Raising of Re-employment Age at Organisations that Receive Significant Direct or Indirect Government Funding

Mr Kwek Hian Chuan Henry asked the Minister for Manpower whether the Government can strongly encourage all organisations related to the Government, Ministries and Statutory Boards outside of the Public Service that receive significant direct or indirect Government funding, to raise their re-employment age limit to 68 years with immediate effect.

Mr Deputy Speaker, Sir, in 2019, the Tripartite Workgroup on Older Workers recommended that the Retirement Age (RA) and the Re-employment Age (REA) be raised from the current 62 and 67 years to 65 and 70 years respectively by 2030. The recommendations were accepted and we will take the first steps towards achieving this by raising the RA to 63 and the REA to 68 from July next year. Notwithstanding this, the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) encourages all employers to exceed the prevailing statutory retirement age and re-employment age where possible. We support their efforts through targeted schemes.

We offer the Senior Worker Early Adopter Grant to any employer that implements a higher RA or REA as a company policy, ahead of legislation. Companies can receive up to $125,000 for being early adopters and more than 1,800 companies have already done so. The public sector has also taken the lead to implement a higher RA and REA ahead of legislation.

We also provide wage offsets of up to 8% for employers that hire Singaporean workers aged 55 and above through the Senior Employment Credit scheme which was introduced this year. Under the Special Employment Credit scheme that preceded this scheme, the Government provided over $4.6 billion in payments since its inception in 2011. For new local hires aged 40 and above, the Jobs Growth Incentive also provides significant wage support of up to $54,000 per hire between September 2020 and September 2021 in eligible firms. This is more than triple the support of up to $15,000 per non-mature hire.

The Government will continue to encourage all companies, whether or not they receive direct or indirect grant funding, to support the working life of senior workers, including raising their internal retirement and re-employment ages.

Mr Deputy Speaker, I thank the Minister for Manpower for his comprehensive answer and for pushing ahead in helping our seniors secure their livelihood. I would like to ask MOM again: if we cannot encourage all Government-related organisations to move ahead like the rest of the Civil Service, can we at least proactively move some of them who are more ready, for three reasons?

One, the Government has already decided to lead the way, ahead of the private sector. Therefore, the signal we are sending to the private sector will be stronger and more consistent if we include the Government-related organisations as well.

Two, the Government- and Ministry-related organisations are largely funded by the Government. An example is the Singapore Youth Flying Club, SAFRA. This means that the public sees little difference between them and the Government.

Three, given the COVID-19 challenges to the private sector, I think it is important that the Government and Government-related organisations are seen leading the way so that the rest of the private sector can be inspired to follow through.

I thank Mr Henry Kwek for his suggestion. We certainly will take it on and we will continue to encourage all companies, not just public sector, Government agencies. We encourage all companies, whether or not they receive direct or indirect grant and funding, to support our initiatives and to move ahead, instead of the prevailing guidelines that we have set.

Having said that, I think one also has to appreciate some of the different agencies' constraints. I am not privy to necessarily all the constraints, but we will collectively, at MOM, take to heart Mr Kwek's suggestion. And we certainly encourage all companies, regardless of whether they are in the public or private sector, to move ahead, but taking into consideration certain constraints that each one of these agencies may face.