Newsroom

LOCATION NUS Guild House

SPEAKER British High Commissioner, Paul Madden

EVENT NUS Society inaugural "Meet the Ambassadors" lecture

DATE 18/08/2009

I'm going to be talking about the role of the British High Commission in promoting UK/Singapore relations across a wide range of fields. A High Commission or Embassy is, in fact, a platform for a whole range of government agencies, with a wide variety of different focuses. I'm going to include:

the business relationship, and two way flows of trade and investment
policy areas where we work together on global challenges like climate change and counter-terrorism
education and science, and how we try to build on the existing strong links in these fields
the human relationship - our support for the large British community here; and our role in regulating the flow of people through immigration policies.
Finally, I'll say something about the management challenges we face, which are not dissimilar to anyone running an overseas operation for a big multinational organisation.

Just to set the context. Here in Singapore we are of course operating in a relatively benign environment. Singapore is obviously a friendly nation. Our approach to many international issues is very close. Our economic ties are particularly strong. And we have an extraordinary history together, which has left us with so much in common, from educational structures, and legal systems, to a shared enthusiasm for football.

The relationship between post-Colonial societies and their former metropolitan hubs, can be a complex one. But I can think of few cases where this process has been handled more smoothly than in Singapore. I hope that this is partly because of the manner in which Britain conducted itself in the past. But I think it is mostly because Singapore proved to be a shrewd judge of which parts of its colonial heritage to maintain and improve, and which to discard. And secondly, because Singapore has been so successful over the last four decades, that is has developed the pride and self-confidence to measure itself in its own terms, rather than in contrast to somewhere else.

Business

So let me talk first about the commercial world. Many people are surprised to learn that Britain is still the largest investor in Singapore, with over 62 billion sing dollars of FDI. That includes both long established multinationals like Shell who have been here for over 100 years, and SMEs who started up last week. The British presence runs right across the board in sectoral terms - manufacturing companies, like GSK and Rolls Royce, who have just announced major new investments at Seletar aerospace hub. Financial giants like HSBC and Standard Chartered. And retailers from Marks and Spencer to Cold Storage. Our two way trade is over 25 billion sing dollars. More than half our exports to Singapore are services.

Like their counterparts from other countries, many of these companies are of course suffering from the current global economic situation. But our experience is that very few British expats are going home. When you talk to the British companies, they tend to say that they have experienced recessions in this part of the world before, so it’s not new. And that when the dust has settled and global growth eventually picks up again, it is this part of the world that will be best placed to take advantage. And so they understand the importance of demonstrating that their companies are in the region for the long term.

For many UK companies, Singapore is their regional hub for SE Asia or even Asia Pacific. I regularly invite the regional CEOs of some of the biggest UK plcs round for dinner, and it’s always interesting to get their perspective on regional trends. One interesting observation is how many of them are not British themselves. Sitting around my table at these sessions I find Singaporeans, Australians, Americans, Indians. Many nationalities. It's a sign of just how internationalised these big corporations have become. And on the other hand, of course there are also plenty of Brits here as CEOs of firms from different countries.

I have a big team at the High Comm of staff from UK Trade & Investment, Britain’s equivalent of EDB and IE Singapore. Unlike our teams in some countries around the region, they do not have large numbers of trade barriers and restrictive practices to lobby the government on. Singapore is a very open market. But that’s not to say the situation is completely perfect. We’d like to see less restrictions on our banks ability to expand the number of branches and ATMs they have. And Cadbury’s would like to have seen the market for chewing gum opened up to their products not just those of their American competitors.

But most of our work is helping SMEs, particularly those new to the market, who see Singapore as the ideal stepping stone into the opportunities of Asia. We run a chargeable service, through which we can do things like market research for them, or introduce them to Singaporean customers or agents. Sometimes we support their participation in the big regional trade shows which Singapore regularly hosts.

Like EDB, we also have a mandate to promote Singaporean investment into the UK. It’s quite a success story - around 80% of all Singaporean investment in Europe goes into the UK. Comfort Delgro runs 1 in 6 of London’s buses. Singapore Food Industries has the best known chilled soup brand in Britain. Of course this is not just as a result of our efforts, but because of the many attractions of the UK location, particularly as a gateway into Europe. Also Britain is a place where Singaporean investors feel readily at home, thanks to the common language, legal system etc.

Political issues

I think people probably expect diplomats to be spending most of their time dealing with complex foreign policy issues, not helping SMEs. Actually commercial work does take up much more of our time than you’d expect. But of course there are a wide range of foreign policy issues we deal with too. In particular, issues where the challenge is a shared global one where Britain, Singapore and other countries need to work together.

Climate change

Perhaps the most important of these is Climate Change. I have two staff in the High Comm who work full time on Climate Change - a regional manager and a Singapore country expert. Their task is to understand and try to influence the climate change policies of countries around the region, in particular in the run up to the big UN conference in Copenhagen this December, which will set the framework beyond the Kyoto Treaty.

