MINISTRY OF THE ENVIRONMENT (Displacement of Pumping Station attendants)

Mr M.K.A. Jabbar asked the Minister for the Environment if he will explain why about sixty monthly-rated staff in his Ministry were recently converted to daily-rated staff resulting in a loss to them in take-home pay.

Mr Ong Pang Boon: Mr Speaker, Sir, in line with our national policy of upgrading operations and reducing manpower, the Ministry has progressively automated its sewage pumping stations. As a result, the 65 pumping station attendants have to be displaced. There are no vacancies of equivalent grade in the Ministry to absorb all the 65 attendants.

Consequently, the pumping station attendants were informed in December 1980 that they would all be retired by the end of March 1981. At the same time, the Ministry circulated notices of monthly-rated job vacancies in the Ministry of the Environment, Ministry of Health, Prisons Department, Jurong Town Corporation, Housing and Development Board, Telecommunications Authority of Singapore and CISCO for the 65 pumping station attendants to apply. There were adequate monthly-rated posts to absorb the 65 attendants, if they were selected. The Ministry also circulated notices of vacancies in its skilled and semi-skilled daily-rated posts.

To-date, 13 pumping station attendants have applied for the monthly-rated posts. Four were offered and accepted jobs with the Ministry with no break in service and no loss of salary, while two were selected and offered jobs by the Jurong Town Corporation. Thirty-nine chose to apply for the skilled and semi-skilled daily-rated posts in the Ministry, out of which 35 were offered appointments.

It is inevitable that some of the pumping station attendants may suffer a drop in take-home pay, depending on the jobs they have applied for. However, several of the alternative jobs have higher wage ceilings. This means that in a few years' time, they can earn more in their new jobs than if they were to stay in their existing posts.

My Ministry is also looking into the retraining of some of the attendants if they can be re-employed by the Ministry. This will upgrade them for higher skilled and higher paid jobs in the Ministry.