HAWKER CENTRE CLEANLINESS
Letter from Lim Teck Kong
I WRITE in with personal experience as a hawker’s son and as a stall assistant.
Over the past five years, there has been a tremendous drop in the focus by the National Environmental Agency (NEA) on hawker centre cleanliness issues. I do not understand the reason for this change, but there were indicators that led me to believe that it had happened.
Most hawkers have been quite well-acquainted with the head of the Hawkers Department, who, according to my hawker father, had steered the department for the past few decades.
I used to see him making his rounds in the previous centre where my father’s stall was, as well as the current one (Redhill Hawker Centre), to ensure that everything was in place and that no one was breaking the law. If there was such a person (my father had once smoked while cooking), the head would march up to him and discipline him for the bad deed.
This was five years ago. These days, apart from the regular officers who have been assigned to look after our hawker centre, we do not see the head of the Hawkers Department checking the place on his own anymore.
My father’s stall has been cleaner because we were afraid that the Head would come again and scold us. But other stalls have become dirtier and they are not scared of the uniformed officers at all.
I feel that having the senior management like the department head to personally take an interest in matters on the ground had made a good difference before. I do not know why this practice has not been continued, but I do know that, especially with the increase of foreign workers working in hawker centres, the issue of hawkers’ personal hygiene has been neglected.
Flies in a hawker centre are an indication of how clean a place is. In recent years, the number of flies at hawker centres have increased. Perhaps the Hawkers Department still has not realised that.
From TODAY, Voices - Monday, 13-April-2009
Letter from Lim Teck Kong
I WRITE in with personal experience as a hawker’s son and as a stall assistant.
Over the past five years, there has been a tremendous drop in the focus by the National Environmental Agency (NEA) on hawker centre cleanliness issues. I do not understand the reason for this change, but there were indicators that led me to believe that it had happened.
Most hawkers have been quite well-acquainted with the head of the Hawkers Department, who, according to my hawker father, had steered the department for the past few decades.
I used to see him making his rounds in the previous centre where my father’s stall was, as well as the current one (Redhill Hawker Centre), to ensure that everything was in place and that no one was breaking the law. If there was such a person (my father had once smoked while cooking), the head would march up to him and discipline him for the bad deed.
This was five years ago. These days, apart from the regular officers who have been assigned to look after our hawker centre, we do not see the head of the Hawkers Department checking the place on his own anymore.
My father’s stall has been cleaner because we were afraid that the Head would come again and scold us. But other stalls have become dirtier and they are not scared of the uniformed officers at all.
I feel that having the senior management like the department head to personally take an interest in matters on the ground had made a good difference before. I do not know why this practice has not been continued, but I do know that, especially with the increase of foreign workers working in hawker centres, the issue of hawkers’ personal hygiene has been neglected.
Flies in a hawker centre are an indication of how clean a place is. In recent years, the number of flies at hawker centres have increased. Perhaps the Hawkers Department still has not realised that.
From TODAY, Voices - Monday, 13-April-2009
No comments:
Post a Comment