It was her first major address to tripartite partners after assuming the Cabinet position of Manpower Minister on 1 May 2018.
Speaking at the Ministry of Manpower’s (MOM) Workplan Seminar themed “Tripartism in an Age of Disruption” on 28 May 2018, Mrs Josephine Teo outlined three ways to further strengthen tripartism for the betterment of all working people.
Mrs Teo said she has consulted NTUC Secretary-General (SG) Ng Chee Meng and Singapore National Employers Federation (SNEF) President Dr Robert Yap on the steps ahead.
Helping Older Workers
The first step is to help older workers stay relevant in the age of technological disruption, said Mrs Teo.
Currently, about one in three of Singapore’s resident workforce is aged 50 and above. They are anxious about the future with technology disrupting businesses and jobs.
To address their worries, Mrs Teo announced that a Tripartite Workgroup on Older Workers will be formed.
It will be chaired by the Permanent Secretary for Manpower Aubeck Kam and involve representatives from the tripartite partners, with Mrs Teo, SG Ng and Dr Yap on board as the workgroup’s advisors.
The workgroup will focus on ensuring workplaces are progressive and value older workers. It will also review how relevant the present retirement and re-employment age ceilings are and consider the next moves in these areas.
NTUC Assistant Secretary-General (ASG) Cham Hui Fong emphasised that the intention of the tripartite committee is to protect the interests of mature workers and work with partners to ensure that mature workers will continue to add value to companies.
She explained: “For retirement, we would like to have a tripartite consensus if we should raise retirement age since most people are able to work beyond 62 today. For re-employment, we are looking at further extending the re-employment age. An ageing Singaporean workforce is a reality, so workers’ training and job redesign including embracing technology to up productivity of older workers go hand-in-hand to ensure the viability of businesses and also the interests of workers.”
Enhancing IGP
The next area is to enhance the Inclusive Growth Programme (IGP) which is administered by NTUC’s e2i (Employment and Employability Institute).
Launched in 2010, IGP incentivises businesses to share productivity gains with lower-wage workers. Mrs Teo said this has benefitted over 2,500 employers and 113,000 workers to date.
During the recent debate on the President’s address, SG Ng revealed that NTUC will expand the use of the IGP to support more companies in their efforts to raise productivity and ensure that lower-wage workers are taken care in the process.
MOM will work with NTUC to enhance IGP and look into other possibilities to ensure that lower-wage workers are also part of the nation’s progress.
NTUC ASG Zainal Sapari, who has been championing the Progressive Wage Model for lower-wage workers, added that the enhanced IGP could also look into including skills training and career progression opportunities for this group of workers.
Improving HR Capabilities
The third area is to help enterprises improve their human capital capabilities.
For this, the SkillsFuture For Enterprises (SFE) will be rolled out to help companies put in place human resource systems and practices to provide better training and development for their workers.
MOM is partnering SNEF in a one-year pilot programme to target 1,000 companies across the 23 sectors under the Industry Transformation Maps. It plans to expand the programme to 10,000 companies over five years.
Good To Know
The Labour Movement has several initiatives to help workers upskill themselves and companies improve their HR capabilities:
• NTUC LearningHub (LHUB) in partnership with Amazon Web Services and NTUC’s e2i (Employment and Employability Institute) rolled out new programmes to raise cloud computing literacy among working Singaporeans.
• LHUB also has the SkillsFuture for the Digital Workplace, a course for all Singaporean adults including those planning to return to the workforce to be familiar with the use of new technologies at work or in their personal lives.
• LHUB is also involved in the creation of an online self-help HR resource portal (website address?) for companies in collaboration with Enterprise Singapore and the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development.
You can find out more at www.ntuclearninghub.com
