Update on COVID-19-related Processes for Visitor Entry and Airport Worker Deployment

Mr Dennis Tan Lip Fong asked the Minister for Transport in respect of flights from high-risk COVID-19 countries (a) whether the Government will consider setting up a separate stand-alone facility away from the airport terminal buildings for immigration and customs clearance of arriving passengers; and (b) whether transit passengers from such flights can be sent from such facility to their departing aircraft at a remote bay thus avoiding any sharing of the use of the terminal buildings with other passengers arriving from or departing for other countries.

Ms Yeo Wan Ling asked the Minister for Transport (a) what are the additional duties or responsibilities that airport workers have had to assume since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic that allow them to keep Singapore and Singaporeans safe for more than 16 months before the Delta variant came about and since the more transmissive Delta variant arose; and (b) how are the Government and aviation companies supporting frontline airport staff especially when these staff have had to adjust to enhanced measures at Changi Airport.

Mr Saktiandi Supaat asked the Minister for Transport (a) in light of the zonal segregation measures at Changi Airport, how will countries be classified based on their evolving COVID-19 situation; (b) whether the Ministry will consider dedicating one terminal away from the main arrival terminals for use by arrivals from very high-risk countries; and (c) how can the frontline aviation workers safeguard themselves and Singapore given the risk they face daily in keeping the airport open.

Sir, since the first overseas cases of COVID-19 were reported in December 2019, the Ministry of Transport (MOT) and CAAS have worked closely with the Ministry of Health (MOH) and other Government agencies to implement measures to minimise the risk of COVID-19 transmission and to protect workers and members of the public at the airport. These measures are reviewed regularly to take into account public health experts’ latest understanding of the virus and the evolving COVID-19 situation around the world.

In January 2020, when still not much was known about the virus, Changi Airport put in place temperature and enhanced health screening for arriving travellers and disallowed entry of short-term visitors from places where cases had been reported.

In March 2020, as the pandemic surged across the world, we took the unprecedented step of closing our borders to all short-term visitors. For returning Singaporeans, Permanent Residents (PRs) and long-term pass holders, in line with MOH’s public health risk assessment, we adopted risk-based differentiated border measures based on their recent travel history. For example, the immigration clearance of passengers from the US and UK was done at dedicated gate hold rooms. They were then escorted to their assigned SHN Dedicated Facilities (SDFs) to serve their mandatory Stay-Home Notice (SHN).

Similarly, when transfers resumed in June 2020, the transit passengers were escorted from disembarkation to dedicated transit holding areas and, subsequently, to board the connecting flight.

In January 2021, when mandatory on-arrival COVID-19 tests were introduced, these were done at separate health screening stations for passengers from very high-risk places.

As observed by Ms Yeo Wan Ling in her question, these measures had helped to ensure that for more than 16 months, that is, from January 2020 to May 2021, the aviation community was able to keep our borders open while keeping Singapore and Singaporeans safe. In May 2021, however, the Delta variant, which is causing a new wave of infections across the world, breached these defences, resulting in the first airport cluster.

In response, Jewel was immediately closed and public access to the airport terminals was restricted. Jewel re-opened on 14 June this year, but the airport terminals remain closed to members of the public.

MOH monitors the public health situation overseas and assesses the appropriate risk level, taking into consideration information from WHO, experts and academic networks, as well as Singapore missions overseas. Depending on how the risk profile changes, CAAS and our aviation stakeholders then promptly adjust their protocols.

Hence, in consultation with MOH and the National Centre for Infectious Diseases (NCID), we further tightened our measures based on our understanding of the Delta variant. Beyond the earlier passenger segregation measures, the airport itself is now segregated into physical zones. Disembarkation piers, toilets, arrival immigration halls and baggage claim belts are now separate for passengers from places of different risks.

Changi Airport now processes passengers from very high-risk places at dedicated bus gates at Terminal 2, which is currently closed for renovation. These passengers are then transported directly to their SHN dedicated facilities. We do not allow transfer passengers from these very high-risk places, and Changi is also studying the option of using Terminal 4 for such passengers.

Sir, our top priority is to keep our airport workers safe, thereby also protecting their families and the wider community. They are at the heart of Changi Airport’s operations and at the frontlines of our border defences. Hence, we have prioritised our aviation workers for vaccination. Today, 95% of frontline aviation workers are fully vaccinated.