The UK and indeed the EU more generally has taken a very forward position on Climate Change. Our government have announced very ambitious CO2 emission reduction targets. This includes a commitment to increase five fold electricity from renewables, to around 30% of supply by 2020.

But we're not doing this just to claim credit for it. Climate Change is not an area you want to be competing in. The scale and complexity of the challenge means that it requires action by all countries. Particularly the big emerging countries like China. And, in this region, by Indonesia which, through its deforestation is a major contributor to climate change. Of course we acknowledge that most of the CO2 already in the atmosphere was emitted by the developed countries. And we cannot simply tell the developing world that they don't have the opportunity to grow as we did in the past. We recognise that we have a responsibility to support them with financial and technical assistance.

The Singaporean government is increasingly aware of the challenges of Climate Change and has put in place co-ordinating structures and a national strategy. Some argue that Singapore is not a significant CO2 emitter in absolute terms. That is true, but it is quite high per capita, and everyone needs to play their part.

So what do our Climate Change team do at the High Commission? One of our biggest projects has been to fund an Asian Development Bank study of the economic impact of climate change on SEAsia, using analytical techniques developed in the Stern Report. Interestingly it concluded that SEAsia is significantly more vulnerably to climate change than the world average. This is because such a high proportion of the population live so close to the coast, and because the economies are so heavily dependent on agriculture and natural resources. We have also organised seminars on things like carbon trading. And in Indonesia we have been funding pilot projects to avoid deforestation and encourage the sustainable production of palm oil.

Counter terrorism

Another area of shared global challenge is the scourge of terrorism. Living in this part of the world, that is obviously something Singapore takes very seriously - as we saw in this year's National Day Parade. After the 7/7 London tube bombings there was a lot of interest in how the city responded to the tragedy. A number of Singaporean experts went over to London to see for themselves.

An important part of all our approaches to Counter Terrorism is reducing the conditions which help foster it. And Singapore has done an excellent job in promoting harmonious relationships between its different communities over the years. One aspect of its policies which some of our experts have been particularly interested in, is the programme for religious rehabilitation of prisoners.

Burma

I've talked about areas where Britain and Singapore see very much eye to eye. But of course we do find areas where we have different approaches. One of the most topical of these is Burma/Myanmar. Of course, we would both like to see the same ultimate outcome of the restoration of democracy, and the release of political prisoners like ASSK, in that troubled country. But we do differ on the right means to get there. For Singapore and its ASEAN partners the focus is very much on engagement. The EU and US believe that the intransigent Burmese junta will only respond to pressure. So we have various trade sanctions in place targeting the leaders. But we want to help the Burmese people themselves, and following Cyclone Nargis last year, we have committed some US $200m in aid over two years, making us the largest bilateral aid donor there.

A Singaporean official said that for Europe this is "a moral issue, whereas for us it's a strategic issue". But in countries like the UK, there is a huge weight of public opinion on human rights issues like Burma, which ensures that it remains centre stage. It remains a real drag on progress between ASEAN and Europe on a whole range of issues.

Science & innovation

Well let's move from foreign policy to an issue that is perhaps more directly relevant to the venue we find ourselves in today at NUS. That is Science and Education. I have a team of four people working on Science and Innovation at the High Commission. In fact they also have an office at Biopolis which they used for part of the week. They work to promote scientific collaborations between institutions and individuals in the two countries. Over the last 5 years we have organised 29 seminars and workshops in Singapore. We have a joint research programme in the field of medical research. And we have helped bring UK and Singaporean institutions like Imperial College, NUS and NTU together. They have been discussing some very concrete opportunities for partnership.

We are helped in this by the fact that there are so many top British scientists working in Singapore’s universities and research institutes. I see some of them quite regularly and they are always highly complimentary about the Singapore science scene, from the facilities to the quality of Singaporean researchers.

Education

Of course education is one of the richest areas of traditional links between our countries. At the schools level, the British Council have for many years worked closely with MOE, on things like English language curriculum development, and promoting exchanges between teachers and school leaders.

At the university level, there is a long tradition of Singaporeans going to study in the UK. Around 2/3 of Singapore’s Cabinet ministers went to a UK university, and half of the cabinet attended a single institution - Cambridge.

Of course in recent years, Singapore’s own universities have become well-established, world class institutions. And Singaporean students have also gone in significant numbers to additional destinations like Australia and the US. But I think we’re still getting a good share, with over 3,000 students coming to the UK each year.

Of course we'd like it to be more. Not just because Singapore's talented students (and their fees) are welcomed by British universities. But because spending your formative student years in another country usually leaves you well-disposed to that place for the rest of your life.

So we try to encourage the Singaporean scholarship-awarding ministries and agencies, like PSC, to continue to send a reasonable share of their scholars to the UK. Given the strength of some of our top, world-leading institutions, this is still pretty successful. It is particularly pleasing that we get around half of the A*STAR scholars. But this is rather too heavily concentrated at the undergraduate level and we would definitely like to see more of them recognising the strengths of British PhD programmes.

I was delighted to be at a ceremony at the Istana last week to honour this year's Presidents Scholars. I found that four of the six scholars were going to institutions in the UK.

