In 1966 the Singapore Government institutionalised a bilingual education policy, under which Singaporean students were required to learn both English and their "designated mother-tongue". For ethnic-Chinese Singaporeans, the designated language was Mandarin, in line with the national language policy pursued in both Nationalist and Communist China. The Goh Report, an evaluation of Singapore's education system by Dr. Goh Keng Swee, claimed that less than 40% of the student population managed to attain the minimum level of competency in two languages.'The Goh Report' The Government then alleged that learning of Mandarin amongst the Singapore Chinese was hindered by the home use of various varieties of Chinese. These varieties included Hokkien, Teochew, Cantonese and Hakka.Manfred Wu Man-Fat, "A Critical Evaluation of Singapore's Language Policy and its Implications for English Teaching ", Karen's Linguistics Issues. Retrieved 4 November 2010Bokhorst-Heng, W.D. (1998). "Unpacking the Nation", in Allison D. et al (ed.), Text in Education and Society, Singapore: Singapore University Press, pp. 202–204. . Since then, the Singapore Government has pursued a hostile stance against these varieties, and has promoted the use of Mandarin as a universal mother-tongue amongst Singapore Chinese.