From the onset of COVID-19, MOT and CAAS have worked with MOH and NCID to ensure that airport workers don the appropriate level of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and undergo regular testing based on their job function. In response to the Delta variant, we have stepped up the PPE posture for airport workers and implemented more frequent routine testing. Within the higher risk zones, workers are also cohorted and have separate toilet, dining and rest facilities.

Collectively, these measures represent a fundamental shift in operations, imposing further adjustments and stress on our airport workers as they adjust to a very different workflow. For example, workers in the higher-risk zone have to stay within that zone during their mealtimes and break times, which can be quite isolating from the social point of view. We are also working closely with union leaders and industry players to help our workers adapt to these new measures.

My Ministry and I are deeply appreciative of the sacrifices made by the airport community to ensure that our borders remain open for essential supplies and for Singaporeans to return home. The aviation community has set aside $15 million for airport workers’ welfare during this time. I am also very glad for the support from our corporate partners and members of the public, including some CAAS staff, who started "Friends for Aviation" to provide encouragement and practical support for our frontline airport workers.

Mr Speaker, even as we stay vigilant and adjust to protect ourselves from the evolving virus, we must do our best to safeguard Singapore’s hard-earned position as a global air hub. We must adapt to a new normal, where we keep our borders open and safe for passengers, our airport workers, their families and the community. Only then can Changi continue to thrive as a safe aviation hub, connecting Singapore to the world and the world to Singapore.

I thank the Minister for the comprehensive answer. Sir, I have three supplementary questions.

In May, we had the unfortunate situation where an 88-year-old cleaner working in T3 caught the virus at work. What are some of the additional measures we have put in place to protect the more vulnerable workers at the airport?

Secondly, I declare that I am an adviser to the National Taxi Association (NTA) and the National Private Hire Vehicles Association (NPHVA). Taxi drivers and private hire drivers are transport partners in the larger eco-system of workers supporting airport functions. Have these safety measures put in place by the airport over the past 16 months also factored in our drivers' comfort and safety?

Finally, I am very glad to hear that 95% of our workers are vaccinated. But many of our airport frontline workers live in my constituency and they have young children and many live with their elderly parents as well. So, as our airports start to open up and should our frontliners catch the virus, will the Ministry also be coming up with more support measures to assist these families and workers, especially if livelihoods are affected?

Mr Speaker, I thank the Member for her questions. The overall theme of the Member's questions, which I think are quite appropriate, is the focus on the welfare of the aviation workers, workers on the frontline and those who are supporting. As I have said in my reply earlier, this is, in fact, one of our overriding priorities because we need to ensure that these workers are protected to the best of our ability and also that, where it is essential, we also undertake specific measures to address any concerns they have with respect to their welfare.

So, let me start by saying that, in the course of many of the transitions to the new measures that we have had to put in place, I have personally been involved, together with the CEOs of Singapore Airlines (SIA), SATS and Changi Airport Group, in discussions with workers from the whole gamut of workers in our airport community. This includes not just Changi Airport Group's (CAG's) employees, SATS or SIA employees, but also those who work in ICA, Certis Cisco and so on, in order to fully comprehend the challenges of the changes that we are imposing on them, how they are coping and how we can help them further, if that is necessary.

And I would like to start by sharing with Members that, actually, the morale is very strong. And that was something that gave me great heart because it means that, despite the nature and the scale of the challenges we are facing, the Changi Spirit remains strong and they remain optimistic and they understand the need for these measures and have been cooperating with the health requirements as well as some of the operational shifts that we have had to make.

Turning to the Member's specific question on measures to protect more vulnerable workers, as I said, the starting point is to ensure that now that we have got physical segregation, the workers have to observe specific protocols, and, in particular, PPE. The PPE regime has been stepped up across the board and now they don and doff, and they are trained on this already, but we have re-emphasised this. On top of that, of course, is the vaccination programme, which is a general programme that we have undertaken. In terms of the testing regime, we have now RRT, rostered routine testing for workers. Those who are in the high-risk areas, we do seven-day PCR and ART on day three or day four. For those who are in the less risky areas, we conduct a RRT PCR test every 14 days; and on about day seven or day eight, we do the ART testing.

