To help lower-income households with costs of living, the quantum of GST Voucher (GSTV) – Cash will be increased by $50 from 2015 onwards, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam said in the Budget 2015 statement yesterday.
Eligible Singaporeans aged 21 years and above will receive $150 or $300, depending on the annual value of their home. However, individuals who own more than one property will not qualify for the GSTV – Cash.
The enhancement will cost $70 million per year and benefit about 1.4 million Singaporeans.
Eligible older Singaporeans aged 55 years and above will receive the GSTV – Seniors’ Bonus to help them with their daily expenses. Including the GSTV – Cash that they regularly get, they will get up to $600.
Those aged 65 years and above and living in homes with an annual value of up to $13,000, which comprises mostly HDB flats, will receive a further $300. They will therefore get a total of $900.
This will cost $315 million in 2015 and benefit more than 660,000 elderly Singaporeans.
To provide further support for cost of living, the government will provide one to three months of Service & Conservancy Charges (S&CC) rebates.
One and two-room HDB households will receive a total of three months of rebates for this year, while three and four-room households will receive two months of rebates.
The S&CC rebate costs $80 million and will benefit about 800,000 HDB households.
Muneerah Bee, Senior Journalist at PropertyGuru, wrote this story. To contact her about this or other stories email muneerah@propertyguru.com.sg
