CPF Education Scheme for All Approved Educational Institutions

41 Mr Patrick Tay Teck Guan asked the Minister for Manpower whether the CPF Education Scheme can be expanded to all programmes at approved educational institutions and not limited to only full-time subsidised diploma/degree courses.

Mr Lim Swee Say: The primary purpose of the Central Provident Fund (CPF) is to support retirement, healthcare and housing needs. When the CPF was expanded to support education in 1989, it was designed as a loan scheme and confined to only, firstly, full-time, secondly subsidised, and thirdly diploma and degree programmes offered by local approved educational institutions. Students have to repay in cash the amount withdrawn plus interest into the CPF member’s Ordinary Account so as to restore members' CPF savings for their retirement needs. This cautious approach is to safeguard the fundamental objectives of CPF.

With increasing life expectancy, we are doing more to safeguard the retirement adequacy of CPF members. We need to be careful about expanding the use of CPF, including the proposal by the Member to include all programmes beyond full-time subsidised diplomas and degrees.