Freelancers and the self-employed should also be entitled to fair work terms, similar to what workers on traditional work arrangements enjoy.
NTUC will be focussing on these two groups, with their numbers increasing in the workforce.
Current Concerns
There are about 200,000 freelancers in Singapore and they require support, said Assistant Secretary-General (ASG) Ang Hin Kee. He is also the director of NTUC’s Freelancers and Self-employed Unit (U FSE) Ang Hin Kee.
Unlike employed workers, freelancers here are not legally entitled to statutory protection and benefits like Central Provident Fund (CPF) contributions, annual leave, medical leave and rights under labour legislation.
He explained during an impromptu media session on 27 December 2016 that freelancers can be categorised into various groups.
One group is the free agent freelancers.
They own their business, they are free to set the prices for the services rendered and can work with many buyers at a time.
They also provide for their own medical and retirement needs.
However, the group which NTUC wants to focus on is the “tied freelancers”.
They are freelancers who cannot determine the price of services rendered. Also, they must comply with the buyer’s price. Furthermore, they lack workplace protection, medical and retirement coverage.
“They are not free agent freelancers. They are tied to certain pricing and requirements by the buyers and they are very dependant on these buyers. For this group, we are pushing the Government to consider ways to protect them in terms of providing for protection at the workplace, security for retirement and medical coverage,” said ASG Ang.
On-going engagement
Apart from looking at ways to protect freelancers , NTUC has also been meeting different groups of freelancers to help them organise themselves as a society or association so that the Labour Movement can gather views from the ground about their concerns.
Such groups include sports coaches, photographers and beauticians.
“We are working with different groups where we run master classes and bring in speakers who are experts in particular fields. Some photographers are talking about how to expand into drone photography to broaden their market,” said ASG Ang.
Also on the cards in April 2017, a trade fair for freelancers to showcase to buyers what they can offer.
This comes on the back of a fair for freelancers held in September 2016, which received good response.
Source: NTUC This Week