These and the protocols themselves are all designed to protect the workers to the best of our ability. The management of the companies are also committed to ensuring that if any worker finds it very difficult to continue in that particular role, then they will find a way to redeploy him elsewhere, so that he can continue to work, but in a different context.

I agree with the Member. Taxi-drivers, limousine drivers, they are a very important part because they are the extension of the broader network, in terms of transport and connectivity. In particular, we have instituted it and, as you know, again, vaccination of drivers is a key part of this. Also, they know what are the protocols to be observed, in terms of when they are carrying passengers, the kind of safe management measures (SMMs) they need to observe and so on, and there are also testing regimes in place for them.

Livelihoods, this is key. As the Member would know, I mentioned the $15 million fund and the intent is to try and help those who might be under particular stresses because of these changes. In addition, the Member would also be aware of the COVID-19 Driver Relief Fund for those who are in the point-to-point driving services, taxi services and private hire cars. These are some of the areas we have focused on.

I can assure the Member and Members of this House that we remain focused on this. Should new needs arise, we will certainly look at them. As the Member would be aware, even with, for example, the COVID-19 Driver Relief Fund, the Government responded very quickly. With the help and support of the Ministry of Finance, we were able to announce the extension of these measures quite quickly. We remain committed to continuing to help and address the welfare needs of our aviation community workers.

I thank the Minister for Transport for his detailed answer, in particular, the clarification that physical segregation was implemented after the detection of the Delta variant. I just have a few supplementary questions.

The first is to ask if inter-mingling between passengers arriving from countries with different risk levels associated with them was allowed prior to mid-May 2021? And if so, what was the thinking behind that and what were the lessons drawn from that? Now, of course, there is physical segregation but to what extent was inter-mingling within the airport permitted then? The context for that is really anecdotal feedback that there was such inter-mingling being seen. Whether this is accurate or not, I am not sure, and that is why I am asking the supplementary question.

And with your permission, Mr Speaker, Sir, may I quote very briefly from a Straits Times Forum letter from someone in April that gained some wide circulation?

This letter writer in April said, and I quote, "much to my dismay, inbound passengers were allowed to roam freely upon landing. One was free to hang around in the terminal between departure gates for as long as one wanted, rather than being sent straight to swab testing. I observe similar unregulated processes at the baggage claim area long before passengers were funnelled to the stations", and so on and so forth.

This was in April and so now, of course, we have had that physical segregation.

So, I just wanted to ask whether that was the case, what was the thinking behind that and what were the lessons drawn from that?

The second supplementary question is, what are the criteria that the Government uses to classify countries into different risk levels and does that take into account the extent of vaccination?

Mr Speaker, I thank the Member for his questions. On the second point first, the risk assessment and categorisation are undertaken by MOH. So, I would not want to represent the overall thinking on behalf of the Ministry and its experts, but I would say that the officials, the experts take into account a gamut of factors and it is also an evolving set of factors. I think the state of vaccination is certainly one of the considerations but it is by no means the only one, as the Member would well appreciate.

Secondly, on the point about inter-mingling and what was the thinking, and so on, as I explained in some detail in my response to the Member's question earlier, the starting point must be that we are undertaking measures based on a detailed risk assessment. And that risk assessment is informed by an as up-to-date an understanding as we have of the virus, its characteristics, its transmission nature and also how these are changing with new variants emerging.

And, therefore, this is a risk-adjusted approach. And it has to be so. Because as we have observed around the world, really, hardly any country so far has been spared the Delta variant, regardless of the posture they take. What we need to do is ensure that the posture we adopt and the measures we adopt respond promptly to the latest understanding and address the risks that are posed, in a dynamic situation with equally dynamic responses.

In that context, prior to the latest set of measures and the physical segregation that I talked about, we had progressively instituted a series of measures which I have just elaborated, so I do not propose to repeat them. There may well have been some inter-mingling, but that was not something that was encouraged. It was actually generally designed for people to move from the aircraft to the immigration process, collect their baggage and exit.

I also want to emphasise to the Member, what we have undertaken in Changi now, with physical segregation of the airport, is really turning the operating model on its head. And I hope we all appreciate that. Because civilian airports, as we might recall from a not-too-distant past, are designed for passengers to come in and to actually have an experience at the airport, what we call the Changi experience. So, when we now say passengers are completely segregated physically in different zones and their movement from aircraft to immigration to baggage collection to transportation and so on, and we add now testing, it is a completely different model.

