We are committed to supporting our athletes in achieving their sporting aspirations

Introduction

1. Mdm Speaker, I thank Er Dr Lee for her comments.
   

Supporting our young athletes

2. Indeed, sport has tremendous power to inspire and galvanise us as a nation. Joseph Schooling's win at the Rio Olympics has inspired the entire nation. It showed that a small country like Singapore can dream big and make the dream a reality if we put our hearts and minds to it. We in MCCY are committed to supporting our athletes in achieving their sporting aspirations.

3. Our sports excellence programme starts with identifying and developing a pipeline of young athletes. The Singapore Sports School, into its 13th year, offers a unique pathway for young athletes by combining quality education with an excellent sports programme to develop student athletes that can represent Singapore.

4. The School offers disciplined and systematic sports training with quality coaching, complemented by support in nutrition, physical and mental development. Special effort is taken to integrate a rigorous academic programme with the training and competition required for athlete development.

5. The contribution of the Sports School is clear. Our Sports School students and alumni shone brightly at the SEA Games last year and we are so proud of them. They contributed a total of 32 gold medals at the SEA Games - nearly 40 per cent of Singapore's total haul of 84.

6. At the same time, we know that there are many high-performing youth athletes in our mainstream schools. To further strengthen the youth sports excellence ecosystem, a new National Youth Sports Institute was set up this year to provide specialised support to our youth athletes nationwide. NYSI works closely with partners in the areas of talent identification and development, youth coaching, sports science and athlete life management.
   

High Performance Sports Ecosystem

7. In 2013, we introduced our latest iteration of the High Performance Sports System (HPS). The System offers comprehensive support from financial grants, training and coaching, sports medicine to personal development. We will spend a total of $60M over 5 years. If we include funding and support given to NSAs and all athletes, we would be investing close to S$90M per year. Our HPS system is still evolving, and we will continue to improve this as we go along.

8. The System supports athletes of varying potential and development needs. There are currently over 1,500 carded athletes, including our para athletes, covering over 40 sports. Through SportSG's carding system, athletes are identified based on their actual achievements and assessed potential. Support programmes are then customized for the individual needs of the athletes to help them achieve their goals. This targeted, systematic and disciplined process ensures that our resources are optimised in our pursuit of sporting excellence.

9. We also introduced the spexScholarship scheme in 2013 to enable our elite athletes with the potential to excel at the highest level to focus on training full-time. There are 69 spexScholars at present – 14 of them qualified for the Olympics and 7 for the Paralympics. Team Singapore athletes have also benefitted from the Race to Rio programme since March this year, which provided enhanced support for those seeking to qualify for the Games, and full-time training for those who had qualified.  For example, Joseph Schooling had received various spexGrants, and sports science and medicine support, prior to him being awarded the spexScholarship in 2013. He received support such as training equipment, overseas training camps and competitions, and coaching needs. His University of Texas scholarship imposes conditions on the level of external support he can receive.

10. The System is reaping benefits. In bowling, for example, Singapore has produced several world champions such as Shayna Ng, Joey Yeo and New Hui Fen.  At this year's Olympics, we witnessed breakthrough performances by Quah Zheng Wen and Saiyidah Aisyah in swimming and rowing respectively. And who can forget Joseph Schooling's and Yip Pin Xiu's record-breaking swims at the Olympics and Paralympics? All our Team Singapore athletes have done us tremendously proud.

11. I agree with Er Dr Lee that the live TV broadcast enabled Singaporeans to come together to rally behind our athletes. Loud cheer erupted throughout the island - in HDB estates, schools, offices, and other mass gatherings - when Singaporeans dropped whatever they were doing on the morning of August 13th to watch Joseph Schooling's triumphant swim.

12. Moments like these bind us as one united people, and bring us tremendous national pride. The Government is certainly supportive of live coverage of our Team Singapore athletes, and does provide funding support to Mediacorp. However, we are also mindful of the escalating fees for broadcasting such events. You may have read from media that Mediacorp paid about US$2.5 million for broadcast rights to the 2012 London Olympics, and were quoted almost three times that for the Rio Olympics.

13. It is therefore a sound and rational approach to leave the negotiation of broadcast rights to Mediacorp and the Pay-TV operators. As in many other countries, our broadcasters can harness the marketing potential of the programme through advertising revenue, subscriptions and sponsorships. And I would like to urge businesses and foundations in Singapore, and Singaporeans in general, to step forward to support the broadcast.  It would be unwise to take the position that we should have live telecasts regardless of cost, and for the Government to underwrite any amount demanded by rights owners. This would be a poor position to take, particularly while the rights are being negotiated.

14. Success in high performance sports is borne from the partnership with many stakeholders and not just the Government alone.

15. Our National Sports Associations and sports clubs play important roles in developing interest in and providing broad-based support for sports. They are also instrumental in developing and grooming competitive athletes at all levels.

16. Corporates constitute another important set of stakeholders. Corporate sponsorships have made many local sports events possible, such as the OUE Singapore Open for badminton, Mission Foods Nations Cup for netball. Many of our athletes have benefitted from the exposure and the opportunity to compete with the best in the field. In time to come, we hope Corporate Singapore can play an even bigger role in the HPS system by directly sponsoring our NSAs or athletes.

17. Businesses can also provide employment opportunities to our athletes.  Our spexBusiness network has 33 businesses offering opportunities to our athletes. More than 80 athletes have benefitted from this programme. As career after sport weigh on the minds of athletes and their families, we call on more companies to join us in supporting our athletes.

18. We note that NS is a concern for some of our athletes. We have been working closely with our NSAs to propose NS deferment for those athletes who require a continuous development pathway and who have consistently demonstrated their sporting potential. MINDEF has granted exceptional sportsmen long term deferment from NS, on the basis of them meeting sporting goals and agreed performance; and MINDEF has announced that Schooling's deferment has been extended to 2020. Besides long term deferment, there are other opportunities for servicemen to train while fulfilling their fulltime NS commitments, such as through the SAF or Home Team Sportsmen Scheme.
    

Encouraging sport participation and realising the inclusiveness of sport

19. Our sporting vision goes beyond the success of a select few. We want Singaporeans to enjoy sports regularly, regardless of sporting ability. Apart from health benefits, sport also engenders social cohesion.

20. The numbers are encouraging. Our sports participation rate is about 55%, up from 44% in 2011. ActiveSG, our national sport movement, has about 1.1 million members. This year, we also launched Get Active! Singapore, a week-long sporting bash to celebrate National Day as One Team Singapore.
    

Conclusion

21. 2016 has been a wonderful year for sport in Singapore. Our athletes have made their mark on the world stage and inspired Singaporeans back home. Nevertheless, the journey toward fulfilling our sporting vision is a marathon, not a sprint. While the Government will continue to support our athletes, we must not forget the work it takes to groom a Team Singapore athlete – years of training by the committed athlete supported by a dedicated team of coaches and sports specialists. And at the heart of it all, is the special role of family and friends in providing a secure and encouraging environment for our athletes.

22. We hope that with the support of all stakeholders, we can develop a healthy ecosystem and inspire Singaporeans to Live Better Through Sport.