Mr Lim Swee Say, Secretary-General, NTUC
Comrades from our affiliated unions
Management partners
Tripartite partners
Distinguished guests
Ladies and gentlemen
Good morning!
1. First, let me extend a very warm welcome to everyone present at today’s event. About a year ago, the NTUC launched our efforts to promote the re-employment of older workers with only 23 companies pledging their commitment to re-employ workers reaching retirement age. We set for ourselves a pretty modest target of 50 unionised companies to fine-tune their re-employment policies and wage system, and to redesign jobs to make them age neutral.
2. One year hence, I am glad to announce that we have made significant progress in our efforts to help older workers get re-employed. To-date, 208 companies have committed to re-employing older workers, with 2674 workers above 62 being re-employed. At this point, I want take this opportunity to thank our management partners, our affiliates and the Singapore Workforce Development Agency (WDA) for the support in helping to promote the re-employment of older workers.
3. Our management partners value the contributions of older workers and are far-sighted in tapping their experience and capabilities.
4. As we all know, the labour market is tightening and this is another important piece of good news for our older workers. A record high number of our older population is in the labour force and in employment, as reported in the recent Ministry of Manpower (MOM) findings. The participation rate among males aged 60 to 64 rose substantially from 49% in 1996 to 63% in 2006. The labour force participation rate of older male in Singapore compares favourably to countries in the region and beyond. Similarly, the labour force participation rate of older female in Singapore for the same age group showed encouraging improvement too; from 15% in ten years ago to 26% in 2006.
5. One major factor is strong economic and job growth. For companies that have not come on board yet, this is the best time to do so as the labour shortage is likely to continue for some time. Last evening, the MOM announced various measures to ease the labour shortage in some sectors by allowing more foreign workers. We urge companies not to look at foreign workers alone to ease their labour shortage but to also focus on how to maximise opportunities for our older workers as what we need to see is a sustainable, long term commitment to employ older workers. We urge companies to move away from an ad hoc, random approach in the re-employment of workers above 62 years of age to a more pro-active and systematic policy in addressing this challenge brought about by a rapidly ageing population.
6. In a survey which was recently conducted by the MOM, many companies expressed their wish to employ older workers, so what we need to do now is to help these companies move on to the next stage and actually translate this strong desire into a practical implementation programme.
7. To help companies adopt a systematic and structured approach in the employment and retention of older workers, we have since the launch developed five strategic thrusts to promote the employment of older workers. Expanding employment opportunities for older workers through job-redesign; enhancing their cost competitiveness through age neutral remuneration system; raising their skill and value through training and skill upgrading; changing the mindset of both the older workers and employers and helping our older workers remain fit and healthy. This will be our key focus for this year. We look forward to working closely with our affiliates, management partners and WDA to achieve this.
8. Since last year too, we have initiated a number of activities in order help companies to tap the potential of our older workers through workshops and seminars. One key tool is the funding through the “ADVANTAGE” scheme, a 30 million dollar fund, which has been made available to help companies embark on projects to employ or to re-employ older workers. To date, a total of 40 unionised companies have benefited from the scheme. Some of these companies are featured this morning. They have tapped on the ADVANTAGE fund to automate, mechanise, change their job processes or retrain their older workers and supervisors to deal with an ageing workforce.
9. In line with this more strategic approach in promoting the re-employment of older workers, we are launching today two programmes. The first progamme is the Seniors’ Employment Guidance Programme. Developed in tandem with the Centre for Seniors, this programme is targeted at older workers, to help them prepare for work beyond the retirement age. We realise that it is not sufficient to focus on companies alone as workers too need to re-adjust, moderate their expectations and prepare for new challenges if they want to remain gainfully employed.
10. The second programme that we are launching today is the U-HEALTH Programme, which has been developed by the NTUC together with the Health Promotion Board. This programme is aimed at keeping older workers healthy and fit for work as we realise that there are many older workers who want to work but their health situation becomes a major obstacle to their re-employment. Employers, understandably, are concerned over the issue of higher medical cost if they were to re-employ these older workers.
11. Employers have also cited safety as another reason why they find it difficult to re-employ unfit older workers, especially if these workers are doing jobs which can compromise their own safety or that of fellow workers if they fall ill whilst at work. So, it is important that older workers stay healthy and fit to prepare them for a longer period of employment.
12. I am happy to announce that forty companies have agreed to take part in the Seniors’ Employment Guidance and the U-HEALTH programme.
13. As we move on, we also need to highlight and showcase the examples of companies, which have developed good practices in the re-employment of older workers. These are companies which have adopted one or more of the five strategies that I mentioned earlier, that is, expanding employment opportunities for older workers through job-redesign; enhancing their cost competitiveness through age neutral remuneration system; raising their skill and value through training and skill upgrading; changing the mindset of both the older workers and employers and helping our older workers remain fit and healthy.
14. Today, in our programme line-up some of these companies will be sharing their experiences with us and I hope that other companies that have not yet embarked on these five strategies would find these experiences useful for implementing their own programmes to help our older workers remain re-employed.
15. Croda Singapore, a manufacturer of special chemical for healthcare products has 22% of their workfare above age 40. The company tapped the ADVANTAGE fund to mechanise and automate their process to make work environment less physically demanding and strenuous so that older workers can do the job as effectively as their younger peers.
16. Cooking up another success recipe for older workers is NTUC Foodfare, which has 60% of workers age 40 and above. NTUC Foodfare hires older workers for their reliability and low turnover. They also find that older workers, contrary to popular belief, are flexible and open to changes. The co-operative has analysed their work process and implement mechanisation to suit the profile of their workers.
17. In Keppel Shipyard’s example, the company has restructured their wage system to peg remuneration to performance and productivity, not to seniority. Three unions (Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Employees’ Union, Keppel Fels Employees’ Union and Keppel Employees’ Union) have worked with their management to implement a performance based wage system. Last year, Keppel Offshore and Marine paid their employees an average of 7.2-month bonus – among the highest in our unionised companies.
18. PUB has gone one step further to create job opportunities for their older workers by deploying some of them as ambassadors of Enhanced Water Efficient Homes Programme and the others to monitor and keep a watchful eye on the catchments, waterways and reservoirs. PUB also implemented a programme to promote a healthy work environment.
19. In the case of Aqua Cultural Farm that does live fish packing, they leveraged on the job redesign process to implement bar coding and a new inventory system so as to help older workers enhance their productivity at work.
20. In just one year we have come a long way in our efforts to promote the re-employment of older workers. Let us keep up the momentum. I hope that more companies will see older workers as a strategic and important resource and adopt clear policies on the re-employment of older workers and work with us on the five strategies that I have mentioned earlier.
On this note, I wish everyone a fruitful sharing session.
Thank you.
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