Talking about scholarships, the High Commission run the Foreign Office’s own world-wide programme for post grad masters degrees - the Chevening Scholarships. Over the years this has produced some really talented individuals who have come back to make a real contribution to their society. This year's crop included an LTA official going to study carbon trading, one of the Mufti’s top aides, and a hearing-impaired community worker.

Consular

I'd now like to turn to some of the people to people aspects of what we do. We now have around 25,000 Brits living in Singapore, and a further 600,000 visiting each year. We provide routine services for them, like passports, (we issued some 6,000 last year), birth certificates, and certifying / legalising documents. And we stand ready to assist them in the case of major disasters, like the tsunami or the Bali bombings, as well as assisting individuals who run into particular problems, like crime, accidents or ill health.

Obviously looking after British citizens is a top priority for the Foreign Office. But it's a challenging area. More British tourists, including more frail and elderly ones, and more inexperienced travellers, are travelling to more remote and challenging destinations than ever before. More British pensioners have taken up permanent residence in lower cost locations like some of Singapore's neighbours than ever before. And expectations about what we can be expected to do for them in a crisis are constantly being raised. Our overseas consular work is a self-funding operation, financed from passport fees rather than by the UK tax-payer. So we are constantly having to balance the high levels of customer expectation with what we can realistically afford to provide.

Occasionally British citizens fall foul of the law here, although I have to say it's very rare indeed. But it has given me an interesting opportunity to see the inside of a Singaporean prison, which not many people get the chance to do.

Visas

As well as looking after our own citizens we also have responsibility to regulate the flow of foreign citizens into the UK. This is a very contentious issue in British domestic politics. My colleagues in the UK Borders Agency tell me that they get a lot of complaints that Britain is letting too many people in, and this is balanced only by the number of complaints that we’re letting too few people in. Recent years have seen a very significant increase in the flows into the UK. Alongside the traditional migration from the Indian sub continent and Caribbean have been massive waves from Eastern Europe, after countries like Poland joined the EU, as well as refugees and asylum seekers from trouble-spots around the world. Economically they have maintained the vitality of the UK. They have certainly enhanced our cultural and culinary diversity. The assimilation has been remarkably successful by any standards. But there have been some inter-community tensions. And many Britons were horrified to find that the London tube bombers were not foreigners but home-grown.

So the visa staff in our overseas embassies are under a lot of pressure. They have to deal with a volume of international travellers, for business, tourism and study, which has seen unprecedented growth. The processes have become increasingly complex as we move towards greater security through use of biometric identifiers. And there is great pressure to keep costs down, since the operation has to be self-funding. The rules have become stricter and less flexible. Sometimes that means we have to convey some difficult messages. For example, we’ve had a few cases of Singaporean students who forget to renew their student visa in timely fashion, and as an “overstayer” find themselves with a one year ban on travel to the UK.

Public diplomacy

The last area I wanted to talk about is what we nowadays call Public Diplomacy. We used to call it press and public affairs, and I guess in business it would be called marketing. It’s about how we project images of the UK brand, in support of our other objectives which I have been talking about.

Of course how you play this role depends on the starting point. What perceptions do the people in the country where you’re posted already have about the UK? Inevitably that is shaped in a country like Singapore by the post colonial experience. For people of an older generation particularly there is obviously some cultural baggage.

Interestingly, for the younger generation, Britain is often seen as a hip, modern place, bursting with pop and fashion icons. This is a useful counterpoint to some of the more traditional images from Britain’s history. It’s a difficult balance to project. We need to emphasise some of the more modern cutting edge elements of Britain, to counter any misconceptions about the UK’s continuing vitality and relevance. But at the same time we recognise that some traditional institutions and sites are also very much part of our national prestige and reputation, and something that tourists for example value.

In doing this we use a variety of new media and marketing techniques. In fact the director of our web platform for the whole of Asia Pac, sits in my High Commission in Singapore.

Management challenges

Well I've given you a pretty lengthy run down of the kind of things we do at the British High Commission to take forward the very diverse, wide-ranging relationship between our two countries. Perhaps I should end by describing some of the challenges for a High Commissioner in running these diverse institutions.

One that strikes me particularly is the need to protect our staff and our customers. When I first arrived in Singapore on a previous posting back in 2000, we didn’t even have a perimeter fence at the High Commission, you could just walk in off the street. Now, sadly, like other similar organisation, we bristle with security measures and guards. So we have to work hard to get across the message that we’re also a very welcoming place to come and visit.

In some ways, running an embassy is like running a small business, turning over a few million dollars each year. Like managers of SMEs we face the same kind of challenges to manage our costs, and fluctuations in demand for our services and in exchange rates. So, like business, we are affected by the recession.

Finally, it's quite a challenge trying to ensure we maintain a joined-up cohesive operation, when we’re running a matrix organisation, in which most of our staff are "owned" by parent organisation in the UK, not the Foreign Ministry. And where many of the High Commission team are focussed on the region rather than Singapore itself.

But I guess that's what makes it all such fun.

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