Mr. Lawrence Leow, President ASME
NTUC Central Committee members
Management partners
Brothers and Sisters
Ladies and gentlemen,
Good morning.
Singapore celebrates our 44th National Day this year. As a country, we have certainly come a long way. We have seen many big, fundamental changes take place within one lifetime.
For example, Singapore’s GDP at market prices in Singapore dollars in 1965 was $2.9 billion. In 2008, it was $257 billion. Mean life expectancy at life for both sexes in Singapore in 1965 was around 63 years. Today, it is around 80 years old. In 1965, only 6% of each year’s cohort of babies can expect to graduate from institutes of higher learning. By 2004, the figure was around 67%.
Even the way Singapore has been able to tackle the ongoing crisis speaks volumes not only of our resources but our resourcefulness, and our determination to come out from the difficulties stronger and more united.
Singaporeans can be justly proud of these facts and achievements.
How did we do that?
I think that there are 3 key principles:
A Self-help thinking
B Fact-based analysis
C Decisive action ahead of the competition
Self-help thinking
At the point of Independence, it was clear to us that we could not depend on anyone else to help us. This spirit of self-help, partly innate and partly brought about by circumstances, has shaped policy thinking and the social contract in this country. You see this in the way the Government helps workers save for their own future needs via the CPF. You see the same spirit in the Workfare Income Supplement Scheme. You certainly see it in the way Singapore positions itself to attract and retain investments.
Fact-based analysis
Singapore’s pragmatism is well-known. It is not a question of rigid doctrine or ideology. What needs to be done is what works.
We recognize that our lack of market size and small population and talent base are real constraints. We knew in the early years that a poor, under-educated and under-skilled population and workforce and poor health are like brakes holding back our progress. We were fully aware that high crime and industrial strife do the country no good, and hurt the common people the most. These are facts. We did not let these facts scare us or paralyse us. We certainly did not just spend our time moping about bemoaning our misfortune, or blaming others. We know that that would be the biggest waste of time.
Instead we dare to stare reality in the eye, and figure what needs to be done given that reality.
Decisive Action ahead of the competition
All the awareness, courage and sound analysis in the world would mean nothing until action is taken and outcomes attained. Put simply, results come from walking the talk, once we figure out what is the “right talk”. It also means that we must dare to dream, dare to try and dare to do things differently.
It was this decisiveness and proactive-ness that gave Singapore an advantage over many others all these years. While we may be like the porcupine when it comes to defence, in overall attitude we were certainly more like the beaver.
This is why makes Singapore a choice investment location, Singapore’s workforce No. 1 in the world (according to the BERI – Business Envrionmental and Risk Intelligence survey on Labour Force Evaluation Measure) continuously since 1980, and productivity-driven growth accounting for 78% of GDP growth between 1965 and 2004, allowing real wages to improve over time.
Not by chance, but by choice.
Challenges ahead
44 years into our nation-building, we must build on our achievements and tackle the many challenges ahead with fortitude and determination.
One key challenge is that of an Aging population and workforce. The bottom-line is this: as we live longer, what must we do to live well (that is, with purpose and quality) and live with peace of mind?
We can look at the issue from the perspectives of the Employer, Worker and Government to better understand what is at stake. Employers need energetic, skilled, and motivated workers for peak performance. Workers need to earn a living to upkeep themselves and build a better tomorrow for the family. The Government wants a high employment rate and improving value-add in jobs, so that the people are indeed creating value and seeing their lives get better. This is critical for social peace.
As the aging of our population is unavoidable, we must find the Common Ground here and apply our minds and efforts to it so that workers reaching retirement can continue working for as long as possible, and in ways that add value to companies.
We can use the same 3 principles I spoke about earlier for this purpose.
Self-help thinking
As a country, we have long recognized the danger of an entitlement mindset. Workers must therefore know that just because we have an aging population does not mean that jobs will be reserved on account of age, regardless of the value that a person brings to the job. Companies must also know that it is their basic responsibility to make full use of the assets, including their people asset, for growth and profitability. This means that it is the basic duty of management to think ahead and adapt for market development, revenue growth and productivity improvement, and not just passively continue with existing arrangements or expect the Government to micro-manage arrangements.
