Singapore’s Workplace Safety and Health (WSH) performance has been gradually improving over the years.
In 2010, Singapore’s three-year average workplace fatality rate stood at 2.5 per 100,000 workers. Eight years later, the rate stood at 1.4.
In 2018, Singapore ranked seventh among OECD countries, an improvement from 18th in 2010.
So far, there are only four OECD countries in the world that have reduced their workplace fatality rate to less than 1 per 100,000 workers – Netherlands, Sweden, United Kingdom and Germany. These countries are the top four in having the best WSH track records.
Singapore hopes to join the ranks of the four OECD countries by reducing fatal and major injury rates to less than 1 per 100,000 before 2028. And to do so, the WSH 2028 Tripartite Strategies Committee has recently recommended strategies.
Three other outcomes the committee hopes to achieve by 2028 are:
As part of the strategy to achieve the outcomes, the committee said that all stakeholders should take WSH ownership beyond the basic level.
To facilitate this, the rates of workplace fatalities and major injuries for every company will be published online by the Ministry of Manpower (MOM).
Minister of State for Manpower Zaqy Mohamad said: “It gives greater visibility to market, in terms of who you work with, not just for service buyers but also for consumers if you’re interested to see whether the companies you work with are safe and are taking care of the safety of their workers.”
Business owners must also share work injury compensation claims information with the insurance industry so that premiums will now be differentiated according to the WSH performance of a firm.
To strengthen the WSH ownership of workers, unions will use collective agreements and partnerships signed with companies to implement initiatives such as WSH committees and near-miss reporting systems.
Every union would also be expected to have in-house WSH expertise.
Additionally, the Migrant Workers’ Centre will assist in educating foreign workers on progressive WSH practices.
“Today, some unionised companies already have WSH terms in their collective agreements. I think what we want is to make this a structured way of looking at WSH for all companies. With unionised companies, we will put this in place to their framework, and for non-unionised companies, we will work with them to sign MOUs [memoranda of understanding] to focus on safety and health at the workplace,” said NTUC Assistant Secretary-General Melvin Yong, who sits on the committee.
Another strategy will be to enhance focus on workplace health by expanding occupational disease prevention efforts, such as through expanding the list of occupational diseases that must be reported to MOM under the WSH Act, and building companies’ capabilities to promote workplace health.
"Chronic conditions like diabetes, for example, that are not well managed can also cause a worker to lose consciousness and therefore affect not just his safety but also the safety of his co-workers," said Mr Zaqy.
The committee also said that there is potential for WSH to be transformed through technology. One of the recommendations for this is to develop a WSH technology roadmap to identify emerging technologies that can help solve WSH problems.
“One of the game changers in the recommendations is the use of technology to mitigate or replace high-risk jobs. This would really help workers in areas where the jobs may not be safe or come with certain risks … We hope to work closely with companies to implement these,” added Mr Yong.
