Many Singaporeans are rich but have no time, so they ask their maids, their foreign workers to queue on their behalf. The latest is to pay students as “part time workers” to queue for buying a flat.
What message are we sending to the young? There are easy money to be made? No need to work hard, just queue. As one “queuer” said” “ten dollar an hour is quite good because you are not doing heavy work. I’ve done service-related jobs at restaurants and the rate is abut $7 an hour.”
There should be a law to ban such ugly and disgraceful practice!
Agents vying for Bedok Residences enlist their help on part-time basis
Source: Todayonline 23Nov2011
The appointed marketing agent for Bedok Residences has come out to explain why there were students being paid by agents to stand in line.
The project – a development by CapitaLand – will be launched today. But since Sunday, a queue had formed, with students (picture) spotted among the hundreds of people who have been queueing.
Contacted by Today, ERA Realty key executive Eugene Lim said: “Agents can only queue for one space and they might have more than one buyer so they have to get people to help them out in the queue.”
He added: “The reason why there are students in the queue is because it is the school holidays and they see this as a part-time job.”
According to ERA, the queue had been forming since Sunday. As of yesterday, there were about 500 people in the queue, ERA added.
Mr Lim noted it was not possible to determine how many of those in the queue were teenagers hired by agents as some of them could be relatives of genuine buyers.
Meals are provided by the agents and as there is security, it is safe for the teenagers, Mr Lim noted.
“They are doing what they would usually do at home, playing on their phones or computers, and by sitting in the queue they get to earn money,” said Mr Lim.
ERA also said that they had done an audit at midnight on Tuesday to ensure that all Ministry of Manpower guidelines on the age limit for part-time employment were strictly being adhered to. ERA staff also performed an identification card check on those in the queue.
According to Mr Lim, only those over the age of 16 had been queuing overnight. Younger replacements – aged 13 to 15 years – relieved them in the day.
He said that the students are mainly personal contacts of the agents and are mostly Singaporeans. The rate at which they are paid varies and is determined by the different deals struck by the agents and the students. They are paid either on an hourly basis or on a project basis, said Mr Lim.
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