Foo Mee Har

Foo Mee Har ( zh, s=胡美霞, p=Hú Měixiá; born 10 January 1966) is a Malaysian-born Singaporean businesswoman and retired politician. She is a member of the governing People's Action Party (PAP). Foo has served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for the Ayer Rajah division from 2011 to 2020. Since 2020, she has represented the Ayer Rajah-Gek Poh division in the West Coast GRC.

Foo entered electoral politics during the 2011 general election as a part of a five-member PAP team, contesting in the West Coast Group Representation Constituency (GRC) securing 66.6% of the vote. In the 2015 general election, She retained her parliamentary seat in the West Coast GRC, with the PAP team receiving 78.6% of the vote against the Reform Party. In the 2020 general election, Foo continued to hold her seat in West Coast GRC after obtaining 51.68% of the vote.

Foo was appointed as the CEO of the Wealth Management Institute, Asia's Centre of Excellence for wealth and asset management education and research, in 2015. She was also appointed as a Council Member of the Singapore Business Federation in 2018.

Education

Foo attended Ave Maria Convent School (1973 – 1982) in Ipoh, in the state of Perak, Malaysia and later Loreto Normanhurst (1983–1985) in Sydney, Australia from 1983 to 1985. She graduated in 1989 from the University of New South Wales with a Bachelor of Science degree, earning first-class honours in psychology.

Career

Foo started her career in 1990 as a Management Consultant with Coopers and Lybrand Management Consultants (now PricewaterhouseCoopers) and PA Consulting Group. She later joined Jardine Matheson's shipping group as the Head of HR.

Foo was with Standard Chartered Bank from 1994 to 2012. From 2003 to 2005, Foo was appointed Country Head of Consumer Banking in China, spearheading the growth of the Consumer Banking franchise in the country. From 2006 to 2008, she served as President and CEO of Standard Chartered Bank (Thai) PSL, with overall responsibility for the Bank in Thailand. In 2008, Foo was appointed Global Head for Priority & International Banking business with overall responsibility for banking, financing and wealth management of affluent and international banking client segments, a business that spanned over 30 countries in Asia, Africa and the Middle East. Foo was involved with a range of corporate community programs, including advocacy, outreach and fund-raising for causes such as avoidable blindness, HIV/AIDs and healthy living. She started the inaugural Standard Chartered Bangkok Marathon, which has become one of the largest sporting events.

In March 2011, Foo was featured in the ''Sunday Times ''Women at the Top'' series, an eight-part weekly series on successful women in Singapore.

In July 2015, Foo was appointed Chief Executive Officer of the Wealth Management Institute in Singapore.

Political career

Foo joined the PAP in 2010 and was unveiled as PAP's candidate for the 2011 Singapore general election. During her introduction, Foo said that living abroad allowed her to reflect on Singapore and appreciate its unique strengths.

After being elected, she was then appointed Deputy Chairperson of the Finance, Trade and Industry Government Parliamentary Committee (GPC) in the 14th Parliament of Singapore.

PAP Women's Wing

Foo is the Treasurer of the PAP Women's Wing Executive Committee. She is also a member of the Advocacy Subcommittee. She led a position paper urging the government to adopt flexible-work legislation.

In an interview with ''Channel NewsAsia'', she said, "As a professional woman, I'm hoping that I can contribute to the women's agenda in Singapore. I'm a banker by profession, so hopefully this network can help me reach out to women, especially professional women, and understand their issues."

Based on her experience in the financial sector and as a working mother, Foo has advocated for the following causes:

Fiscal sustainability

As Chairman of the Estimates Committee of the Singapore Parliament, Foo urged the government to ensure spending remained sustainable and prudent, without placing excessive tax burdens on future generations of Singaporeans. She also emphasized the importance of establishing KPIs, monitoring mechanisms, and ensuring transparency and accountability in government initiatives. Foo advised the government against relying too heavily on outsourced vendors and consultants for technological knowledge, instead advocating for the development of a strong Singaporean core of public sector officers with expertise in areas such as data science and cybersecurity.

