Comrade John De Payva, President of NTUC,
Central Committee members,
Presidents, General Secretaries and Executive committee members of our affiliated unions,
CEOs and management of Cooperatives,
NTUC-ARU staff
A Good morning to you all,
There was a vicious sting in the tail of the year 2004. The huge earthquake off the northwest tip of Sumatra on 26 December 2004 let loose a huge tsunami that killed over 150,000 in countries around the Indian Ocean. Many Singaporeans were also affected. I am heartened to note that NTUC cooperatives, affiliated unions and many of you have contributed in one way or the other to help the victims of the tsunami disaster. As a token of respect before we start on our workplans seminar, I would like to ask that we observe a minute of silence for the victims of the tsunami disaster. If I you will all please join me by standing up.
[1 minute]
Thank you and please be seated
Globalization
Last year was a year of recovery and consolidation of the economy. The economy grew by 8.1%. Growth for 2005 is expected to be between 3 to 5% growth. It looks small only because last year’s growth looks big as it was measured against a poor 2003.
The unemployment rate is also gradually coming down. As of third quarter 2004, the unemployment rate is 3.4% compared to 5.3% in second quarter 2004. Workers have also obtained better bonuses in 2004 compared to 2003. Civil servants received a total of 2.25 months compared to 1.75 months the previous year. For the private sector, the Industrial Relations Department of NTUC has received information that 80 companies have settled their annual bonuses with their unions. The lowest was zero, and the highest was 7.2 months. The average was about 2.5 months. Separately, I am told that branches of the SMMWU received between a quarter month and one month more in bonuses compared to 2003.
However, underlying all these positive numbers, there has been a lot of toil and hard work by our unions and NTUC to protect and enhance the position of workers. It is now 2005 and time for us to examine what we can further do for our workers, our unions, our members and just as importantly our staff.
Globalization has come of age. In the 1970s and 1980s, Singapore benefited from an inflow of manufacturing investments. We manufactured textiles, white goods such as TVs, radios and irons, and disk drives. Some of these have gone, and for others were are producing less. Global competition is relentless. We witnessed developments that have posed significant challenges for our workers.
To bring home the point, NTUC organized learning trips to India and China. Our union members have seen for themselves at first hand what these global challenges mean. Companies here have offshored or outsourced many of their non-core activities to lower cost countries. Companies have also embarked on wage restructuring to enhance their cost competitiveness. Atypical workers have emerged as companies have become conservative in manpower hiring, preferring to hire part-time or temporary workers. There are also more foreign workers in Singapore, because we have not enough high-skilled workers, and fewer Singaporeans are prepared to take on the lower skilled, low-paying jobs.
Globalisation brings about a greater pace of change. It brings about greater volatility. With a greater pace of change, it brings a greater sense of uncertainty to people. Those who are less economically mobile will find it more difficult to cope with this sense of uncertainty. As a union movement, we must be sensitive to the needs of the workers.
We need to arm our workers. Equip them with the tools and skills to be nimble and flexible to cope;
We should create opportunities for our workers;
We should strengthen and create mechanisms so that workers have the means to cope with job changes;
We should strive to be stronger voices on their behalf.
We start with training and skills upgrading. This will allow workers to be employable, flexible and open up career options to exploit Singapore as a land of opportunities. We have talked about training and skills upgrading countless times over many years. It still remains relevant and perhaps even more so. Let’s not lose focus on it. This applies not only to the young but also the old as it is a growing trend that most of our workers will work past the official retirement age of 62.
Over the years I have studied the social security systems of different countries, to learn from their experiences. I have come to the conclusion that most workers can continue to enjoy the same standard of living in their old age only if they continue working as long as they can. It means adapting, moving on to another job more suited for them. But it means a readiness to learn. It also means self-discipline, to keep fit and healthy. We will have to work with our social partners – government and employers – to facilitate the employment of older workers.
We will create opportunities for our workers using Job Redesign. There is a strong need to cater for those workers displaced by globalization. One of the key outcomes of Job Redesign is to “Redesign, Retrain and Reclaim” back the jobs for our workers in the domestic services sectors. Attention will also be paid to reducing jobs mismatch. Workers with the right skills should be deployed to the right jobs. Workers without the right skills will be trained and matched to the right jobs. Wage restructuring will continue to be pursued to enable job security and wage flexibility. In addition, customer-centric initiatives will be launched to orient our workers towards service excellence and revenue generation. When revenue grows, there will be a bigger piece of the pie to share!
We will continue to push for Individual Savings Account, Individual Learning Accounts and portable medical benefits for our workers. This will create mechanisms to provide backup plans for contingencies that workers may face.
The employment contract is also changing between the workers and the company. There is an emergence of atypical workers in the economy. There are more part-time, contract and flexi-workers. We will need to ensure that they are adequately represented and the labour laws are relevant for the protection of these workers. They should not lose out in savings for retirement, or in provisions for medical treatment. At the same time, fair treatment should also be extended to foreign workers.
Members and Union Leadership
Importantly, what should we do for our members? We strive to be Member-Centric. We have to ask ourselves some questions. Does a worker know immediately where he can seek help when he has a grievance? Does a worker know who represents him for wage increases, bonuses and fringe benefits? Does he benefit from training and retraining extended by unions? Does he benefit from what union co-operatives provide in stretching his hard-earned dollars? Beyond these, is there a lively relationship between him and his union? How do the union and the NTUC keep in regular contact with members? This is so that the union member feels that NTUC and the unions are always looking after his or her welfare.
The leadership at every level in our union movement plays a key role in the sustainability and strength of the labour movement. I have been speaking about this issue on many occasions. Leadership, especially in the area of leadership renewal, can be a sensitive topic. But it is an important topic. The CEO of Nestle was in Singapore last year for a workshop. He told the participants that he started to look for a successor once he was appointed as the CEO! I am not surprised by his statement because I commenced looking for my successor the day I was first elected Secretary-General of NTUC. I am not insisting that you all do the same. But a smooth transition in leadership cannot be done over night. It takes time. Therefore, we need to work on this and create process of healthy renewal in our leaderships at all levels. If we want the organization that we lead to prosper and growth in a sustainable manner, we as leaders would need to ensure that the best people take over the torch and lead the way forward. If we overstay in our positions, we will cause harm to the people we serve.
Conclusion
For this year, NTUC has adopted a “centric” approach in drawing up the work-plans. The “centric” approach comes from the word “centre”. What we are saying here is to put each of the stakeholders in the centre. By putting each of our stakeholders in the centre, we put the spotlight on each of these stakeholders, for example the worker. We focus on what are the needs of the workers and what are the things we need to do. This way, we can be more sensitive to the needs. This way, we can be more effective. This way, we can be more sustainable. While the key focus is the worker, in our range of work, our stakeholders are the members, the customers, the union and our staff.
Now let me hand you over to the programme directors who will elaborate on their key programmes for 2005 to help our workers. If you have any questions, please feel free to clarify them at the end of each presentation.
Thank you.
