he hoped that the expedient solution would be to keep Singapore's constitutional status quo, convinced that if merger was deemed impossible, Singapore would turn to other sources for its future. The consequences for both places are dire. It is of the utmost importance to all of us that this should not happen. … "So, the current situation is that Mr Lee Kuan Yew controls the Cabinet, and the Cabinet is tight-knit. Unsurprisingly they have made some mistakes. Apart from the Prime Minister, I doubt whether they are really as capable as they appear at first glance. They found that, despite the The government is much more difficult than organizing a successful party. But in general they are off to a good start in implementing the various policies they have announced. The prime minister told me to hold off until after they have been in power for a year before making a judgment on their competence pass judgment. what he has said in the past has proven mostly correct so far "Our policy must be to continue to work with the PAP to try to win their goodwill and confidence. In doing so, we will be able to assist them in giving Singapore a competent and stable government, only then can we overcome the small difficulties that often arise We will definitely encounter these small difficulties and challenges in the future." Like my form teacher at Raffles Institution many years ago, Goode gave me a good report card.But he didn't know what trouble my colleagues and I were going to get into, and how wrong his estimates would be if the showdown were different. Goode's "Falling the Flag" report had a decisive influence on the incoming British High Commissioner, Lord Sherk, as well as on his deputy, Moore.Moore, who had served as private secretary to Scherke when he was Lord of the Admiralty, had originally served in the British Colonial Service. Moore, who retired after 34 years, told me that the report played a crucial role.Six months after he arrived in Singapore, he felt that Goode's report was correct, and Sir Wallace, the Under-Secretary for Colonial Affairs in charge of Singapore's affairs, accepted his judgment. I met Wallace in 1961 and talked to him for two and a half hours.Moore had great respect for Wallace.The report thus played an unusually important role in determining the UK's policy towards the PAP government. Before Goode left on 2 December, I wrote to him to tell him that he had done the Queen and Great Britain the best he could, but had also served the people of Singapore well.在喝茶聊天时，他一度告诉我："我们到这里是来捡好处的。对我们没有好处的话，我们早离开了。"他毫不造作，因此我更加敬重他。他决定坐船回国，不坐飞机。在他登上"布瓦塞万号"轮船时，内阁成员都到码头列队欢送他。