Government Support for Full-time Sportsmen After Sports

The Singapore Sports Institute (SSI) seeks to provide comprehensive support to our Team Singapore athletes, through financial grants, training and coaching, sports medicine, as well as opportunities to prepare for a career after they retire from high performance sports.

To prepare our athletes early for a career after sports, SSI works closely with corporate partners under the spexBusiness Network to offer our athletes career development opportunities, ranging from internships and apprenticeships, part-time positions to permanent positions with flexible work arrangements. The Network also organises career-readiness workshops to guide our athletes, as well as networking opportunities with the corporate partners. More than 150 Team Singapore athletes have benefited since its inception in 2013. They include former national athletes, such as shuttler Derek Wong, who has made a successful transition to a post-sport career with Deloitte, and current national athletes, such as netballer Charmaine Soh who is also with Deloitte, as well as archer Christina Gunawan and CP footballer Khairul Anwar who are employed with other spexBusiness partners such as KPMG and MCCY.

Today, the spexBusiness Network comprises more than 50 companies across 25 industries. I would like to encourage more companies and employers to step forward to support our athletes, so that they can focus on doing their best for Singapore, whilst staying abreast in terms of their career development. With more companies on board, we are able to support more athletes in their pursuit of sporting excellence.

Besides the spexBusiness Network, there are also opportunities for athletes to pursue a career in their respective sports and continue to contribute to the sports' development after they have retired from competition. Our increased funding support over the years for the development of sport − from the learn-to-play entry level to the high performance level − has enlarged the ecosystems of many sports. This has created more employment opportunities for national athletes to work in the areas that they are passionate about and pass down their experience to the younger generation of athletes. Many of our former national athletes have led the way, such as former national swimmer Gary Tan, who is now the Head Coach of the National Training Centre for swimming, and former national shuttler Jiang Yanmei, who is now the Technical Manager of the Singapore Badminton Association (SBA) and Principal of the SBA Badminton Academy@ActiveSG.

I thank the Minister for her comprehensive reply. Just a couple of supplementary questions. The first one is: our national athletes are great ambassadors of the sports for Singapore. Is there a structured process for them to take up permanent roles within ActiveSG? And the second question: within the different schools, we have been trying to promote sports. Is there also a similar structured process, or a Professional Conversion Programme (PCP) that allows them to take up these positions within MOE or in terms of promoting the different interest groups?

Mr Speaker, I would like to take both supplementary questions together. The short answer is yes. There have been structured programmes to allow our athletes to pursue education as well as skills training in the area of sports, including coaching, sports facilities management and so on. And we are looking at increasing the training opportunities for coaching while they are in the sports as well. So, it is both in Institutes of Higher Learning as well as outside. This is really to provide more opportunities and options for our athletes. Some of them may like to pursue a career in coaching − that is available to them.

As I had mentioned in my reply earlier, the ecosystem has been enlarged; we have been investing in development as well as in high performance sports over the years. Also, there are other opportunities, such as in the management of sports facilities, gyms and so on.

The idea is to give the athletes options. Some of them may like to stay in the sports that they are passionate about. Some of them may like to move on to other non-sports areas. We would like to see how we can support them better, including allowing them to have part-time, full-time internship, apprenticeship in the area that they are interested in.