MANUAL FOREIGN WORKERS FROM NON-TRADITIONAL SOURCES (Employment)

Mr Teo Chong Tee asked the Minister for Labour whether his Ministry will introduce a policy to allow the entry of manual foreign workers from the non-traditional sources like Indonesia, Myanmar, Nepal, Thailand, etc into our service-oriented and labour-intensive industries which are currently facing a decreasing supply of local manual workers and workers from Malaysia.

The Minister for Labour (Dr Lee Boon Yang): Sir, my Ministry is of the view that we should not open the manufacturing and service sectors to foreign workers from non-traditional sources (NTS). These sectors have been allowed to recruit foreign workers from Malaysia to supplement local workers. Experience shows that Malaysian workers, being from a traditional source, are less likely to create social problems as Malaysian employment practices and social norms are fairly similar to ours. While employers now have to put in greater effort to recruit Malaysian workers compared to a few years ago, because Malaysian wages have risen, the number of Malaysians coming to work in Singapore is still increasing. Compared to the construction and marine sectors, the manufacturing and service sectors have also less difficulty in attracting local and Malaysian workers as the working environment is much better.

Sir, allowing NTS workers into the manufacturing and service sectors can result in a big increase in the number of NTS workers in Singapore. This will aggravate the social problems caused by such workers and make it more difficult to manage the NTS worker population.

Instead of allowing NTS workers into the manufacturing and service sectors, we should examine whether we can make it easier for these sectors to attract more workers from our traditional source. My Ministry is presently reviewing the foreign worker policy to see how we can do so. For a start, last year, we raised the dependency ceiling for the manufacturing sector from 45% to 50% and for the service sector from 20% to 25%. I am aware that higher wages and ample employment opportunities in Malaysia have made it less attractive for Malaysian workers to work in Singapore, and that Malaysian wages are closer to Singapore wages compared to wages in the home countries of NTS workers. We will take this into consideration in our review.

Mr Heng Chiang Meng: Sir, may I ask the Minister whether he would therefore look into the reduction of the foreign workers' levy from the traditional sources as part of his review

Dr Lee Boon Yang: Mr Speaker, Sir, as I said, we are reviewing the foreign worker policy. We will consider all these factors and this is one option that will be considered.