Business transformation

Foo advocated for government support to help small and medium-sized enterprises transform. She urged the government to take a more targeted approach, providing tailored solutions to address the specific operational challenges faced by these companies. At the same time, she highlighted the importance for the private sector to play an active role in driving transformation for it to be successful. Foo also called for the development of strong local capabilities and ecosystems that foster innovation, encourage the adoption of technology, and support research and development (R&D) for successful business transformation. She highlighted the importance of the government creating a framework that facilitates the transfer of capabilities and expertise from multinational corporations (MNCs) to the local ecosystem, while also generating quality jobs within the local economy.

Jobs and training

Foo has called for improvements in skills development amongst Singaporeans, via national policy to prepare Singaporeans for employment. She also pushed for stronger connections between training programmes and employability, stating in Parliament that "There must be clear linkages from training courses to skills, to jobs". She has also spoken out for improved industry competency standards, improved work-study programmes and greater involvement of employers and trade organizations in the effort. In particular, Foo has called for the development of a strong "Singaporean Core" in all major sectors and more job opportunities for ‘Professionals, Managers, Executives and Technicians’ through place-and-train programmes, as well as the re-employment of older workers who wish to work. When Singapore’s economy faced challenging economic times, she consistently advocated for support for Singaporeans affected by economic restructuring.

Foo has called on the government to develop effective strategies to help workers transition to new kinds of work, as machine learning and robotics replace specific tasks performed by humans.

Retirement adequacy

Foo has asked the government to help Singaporeans better understand their assets in the Central Provident Fund (CPF) and the "risk-return" comparisons with other financial products, as well as access to their funds. She has also pushed for improved retirement adequacy, particularly for women and financial security for seniors. Since 2013, she has championed options that allowed Singaporeans to monetise their HDB flats to supplement their retirement needs, if they wished to. She also called for a review of CPF payout durations, a revamp of the CPF Investment Scheme and the launch of the Lifetime Retirement Investment Scheme (LRIS), all towards benefiting CPF members.

Education

Foo pushed for changes in the education system to position future generations of Singaporeans for ‘ Industry 4.0’. In 2018, she said in Parliament that, "The successful reinvention of our educational system depends on transforming pedagogy and redesigning learning tasks." She called on the government to blend work and study into degree programmes to improve job readiness in graduates. Foo also called on the government to review school curriculum to enable students to develop a deeper understanding of ASEAN, China and India, and expand their regional language capabilities. She has been a strong advocate of lifelong learning.

Work-life balance

Since the start of her parliamentary career, Foo has championed the cause for more flexible work arrangements ( flexi-work and work-from-home), especially for women and older workers, as well as other pro-family employment practices. She has also pushed for the Employment Act to extend better protection to ‘Professional, Managerial and Executive’ (PME) employees, as well as contract workers. She said, "Flexi-work should be our response to the modern economy, where workforce agility can generate significant economic benefits and a means to attract and retain talent and get the workforce engaged to boost the competitiveness of companies."

Personal life

Upon her graduation in 1989, Foo moved to Singapore as a permanent resident and married a Singaporean. The couple have two sons.

Foo obtained Singapore citizenship in January 2008 after her overseas postings from 2003 to 2008, when she was eligible to apply for citizenship. Foo spoke about Singapore being home for the last 30 years and that she wanted to make a difference in the lives of Singaporeans.

In an interview with ''The Straits Times'' on 8 September 2008, Foo mentioned that taking up overseas job postings was "always a family decision." In 2003, when Foo was offered a position in China, her husband, then a general manager at a multinational company, left his job to take up a post with another company in China so that the family could relocate together. When Foo was offered a CEO post in Thailand, her family rallied behind her again.

References

External links

Foo Mee Har
on Parliament of Singapore

MP-Elect Profile

{{DEFAULTSORT:Foo, Mee Har
1966 births
Living people
Members of the Parliament of Singapore
People's Action Party politicians
University of New South Wales alumni
Singaporean women in politics
Singaporean people of Hakka descent
Malaysian emigrants to Singapore
People who lost Malaysian citizenship
Naturalised citizens of Singapore
Singapore Business Federation