On one hand, some believe that separating those living in rental flats from other HDB developments would lead to a gentrification of some areas in Singapore. On the other hand, there are also questions whether housing rental residents together with those who are buying prime location homes could inadvertently backfire.
“Will it be a plus? Will it motivate them? Will it demotivate them? Will it be a fraught experience? I think time will tell,” said Mr Lee.
He added that he believed by helping people from different socio-economic groups to intermingle, it will provide the kind of social discourse that needs to be encouraged in a society facing social-economic divide.
The issue of negative perception towards those living in HDB rental blocks and the concept of integrated blocks is not new and have been raised by MPs such as Mr Louis Ng (PAP-Nee Soon) and Mr Murali Pillai (PAP-Bukit Batok).
In a Facebook post in March 2018, Mr Ng wrote about the need to end the stigma for those living in rental flats as they seem to be “isolated from the community”, and his hope for more integrated blocks to be built.
Speaking to TODAY on Jul 13, Mr Ng said that there is a sort of “ingrained” perception that occupants of rental units are those with lower socio-economic status and the area is very dirty, which could be because there is not much ownership in rental units.
However, he stressed that there should be a need to urgently try and change this mindset.
The new integrated blocks that HDB is building can help encourage social mixing between the tenants and home owners, which can also help engineer a form of guidance for children so that they will not always be in “bad company”.
He believes that the “social mixing” afforded by such blocks can be a crucial factor in uplifting someone out of poverty.
“It is really who they know and who they mix with rather than their family structure or the school or the availability of jobs,” he said.
Associate Professor Tan Ern Ser from the National University Singapore’s (NUS) Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy said that some prospective home owners may be reluctant to buy homes in integrated blocks due to negative public perception around public rental housing.
Such perception could have its source in class prejudice, stereotypes, and discrimination, and reinforced by some actual encounters with rental housing residents and conditions of rental blocks, he said.
However, Assoc Prof Tan added the positive features of new estates where integrated blocks are located would still appeal to some BTO applicants.
He added that integrated blocks are generally a good idea as the physical proximity of rental and BTO units could facilitate social interaction.
“The practical implication here is that the social gap between the rental units and the BTO units must not be too far apart, for example, having a one-room rental unit adjacent to an executive apartment,” he said.