And so, we must appreciate that every move like this that we make entails significant adjustments, not just from an operational point of view, but also in terms of the burden it imposes on the workers at the airport. So, I want to emphasise a point that I made earlier, but I think it bears emphasis again, which is that we want to do everything we can to ensure the safety of our passengers, our aviation workers, their families and through that, the larger community, but we also want to ensure that the measures we take reflect our best judgement of the risks based on an evolving situation. And we ensure, to the best of our ability, that we respond in a manner that addresses those risks.

Mr Speaker, I thank the Minister for the answer earlier. First of all, I would like to thank the Minister for sharing the slew of detailed processes at the airport. I thank him because I do have a number of residents who are working as cleaners and staff at the airport.

I have two supplementary questions. First, I seek clarification from the Minister because he mentioned some segregation at Terminal 2 and the potential of Terminal 4 being used in the future. Can he share whether this would be a temporary or permanent sort of situation, so as to reassure the public, in particular as well, because Jewel is now opened to the public. So, whether he can reassure whether Jewel is safe for the public to visit, going forward.

My second question is, as the Minister has mentioned, a risk-adjusted approach is taken. But ideally, as an air hub, it would be very difficult to maintain this at our airports as we plan to open up the economy, hopefully, sooner than later, and to reinstate activity in our airport.

Can the Minister share how we can maintain this potentially start-stop, and/or segregation processes that we have in the future, and whether there will be a need for infrastructure changes at the airport in the future, given this start-stop situation or scenario which could be a possibility?

Mr Speaker, I thank the Member, who is also the Government Parliamentary Committee (GPC) Chair for Transport, for his questions. First, to clarify, Jewel is already open. There was a period of closure for about a month and then we re-opened it on 14 June. The passenger terminal buildings remain restricted from public access, because there is a greater potential for interaction, for example, between workers and members of the public. So, we want to be more cautious, make sure all the measures run in well and then we will have a sense of how to move forward, and if so, when we need to do so.

Another part of that question was about T2 and T4 and the arrangements. Just to be very clear, T2 is going through renovation works, so it is not operational. And what MOT and Changi Airport Group did was to work together and come up with the idea of remote processing, remote bays, as it were, for passengers, from very high-risk countries. They are processed in the bays in Terminal 2, for immigration, for their testing and so on, and then they are immediately taken in buses to their SHN facilities.

We are studying the use of T4 for this purpose because T4 would have a larger capacity and it is something that the various agencies involved are working through now. If we are able to use T4, then it enhances our ability to deal with flows from the very high-risk countries.

Is this temporary, permanent, how long? I think it is a very good question but it is a rather difficult one to answer. Because as we have learnt from our experience over the last 18 months or so, we need to be prepared for any kind of pivot. And that, I think, is the crux of the issue because we do not know how the virus is evolving or will evolve. We also have to make a judgement call because countries, the source countries and the situation can also change quite dramatically.

So, therefore, the posture we adopt in terms of not just the cross-border travel, but how we deal with them at the airport, which is our point of entry into Singapore, is going to be key. What the entire team in MOT, CAAS, CAG, SIA, SATS have endeavoured to do is to adopt a protocol, which is what we have now, which gives us, perhaps, the greatest possible flexibility and adaptability to an evolving situation. That, I think, is key because without that flexibility or dexterity in our response, then there will be a lot more of the fits and starts that the Member refers to, in the way we do things. So, if we have the modalities to deal with the risk, we may not know which country, or at what point, but at least we have a way to pivot quite quickly based on the assessment.

I would say that the mindset that we have adopted is one of "prepare for the worst, hope for the best and be as adaptable as possible, and respond quickly to an evolving situation". That is the way we are doing this.

The Member had the air hub question, I think his question was really pertaining to what might happen, going forward, in terms of travel and so on. I think that remains an issue. As you can see, across the world, there are quite diverse attitudes towards travel and the protocols associated with them. You would also have heard from the Multi-Ministry Task Force Members on some of our thinking, going forward. I would not want to prejudge the path we take at this point but what I would say is that the overriding commitment is to ensure that we are able to facilitate safe travel so that Changi will remain a safe aviation hub for travellers from around the world and, certainly, for Singaporeans.