Preserving Jobs for Singaporeans

Mr Yaw Shin Leong asked the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Manpower whether the Ministry will preserve Singaporeans' jobs in light of the uncertain economic outlook for 2012 by (i) requiring employers to look for qualified candidates at agencies, such as the WDA and e2i, before issuing employment passes; (ii) slowing down the approval rate of employment passes for firms which have conducted retrenchment exercises in the past one year involving 5% or more of Singaporeans in their workforce.

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Mr Tharman Shanmugaratnam: MTI has estimated that economic growth in 2012 will slow down to between 1-3%, below our medium-term growth potential of 3-5%. While we may help companies weather a slowdown, we must also avoid moves that create unnecessary difficulties and uncertainty for businesses, and hence risk hurting the prospects for a recovery in growth and jobs for Singaporeans.

To enhance the employment of Singaporeans, both in periods of growth and slowdown, we have adopted a multi-pronged approach.

First, we seek to maintain a conducive environment for businesses to grow in order to create and sustain job opportunities in Singapore. At the same time, we invest heavily in education and training opportunities for Singaporeans to continuously upgrade their skill-sets to remain competitive and employable.

Second, we seek to progressively raise the quality of foreign manpower inflows and reduce over-reliance on foreign workers. From 1 January 2012, new Employment Pass applicants will have to meet more stringent eligibility criteria which include better educational qualifications and higher qualifying salaries. Foreign worker levies are also being raised every six months until 2013, to incentivise productivity improvements. We also refer companies seeking foreign manpower whose skills and expertise are available locally to the Workforce Development Agency (WDA) and the Employment and Employability Institute (e2i) so that they can meet their manpower requirements.

Third, we utilise Tripartite Guidelines to help ensure that Singaporeans are not disadvantaged in their employment opportunities and that Singaporeans remain the core of our workforce. The Tripartite Alliance for Fair Employment Practices (TAFEP) released a set of revised guidelines on Fair Employment Practices in October 2011. The guidelines, which all employers are expected to adhere to, call for employers to make reasonable efforts to attract and consider Singaporeans for job positions on merit, and to train and develop their potential and careers. Such efforts include ensuring that all jobs advertised are open to Singaporeans, working with educational institutions, career centres and recruitment agencies, such as WDA and e2i, to attract and recruit Singaporeans, and developing the skills and expertise of Singaporean employees and grooming them for higher level jobs.

During the last downturn in 2008/2009, we also developed a set of "Tripartite Guidelines on Managing Excess Manpower" to help guide companies facing a business downturn to manage their workforce flexibly through alternative measures (eg, shorter workweek, training) instead of resorting to retrenchment. If the need arises, similar measures may be adopted to help employers and workers deal with the downturn.

The combined effect of the range of measures above is to help Singaporeans remain employed even during an economic slowdown. At the same time, we have to avoid measures which hinder companies' ability to build up the skills and expertise of their teams. Doing that will reduce Singapore's attractiveness to investors and businesses, limit our ability to respond quickly to changes in global market conditions, and ultimately dampen companies' ability to create more and better jobs for Singaporeans.

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Nevertheless, we will continue to monitor the economic and employment situation closely and make further refinements to our measures as necessary to help Singapore-based businesses and Singaporeans weather the impending economic slowdown.