Ensuring Manpower and Service Level Adequacy with Reopening of Terminals at Changi Airport

Mr Saktiandi Supaat asked  the Minister for Transport with the gradual reopening of terminals at Changi Airport (a) what percentage of its capacity is the airport operating at presently, taking into account the airport’s currently available manpower, retail services and other infrastructure; (b) what are the assumptions underlying the projection that the number of flights handled by Changi Airport will rise to 80% of pre-pandemic levels by end-2022; and (c) what concrete steps are being taken to scale up on the airport’s capacity.

Yes, I am taking Question Nos 14 and 15 together, please, Speaker.

Air travel has recovered steadily since Singapore reopened its borders to all fully vaccinated travellers without testing or quarantine in April 2022. As of the first week of September, average weekly passenger traffic at Changi Airport has recovered to above 60% of pre-COVID-19 levels and it has held at that level steadily. The number of flights at Changi Airport has also recovered to nearly two-thirds of pre-COVID-19 levels.

The number of flights that airlines have filed to operate at Changi Airport by the year end is more than 80% of pre-COVID-19 levels. We expect this to increase further as airlines respond to demand from travellers, following the recent border-easing announcements by key travel markets such as Hong Kong, Japan and Taiwan.

To accommodate this anticipated growth in the number of passengers and flights, we reopened Terminal 4 on 13 September. We will also be commencing departure operations in the southern wing of Terminal 2 on 11 October, in addition to arrivals which had commenced on 29 May. With this, Changi Airport will have the physical capacity to accommodate up to 70 million passengers per annum, which is about 100% of the passenger traffic levels that we had pre-COVID-19. This also represents about 80% of Changi’s pre-COVID-19 capacity itself. In other words, we have used the intervening time to enhance Changi's capacity as well.

Our aviation stakeholders have been concurrently working hard to build up their workforce and train their new hires to support this ramp-up in capacity. This has been an ongoing process since early this year. The air transport sector workforce has recovered to about 80% of pre-COVID-19 levels in the first half of the year. Aviation stakeholders aim to hire another 4,000 workers between September and the end of this year. Cumulatively, this will bring us to about 90% of our pre-COVID-19 workforce. The recruitment efforts of the companies in the sector are currently on track.

And thanks to the efforts of the whole aviation community, including our regulator, the Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS), airport operator, airlines, ground handling companies, unions and workers, Changi has managed the recovery relatively well so far. By continuing to work together as one Changi community, we are confident that Changi Airport will be ready to welcome more passengers back to Singapore and offer them the distinctive traveller experience that Changi is known for.

I thank the Minister for his reply on meeting the short-term ramp-up demands for the industry. Given that Changi Airport is our strategic asset and has still many labour-intensive components, such as baggage handling, catering and training, what lessons can be learnt and incorporated in the future Terminal 5 (T5) design and possible retrofitting of the current infrastructure? And how can we provide more support for the airport workers, such as those represented by Singapore Airport Terminal Services Workers Union (SATSWU) to upskill and improve productivity so that we can continue to improve on the renowned service of Changi Airport?

Mr Speaker, I thank the Member for his questions. Let me take the second question first.

In terms of upgrading and upskilling the workers, this is an ongoing effort. As with all other sectors in Singapore, it is a priority because, ultimately, by upskilling the workers, we enhance their productivity, enhance the competitiveness of the companies and the larger aviation sector and, of course, enable them to have good jobs with good wages. So, it is a virtuous cycle, something that we are continually working on.

The Member's first question was on areas such as baggage handling and what lessons we have learnt that can be incorporated into the T5 design.

The last two years, as Members would know, we had paused in the development of T5 because the trajectory of air travel recovery was uncertain in light of COVID-19. As was recently announced by the Prime Minister at the National Day Rally, we have restarted the design and process for T5. And the key lessons we have learnt include how we can modularise airport operations in order to enhance their resilience – in this case, our civilian airport – to such pandemic-type challenges. Because, as I think all of us would well appreciate, airports are designed for convergence of streams of passengers. And yet, when you are in a pandemic-type situation, the objective is really to separate the streams as much as we can according to their risk categorisation.

That inverts the logic of airport operations and is something that has to be factored into the design early, not just in terms of processes, but in terms of actual physical design. So, modularity and how it can help combine with processes to enhance the resilience of our airport in the face of possible pandemics in the future is one aspect.

