TRANSFER OF INSTITUTIONAL KNOWLEDGE AS SLATAKES OVER STATE LAND MANAGEMENT WITHIN HDB ESTATES FROM HDB

Murali Pillai
2 min readFeb 26, 2023

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It was recently announced that the Singapore Land Authority would be taking over the management of state land by HDB. As this involves 1,408 hectares of land and 600 Temporary Occupation Licences (“TOL”), I was concerned about SLA’s bandwidth to handle this properly. I therefore filed a PQ on the matter. I am happy to note from the Minister’s response that HDB will be transferring its staff handling these matters to SLA. This makes it possible to have a seamless transfer of management. My PQ and the Minister’s response may be accessed below.

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Mr Murali Pillai asked the Minister for Law in relation to the decision of SLA to take over from HDB state land management within HDB estates, how will SLA retain HDB’s institutional knowledge from past dealings with stakeholders, such as concerns of residents and local practices in relation to the organisation of events on state lands, so that they can be taken into account for the issuance of Temporary Occupation Licences.

Mr K Shanmugam: With effect from 1 March 2023, the Singapore Land Authority (SLA) will take over the management of all State land within HDB estates. With this change, all applications for interim use of vacant State land and properties, within and outside HDB estates, will be handled by SLA. This will allow for greater administrative and operational efficiency. SLA and HDB have worked through the transition process to ensure that the transition will be as seamless as possible for existing users of State land and properties within HDB estates.

SLA and HDB have worked closely to ensure the preservation of data, institutional knowledge and expertise in relation to the management of vacant State land within HDB estates. The existing HDB team managing the State land portfolio will be transferred to SLA and will continue to manage State land matters within HDB estates, such as the issuance of Temporary Occupation Licences (TOLs) and handling of municipal feedback.

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Murali Pillai

Member of Parliament, Bukit Batok SMC, Advisor to Bukit Batok SMC GROs.