Speaking at this year’s May Day Dinner, Acting Minister for Manpower (Minister, with effect from 1 May 2014) Tan Chuan-Jin highlighted that tripartism and harmonious industrial relations will be “even more important going forward as we progress on our restructuring journey”, especially as Singapore focuses on restructuring its economy and raising productivity.
The restructuring efforts and productivity drive will be for the long haul and Mr Tan assured that the Government will spare no effort to help businesses restructure and improve their productivity. It will also provide Singaporeans with all the support they need to upgrade and re-skill.
Looking Ahead
As Singapore looks to progress ahead, Mr Tan said that as long as tripartite partners ultimately share a win-win mindset and stand guided by a common conviction of creating a better future for Singapore, he was confident of seeing success.
This common conviction was apparent with the introduction of the Tripartite Mediation Framework (TMF) in 2011. The TMF aims to provide an avenue for Managers and Executives who are union members and who earn up to $4,500 a month to seek remedy for their employment disputes through a tripartite mediation process. Many workplace disputes have been successfully resolved in the past three years.
Covering More
Mr Tan shared that the tripartite partners are considering widening its coverage by removing the $4,500 salary cap and allowing more Managers and Executives other than those with substantial managerial responsibilities to make use of it.
Mr Tan said: “The NTUC has been requesting that we further strengthen this new mechanism as a sustainable way to deal with workplace disputes and grievances, I fully support this.”
He added that the partners are also considering to expand the already substantive list of issues that can be heard through the TMF. The Ministry of Manpower will announce the details when the review of TMF is completed.
Mr Tan also urged that Singapore should aspire to build a fair and inclusive society where every Singaporean is given the opportunity to pursue dreams and compete fairly for job opportunities on a level playing field, with no one left behind.
This, he said, is the spirit behind the Fair Consideration Framework (FCF) which will be introduced in August this year to institutionalise fair hiring practices for businesses operating in Singapore.
Uplifting Low-Wage Workers
Mr Tan stressed that special emphasis will go to uplift low-wage workers to build a more inclusive society.
Mr Tan cited NTUC’s e2i’s (Employment and Employability) Inclusive Growth Programme (IGP) as a useful initiative in helping low-wage workers gain higher wages.
As at December 2013, the IGP has already committed to helping 63,600 local low-wage workers from about 650 companies receive wage increases of about 15 per cent.
He also highlighted NTUC’s Progressive Wage Model (PWM) which has put in place clear wage-skill and career progression pathways for workers, thus allowing them to earn wages that commensurate with skills, productivity and responsibilities.
Mr Tan said: “The PWM is now our unique tripartite approach for specific sectors that suffer from prevalent cheap-sourcing coupled with limited bargaining power on the part of the workers. For such sectors, the Government will legislate the tripartite-negotiated Progressive Wage Model.”
In closing, Mr Tan reiterated: “As long as we keep together as one… I’m confident that we will continue to make Singapore a land of opportunities… we ultimately are trying to build a place that we can all proudly call our home,” he said.
