Grace Fu

Grace Fu Hai Yien (Chinese: 傅海燕; pinyin: Fù Hǎi Yiàn; born 29 March 1964) is a Singaporean politician. A member of the country's governing People's Action Party (PAP), she is the Minister for Culture, Community and Youth. She is the second woman in Singapore's history to hold the status of full Minister, after Lim Hwee Hwa.

Fu began her career with Overseas Union Bank (OUB) as an auditor from 1985 to 1988. She then joined the Haw Par Group, where she worked in corporate planning, financial control and business development from 1991 to 1995.

In October 1995, Fu joined the PSA Corporation as an Assistant Director (Finance). She took on additional responsibilities as Vice-President (Marketing) and assumed the position of Financial Controller of the PSA Corporation in October 1998. She was promoted to the position of Executive Vice-President (Finance) in January 1999. In April 2003, Fu was appointed chief executive officer of Singapore Terminals. In 2004, she became the chief executive officer of PSA South East Asia and Japan, where she was responsible for the business performance of PSA's flagship terminals in Singapore, Thailand, Brunei and Japan.

Fu has been a non-practising member of the Institute of Certified Public Accountants of Singapore since 1992.

Political career

Fu was one of 24 new PAP candidates formally introduced by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong ahead of the 2006 general election. She was elected in June 2006 as a Member of Parliament (MP) for the Jurong Group Representation Constituency (Jurong GRC). On 1 August 2006, Fu was appointed a Minister of State for the Ministry of National Development

On 1 April 2008, Fu was promoted to Senior Minister of State at the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of National Development.

At the 2011 general election, Fu was elected as the MP for the Yuhua Single Member Constituency. She defeated the Singapore Democratic Party's candidate Teo Soh Lung by 14,093 votes (66.9%) to 6,986 (33.1%). Following the election, Fu was appointed Senior Minister of State at the Ministry of Information, Communications and the Arts and the Ministry of the Environment and Water Resources.

In January 2012 Fu expressed concerns over the planned 36–37% income cuts for ministers, saying that if ministerial pay was further reduced in the future, it would "make it harder for anyone considering political office". Her comments contributed to the ongoing public debate over compensation and motivation of public officials, and were subject to criticism from Internet users in Singapore. Others defended her remark as fair, supporting her position that loss of privacy and public scrutiny adds a large personal cost to public positions not found in the private sector.

On 31 July 2012, Fu was promoted to full Minister, together with Josephine Teo. She is the second woman in Singapore's history, after Lim Hwee Hua, to hold this status. She was Minister in the Prime Minister's Office, Second Minister for the Environment and Water Resources and Second Minister for Foreign Affairs from 2012 to 2015. She is currently the Minister for Culture, Community & Youth, the first female minister to hold such political post.

Fu was educated in Nanyang Girls' High School and Hwa Chong Junior College, before going on to the National University of Singapore where she completed a Bachelor of Accountancy (Honours) in 1985 and a Master of Business Administration in 1991.

Fu is married and has three sons. One of her sons was awarded the prestigious Singapore Armed Forces Overseas Scholarship (SAFOS) to read physics at Oxford University.