Statement on the Statutes (Miscellaneous Amendments) Bill
The statutory validation clarifies the basis for property-related administrative charges, potentially reducing uncertainty for owners, developers and buyers using these agency services.
Parliament passed legislation on 7 May 2026 validating agency charges including HDB transaction-approval fees and BCA expedited building-inspection and Temporary Occupation Permit fees.
Body
On 7 May 2026, Parliament passed the Statutes (Miscellaneous Amendments) Bill ( the “Bill”).
Among other things, the Bill validated various fees and charges of certain agencies, including the following:
(a) Fees for expedited inspection of buildings and processing of Temporary Occupation Permits, as well as search and copying fees for structural building plans by BCA;
(b) Fees for expedited processing of certain licences and permits, and fees for species certification by NParks;
(c) Administrative fees by HDB for compulsory acquisition cases, and fees to seek HDB’s approval to carry out various transactions (e.g. resale, transfer, subletting);
(d) Recovery of expenses by HDB and URA for immobilisation, towage and detention or storage of illegally parked vehicles.
These fees and charges were to recover operational costs incurred by the agencies in providing these services. The fees and charges were publicly known and properly administered.
In their Facebook post dated 12 May 2026, the Workers' Party (WP) has queried whether these fees were illegally collected in the past.
The Government’s position is that the fees and charges were legally and properly collected.
As these fees and charges were for carrying out statutory and regulatory functions, the Government has also acknowledged that it would be better to provide for them in legislation, even though the agencies can prescribe such fees, without such legislation.