Fact-based Analysis
The aging of our population will accelerate in the coming years as Baby Boomers (those born between 1946 and 1964) reach retirement age. The Government has announced a Re-employment law that will come into effect from 2012. The HR systems and arrangements within companies must be able to not only cope with the numbers, but to positively tap the value of such employees. Are we ready?
Within the unionized sector, 70% of unionized firms (747 by end June 2009) have also committed themselves to systematic re-employment practices. Under a 4-level NTUC framework to classify preparedness, 40% of unionise firms have systematic written agreements, policies, procedures and practices for re-employment. Together, they have re-employed 5421 workers above the age of 62. In the next phase of action, we aim to further widen the participation to the remaining unionized firms as well as to deepen the practice among the committed companies.
The Civil Service also announced that it would be re-employment ready ahead of the 2012 deadline.
Under the Tripartite partnership on re-employment, SNEF has also encouraged more than 1370 companies to voluntarily disclose their workforce age profile on their portal, and also persuaded close to 300 companies to voluntarily adopt the Tripartite Advisory on Re-employment of Older Workers (issued in March 2008).
The partnership of ASME, NTUC, SNEF and WDA to promote the ADVANTAGE! Scheme has also resulted in 702 companies joining, and 4775 workers above the age of 62 employed by these companies.
Clearly, we have made progress.
But not enough. With more than 100,000 companies and businesses operating in Singapore, more has to been done to outreach to them. Even if most are already practicing re-employment on an ad hoc basis, they can be further helped to fully understand the thinking and guidance of the Tripartite Advisory and the forthcoming law, as well as to benefit from industry best practices in getting value out of re-employment.
Decisive Action
A clear priority is therefore to expand outreach, communications and networking to further boost the momentum in re-employment.
In his National Day message, NTUC Secretary-General Lim Swee Say spoke of the importance of investing in “Productivity Potential”, so that currently excess manpower will not become a future drag on company productivity and performance but a boost.
In like manner, taking the right approach to re-employment can make a world of difference to the business. Instead of re-employment becoming a source of under-employment and a form of compliance cost on business, well-thought-through and systematic re-employment preparation and practice can help the “Productivity Potential” in a company by unleashing the power of experience, commitment and performance.
NTUC is very happy to collaborate with ASME in creating this Community of PREPARE Employers today. As we know, PREPARE stands for “Programme for Re-Employment Practices: A Roadmap for Employers”. It provides guidance to companies in implementing good Human Resource (HR) practices as an integral part of their HR system to facilitate the re-employment of older workers. This programme is heavily subsidized by the WDA is provided through the EDC (Enterprise Development Centre @ASME).
What is NTUC’s interest in this and what do we bring to the table? Over the past 2 years, NTUC has been carefully gathering expertise and cases on how systematic, sustainable re-employment can be done in companies. We know have a sizeable outreach and depth within the unionized sector. We believe that in the next phase, our expertise and cases can also be further leveraged for the National good. To do that, we are happy to work with serious and credible partners who share the common objective of making Singapore re-employment ready ahead of 2012.
ASME has a network that touches more than 20,000 companies each year, through its seminars, briefings, workshops and training programmes. Some of these companies are unionized while others are not. The size of these companies in sales turnover and workforce size and profile also vary. Many of the smaller or medium size ones may face more difficulty in coming to grips with what to do for re-employment that would both comply with the law and make sense for the business.
The experience and viable arrangements made by the currently 220 PREPARE-certified companies for sustained and systematic re-employment will also expand and enrich the database of best practices across different industries. These examples will make clear to all that re-employment is doable and can be cleverly done to serve both business and worker goals.
This collaboration will therefore enable both ASME and NTUC to further broaden and deepen outreach to our respective core constituencies. This channel will complement other ongoing efforts, and will energise and boost the momentum of systematic re-employment within the economy.
I thank ASME for this partnership and I look forward to a mutually productive outcome.
Together, let us Reach Out and help our companies and older workers Reach Up. Happy National Day!
Thank you.
