JAN 19 — He’d walk to the ATM, adjusting his one-size-too-large pants, as we sit tight in the Datsun 120Y. It is one of my most enduring memories of my late father. We are about to eat out, and for the young in a working-class home — my siblings and me — it was about to be a very good night.

So I’m not enthusiastic to attack the RM500 one-off payment the government is about to give each family earning RM3,000 or less. Yes, this probably is an election year, and even though changes in Malaysian aviation may not mean everyone can fly, luckily everyone can still add. That this payment is no coincidence.

However, I want these families to enjoy it. Somehow, most people live within their means and there is a certain life everyone lives — day in, day out — fitting to what they have in the kitty. So an injection of RM500 is bound to give an adrenaline surge to recipients. That is a good.

It came from good government

A minister in charge said the money was available due to good management of the economy. The government of the day, according to him, was just passing back to the rakyat, its due, its largesse.

There is an important concession here, language like the above is not common in Putrajaya. People should benefit from good government is the message, let’s examine that idea more.

It is a fairly important statement. That the people deserve. That this nation must not spend time on whether we as citizens deserve or not, but instead discuss what we deserve.

In summary, the state must decide whether it can give better utility or pass the funds to individuals and hope they get the job done better.

Good government gets the most value from the funds available. Our oil economy distorts things, and averts prudence in government thinking, unfortunately.

Still let’s not stop with the RM500. Three ways to help the economically challenged: Get them more money (the overly disappointing high-income economy pledge), get the citizen more utility from the state’s expenditure and save on their income. 

The column lists below some measures, along the lines of expenditure and income savings, which Prime Minister Najib Razak can implement immediately. The caveat I placed on the suggestions is that they are not elaborate and possible to activate now — low-hanging fruits. 

Education

Every year, most Malaysian families spend billions on after-school tuition under the illusion their children’s education is incomplete otherwise. That is wholly untrue. Except for a minority of students who need extra help to cope with learning, the rest only go to tuition to “beat the system.”

A family with two children likely spends RM200 on tuition monthly.

Switch the system, and the tuition burden might disappear. All the four exam years (UPSR, PMR, SPM, STPM) rely on expert teachers setting the respective subject test questions and answers. If those setting the paper now set completely new questions with no verbatim repeats of previous year papers, the question paper will be hard to predict.

And if those teachers are paid a fair disbursement, and in exchange barred from doing special examination seminars, the tuition industry might clamber around like a drunk.

At the same time, public school teachers will be asked to complete their syllabus without exemption, and barred from advocating tuition in their classrooms. All these will reduce the grip tuition centres have on the wallets of poor families.

Others:

● Water dispensers on campuses. Students are not drinking enough or consuming suspect water from taps. Basic units deployed on school grounds save money and lives.

● Canteen food is generally poor across the board. PTAs should have oversight over canteens, not in managing but in grading them fortnightly. The Education Ministry can then review those negatively-perceived canteens. A good control mechanism leading to healthier young lives.

● Enforce and increase PE classes. The poorer kids are not generally going to get structured and supervised exercise at home, therefore a health hazard manifests when PE is ignored.

● Full Internet connectivity in all school compounds. In many schools it is largely symbolic or limited to some areas on the campus.

● Free annual health screening for all 18 and below by government hospitals.

● Disallow a certain cable company from shooting in schools their promotional videos of their educational channels. The channels are not free, therefore they should not be championed by teachers and students inside schools as imperatives for a complete education. Teachers, students and parents can say so outside school grounds. But right now, it tells parents that they have to get the cable channel or condemn their children to crawl in dank, dark caves.

● Get cheap and open source reliant PCs in schools. Malaysia is a world capital for electronics, located in trade routes and AFTA. Admittedly this is more complex, but it is worth mentioning, and probably hoping.

Workplace

This is a growing nation still, for now. Day-care is a major concern. Government and GLCs, between them employ a large percentage of Malaysians, should have day-care facilities.

Both are over-staffed, some of them can be redirected to running these facilities. Families spend on day-care (facility, transportation, etc), and with these facilities near their workspace do several things: increase productivity, with mothers especially, who are comforted by the young ones on the same premises, reduce travel time for workers, reduce cases of child abuse and increase family bonds.

Others:

● Allow more to work remote or to be on a flexi-schedule so that their lives are not ruled by traffic conditions, parking and scheduling nightmares.

● Free bus passes to government employees. The state already owns and runs the services, and civil servants using the bus pass would mean fewer vehicles on the roads.

● Night buses for main routes. Night travel is expensive. There are no buses after midnight in most cities. Limited service will reduce the cost of travel for many, those on shifts, in the service industry, etc.

● Free water in all restaurants. They will be by law required to serve or have available drinkable water for free to patrons — those already purchasing food and drinks.

The crazier idea

Crazy just because they are different. Every petrol station has stickers indicating how much the government is coughing up as subsidy for each litre of petrol. Ostensibly, they help the average Malaysian. Why not just scrap the subsidy and pass the savings to all Malaysians direct. They can choose to either buy full-priced petrol, spend the money on public transportation or stay at home more.

There will be general price increases as people tend to exploit petrol price increases, as this proposal will bring, but in time it will correct itself and second, subsidy exploiters will not have free rides.

This saving passed back to consumers might result in higher utility to the families than protecting them with subsidised petrol. The community might also become more responsible for its use of fossil fuel.

RM500 is just the start

At the end, the concession that excess money should be passed to those who need it does raise the larger debate of how to pass benefits to the citizenry.

That is why despite the sincerity of the RM500 pay-off is questionable, its recipients’ rights to it is unquestionable.

The challenge is to find ways to make the other expenditure more meaningful to the many, mostly the poor. And that enacted policies help the many to save money.

With those two in positive motion, more people will have more good days, beyond a one-off payment.

* The views expressed here are the personal opinion of the columnist.