Today's Singapore News

The following are stories that are making the headlines over at Topix Singapore News today, edited by yours truly.

-Getting Singaporeans to remain rooted: Even as Singapore inches closer to its goal of being a world-class city, and its citizens are exhorted to think globally, what efforts have been made to get cosmopolitan Singaporeans — aware of opportunities elsewhere — to remain rooted to their homeland?
-Singapore cuts government salaries as slump deepens: Singapore’s government said it will cut the salaries of its top public workers and ministers as a “sharp” recession threatens to increase job losses and hurt lending this year.
-High prices not always due to profiteering: The Committee Against GST Profiteering is adopting a proactive approach to ensure that businesses do not profiteer by maintaining high prices despite the recent fall in prices of commodities.
-Human Organ Transplant Amendment Bill introduced in Parliament: Four amendment bills were introduced in Parliament on Monday. The first was the Human Organ Transplant Amendment Bill, which aims to allow compensation to altruistic living organ donors.
-93 kids abused a year: An average of 93 children a year were abused by adults or their parents in the last five years, with the number rising to 114 in 2008.
-Job losses in recession-hit Singapore could match levels of previous downturns: Acting Manpower Minister Gan Kim Yong has said the unemployment rate due to the current recession in Singapore could reach the levels recorded during the Asian financial crisis in 1998 and the economic downturn in 2001.
-Singapore may see 200,000 foreigners leave: Singapore’s population may shrink in the next two years as “sizeable” job losses amid the city- state’s deepest recession force 200,000 foreigners to leave, Credit Suisse Group said.
-Permanent secretary's article ill-judged: Minister Teo Chee Hean has criticised a permanent secretary for writing about attending a cooking course in Paris, amid gloomy economic times at home.
-Recession-hit Singapore still needs foreigners: Singapore, which relies heavily on foreign workers, will still need overseas labour despite a recession, a minister said in comments released Tuesday.
-Singaporean household income grew across all groups: Household income from work grew in real terms across all income groups in Singapore in 2008 according to an Occasional Paper released by the Singapore Department of Statistics today on 'Key Household Income Trends, 2008'.
-New border facility opens: A new $4 million laboratory and decontamination unit at Tuas Checkpoint, which can spot chemical, toxic and biological agents in consignments carried by trucks into Singapore, opened on Tuesday morning.
-Singapore defends death penalty: Singapore has defended its use of the death penalty, saying capital punishment had deterred drug traffickers in the city-state, which Amnesty says has one of the world's highest execution rates.