Another aspect has been sustainability and how we can focus on ensuring that T5, but more generally all of Changi, can really lead the way as a sustainable air hub. And this is why CAAS is now working on developing a blueprint for a sustainable air hub in Singapore.

And finally, on specific areas like baggage handling which the Member raised, this is actually one of the key challenges and this is not unique to Changi. Because all over the world, baggage handling is one of the most manpower-intensive aspects of airport operations. How we are able to automate this is a key part of the work that is going on.

As I think Members can well appreciate, this is not something you can decide on a standalone basis because it is not only one airport doing this. Whatever we do has to be ultimately coordinated with airlines, aircraft design and what happens in other airports. It is a general effort that is being undertaken to see how greater automation can be brought into the handling of baggage at airports.

In fact, I was in the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Assembly earlier last week and this was one of the topics that was discussed by several of the aviation ministers. So, it is an ongoing effort and CAAS is investing in a lot of innovation work in that regard.

Mr Speaker, I would like to thank the Minister for his answers. I have got two supplementary questions.

First one is: would Minister envisage the possibility of overshooting the capacity over the next few months into the end of this year and possibly into the first half of next year, particularly if regional airports or other hubs, are seeing any delays in their opening? And that also is in relation to one of my Parliamentary Questions (PQs): what would be the assumptions underlying the projection that the number of flights will rise to 80% and above?

My second supplementary question would be: the Minister mentioned that the recruitment is on track, but is it possible for us to speed up the recruitment of talent, especially since technology and changes over the past two to three years have evolved, and whether some of these technological changes mean that we need new talent locally or globally coming to Singapore?

Mr Speaker, the Member said he would ask quick questions but I think I have to give him a slightly longer answer.

On overshooting capacity, I think what the Member meant by that is whether we expect that we will go beyond what we think is the expected volume. To some extent, there is predictability and the reason why there is predictability is because airlines file their flight plans with the airport slots authority, that is, with Changi Airport. In this case, for the next cycle which is really from October through to March next year, it is called the Northern Winter schedule.

From that point of view, we already have a reasonable idea of the kind of flows to expect. Of course, there may be variations to that for a variety of reasons, whether it is disruptions and so on. But by and large, given what has been presented to our airport, we think that the estimations that we have are within the ballpark. Whether it will exactly turn out the way we expect, I think there are many unknowns, as all of us will appreciate. The Minister for Health talked about some of the risks as well.

We need to just bear in mind that we plan with the capacity in mind, but we also need to be vigilant and be prepared to pivot to a more conservative and careful stance if the need arises.

And, of course, the assumptions that the Member asked about – that underlie this planning, apart from what the airlines submit and so on – is, of course, in general, how the source markets are opening up. In particular, in our part of the world, the Asia Pacific, most have opened up, as I mentioned earlier – Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong and so on have all opened up.

One of the most significant markets is China and China's opening strategy is something that we have to observe, because every country has to navigate this path based on its circumstances. China is a significant source for us. Pre-COVID-19, China would have accounted for about 20% of our tourism visitor arrivals. That is a major uncertainty as well that we will have to watch out for.

The second point on recruitment and whether we speed up the recruitment, I can assure the Member that all the aviation companies are throwing the kitchen sink at this because this is a very challenging time. We know that there is just a general shortage of manpower and, in particular, for aviation especially on the air side, it is not just about recruitment but we have to make sure that they are trained and they are able to deliver safely for themselves and for all other users of the aviation services. So, this is a major task.

But as I said, if I can just take Members back, we had about one-third attrition in our aviation industry workforce. It was at about 35,000. At the end of last year, we had about 25,000. In the first half of this year, I think about 4,000 were recruited and the aim is really to get another 4,000 workers to join the aviation workforce. That should bring us to about 90%.

In terms of new talent, that really is going to be an important area of focus going forward because of two aspects. Digitalisation and sustainability are going to be key drivers for the aviation industry. For this, we will need specific skill sets. We have to retrain those who are already in the industry and that is happening as we speak. At the same time, we also may need specific types of talent to come on board to augment what we already have. And so, this is something that both the airlines but also the airport and ground handlers are focused on.