Take-up Rate of Trust Services for Persons with Disabilities from Low- and Middle-income Families

5 Mr Murali Pillai asked the Minister for Social and Family Development (a) what has been the take-up rate of trust services for persons with disabilities from low- and middle-income families to ensure that they are financially taken care of after their primary caregivers are no longer able to support them; and (b) whether the financial support that the Ministry provides to the Special Needs Trust Company (SNTC) for the set-up of trust and related services for the benefit of persons with disabilities can be structured in a manner that will allow the SNTC to focus more on reaching out to families with persons with disabilities from low and middle income backgrounds.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Social and Family Development (Mr Eric Chua) (for the Minister for Social and Family Development): Sir, the Special Needs Trust Company (SNTC), is a not-for-profit trust company incorporated in 2008 to enable families to set up affordable trusts for their loved ones with special needs.

As of 31 January this year, SNTC has a portfolio of 889 SNTC Trust accounts, of which 65% of the accounts are set up by families living in HDB flats.

MSF fully funds the operating costs of the SNTC, which helps to ensure that the trust is affordable and accessible to low- and middle-income families. The initial capital required to set up an SNTC trust account is only $5,000 compared to private trusts which usually requires at least $50,000.

Since 2011, SNTC has also proactively raised donations under its Financial Assistance Scheme to help eligible low-income elderly caregivers with the initial capital of $5,000 to set up a trust account. In October last year, SNTC also launched the Gift of a Lifetime Sponsorship Scheme, or GOAL in short. GOAL supports eligible low-income families with the initial $5,000 needed to set up an SNTC trust account and a further $5,000 matching grant to help the parents co-pay the premium of an affordable term policy, where the insurance proceeds will be paid into the child's SNTC trust account upon the demise of the insured parent. This better ensures that there will be sufficient funds in the trust account to support the long-term care needs of their child.

MSF will continue to explore ways to ensure that SNTC trust services remains affordable and accessible to low-income and middle-income families.

Mr Deputy Speaker: Mr Murali Pillai.

Mr Murali Pillai (Bukit Batok): Mr Deputy Speaker, Sir, I thank the hon Parliamentary Secretary for his detailed answer. I would like to take this opportunity to pay tribute to the board members and the management staff of the SNTC, who have been doing good work since 2008 to help families with special needs members and to give the caregivers assurance that once they pass on, their children with special needs will continue to be taken care of, if they have entered into trust arrangements.

My supplementary question is in relation to quickening the pace of assistance to families from low- and middle-income backgrounds. May I ask whether the Ministry would be prepared to do a gaps analysis to see how much more demand there would be – recognising on one hand, we have SNTC since 2008, administering about 900 trusts; and on the other hand, the number of persons with disabilities in our resident population is about 650,000?

Mr Eric Chua: I thank the Member for his supplementary question. On the point about quickening the pace of our support that is given to low-income families with special needs individuals in the household, SNTC has moved quite a bit in that direction. Hence, the set-up of GOAL in October last year.

Since GOAL was set up, we have also seen a groundswell of donations coming in and we are very happy with what has been achieved through this scheme. The scheme, as I said, was set up in October last year and is still in its infancy stage. So, I would think we should give SNTC some time, to let this scheme grow and mature. Over time, at the appropriate juncture, we can then take stock and perform the gaps analysis that the Member has mentioned to see what else we can do for low- as well as middle-income families in this area.