Live from Parliament: Ong Ye Kung, Tan See Leng speak on Singapore's free trade agreements and CECA

media post on 22nd june this year mr yangman wai again said and i quote the most important economic policies that have affected the jobs and livelihoods of singaporeans relate to foreign pmes and free trade agreements in particular seeker unquote mr speaker these statements are false they have been repeated for too long i am a former trade negotiator at mti when i was a civil servant we worked closely on several fdas i worked with a very dedicated team who has over two decades fought hard for the interests of singapore to expand our economic and political space for our small island state and i feel i owe a duty to correct the false foods indeed singaporean pmes like pne pmes and other advanced economies are facing challenges many have given us their feedback and the government has been taking steps to address their concerns but our ftas in general and seeker in particular are not the causes of the challenges our pmbs face if anything they are part of the solution ftas and zika have been made political scapegoats to discredit the policy of the pap government the second reason to deliver this ministerial statement is to put in context on behalf of mom and mti the parliamentary questions that have been posed to the ministries concerning foreign pmes ftas and sika dr tan ceiling will further elaborate on the answers taken together dr tan and i will address oral questions 1 to 3 and written questions 19 to 24 from yesterday's order paper and oral answers 1 to 6 and written questions 40 to 42 from today's order paper a total of 18 questions several of the questions were felt by psps two ncmps to gather data for a subsequent debate on the motion they intend to file so where we can we will provide relevant data to equip all parties for that subsequent debate so let me recapitulate how we got here first time as i mentioned for months now the psp has alleged that ftas and seeker have led to the unfettered flow of indian professionals displacing singaporeans from their jobs and bringing about all kinds of social ills and this is a seductively simplistic argument that workers facing challenges at their workplaces can identify with and has stirred up a lot of emotions seeker-themed websites have sprouted filled with quite disturbing xenophobic views about indian immigrants words gradually became deeds toxic views turn into verbal and physical assaults on indians including our citizens it is said that serious issues concerning the economic well-being of our country and workers have descended to this that is why the minister for law called out such xenophobic behavior during the may setting of this house and challenged the psp to table a motion on seeker so that the matter could receive a proper public hearing the psp has since made a public statement on the matter standing by its view on fta and seeker it filed several parliamentary questions requesting for more data and information so today i will talk about the following one what is fundamental to singapore's ability to earn a living and survive two why ftas including zika advance our interests and are not the cause of the challenges faced by our workers and three what then are the causes of singaporeans concerns and how do we address them dr tan will provide detailed answers to the specific questions including providing the data which will be useful for our subsequent debate and putting that data in context let me start with the first question what is fundamental to our economic survival simply put we are too small to survive on our own and we need to tap into the global markets to earn a living and be self-reliant what do we have to start with we have no natural resources but we have one precious natural endowment and that is our geographical location it is a lasting advantage but one which requires us to work very hard to realize and to sustain and if we succeed it helps compensate for our lack of size and that is what we have done by capturing the trade flow through the straits of malacca and singapore psa became the largest container transshipment port in the world it is a unique interchange in the world connecting east and west europe middle east india china and the port is central to the growth of the maritime industry responsible for 160 000 jobs in singapore today in addition to our seaport we also have grown into an aviation note before covet 19 hit us changi was one of the busiest airport in the world and it shall be so again though in aviation terms our geographical location is not quite ideal we made it happen with with the renowned changi and sia experience before covet 19 struck the aviation related industry were supporting 190 000 jobs so with this good global connections we built up the manufacturing sector about one-fifth of our gdp today and we obviously don't manufacture just for singapore we are too small but we manufacture for the world and manufacturing supports another 440 000 jobs today our exports also include trade in services and one growing services sector is financial services and today almost every major global financial services institution is in singapore carrying out a range of activities including new ones such as fintech and green finance the financial services sector employs over 170 000 people we are also becoming a center for technology research and development so many global firms from feng to bet and many more are in singapore and they make singapore their regional or global innovation center or engineering hubs and today 50 000 international companies operate out of singapore 750 of them have made singapore their regional headquarters none of this would have happened without a clear strategy implemented well it was a long painstaking process part of the story of our island nation clean government rule of law safety you can walk on the street any time of the day political stability good infrastructure high standards of education openness to the world all this and more come together to make us a good place to invest and created many jobs i should emphasize that another big plus point for us is the quality of the singaporean workforce our people are well known to be well educated diligent responsible trustworthy and we get things done we have one problem which is there are too few of us singaporeans a point which i will come back to later on top of all these plus points we have built a network of 26 free trade agreements including u.s china eu asean japan south korea india australia and new zealand all our major markets and they are all our fta partners and this brings me to the next topic why ftas including seeker are important to singapore we started our fta strategy in the late 1990s we thought through it carefully and executed before other countries did so it gave us a very precious early mover advantage and greatly boosted our efforts to export attract investments venture overseas and created good jobs for singaporeans our total trade is three times our gdp since 2005 our total trade has nearly doubled from around 898.90 billion dollars to now 1.5 trillion dollars and today when edb goes out and persuades investors to come to singapore our network of fts is always a major selling point ftas are especially important to our smes if free they free them from being constrained by our small domestic market and give them access to global markets so our smes are sending all kinds of singapore made products overseas from canned food barbecued pork frozen roti prata i heard some are exported to india to medical devices machines components chemicals ftas are also spurring our companies to venture abroad abroad our investments overseas increased nearly five times from 200 billion dollars 2005 to over 930 billion dollars 2019 so when our companies grow overseas they become stronger and they also employ more singaporeans here if we accept this basic reality that singapore needs the world to earn a living then we would realize the fundamental importance of all our ftas they are a keystone of the economic superstructure that we have built we could not have advanced the welfare of singaporeans to the degree that we have without ftas we cannot take all these for granted recently we fell in the 2021 imd world competitiveness ranking from first place to the fifth place amongst the components evaluated we continue to do very well in terms of government efficiency and economic competitiveness however we lost ground in terms of openness towards global talent and trade but i hope this is temporary and due to the effects of covet 19. overall we are still holding our own in terms of foreign investments in 2020 even as 45 companies seized operating their regional or global headquarters in singapore over 130 companies set up such headquarters here so when you attack ftas and worst if your attacks succeed you are undermining the fundamentals of our existence of the way we earn a living of all the sector's fta support and the hundreds and thousands of singaporean jobs created in these sectors as the attacks on fta especially seeker have been very specific let me now spend some time to explain how fta works and to prepare for this statement i have to dig up my old negotiating notes and do quite a bit of revision and homework here it goes the key disciplines of an fda are as follows it requires a country to remove or lower tariffs on substantially all trade between the fda partners this is of tremendous benefit to singapore very good deal why because other countries customarily impose tariffs on thousands of items we are already very open we impose duties on only three alcoholic products beer stout and samsu all my years of negotiating fta i don't know what samsu is neither have i drank it before but these are our three tariff items hence any fda that substantially removes tariffs imposed by both parties is inherently beneficial to singapore fdas also require governments to accord protection to foreign investments and ensure that regulations are imposed fairly and equally on both local and foreign firms they also set standards on protection of intellectual property singapore we always protects foreign investments and applies our regulations fairly this makes us attractive to foreign investors so it was it has always been our interest to do that so abiding to these principles and disciplines is not a problem for us at all in fact as more of companies expand overseas and they create their own products they too hope that singapore can negotiate similar protection for them when they go overseas so the investment and intellectual property protection disciplines in ftas are therefore important assurances for our companies newer fdas also set certain environmental and labor standards not every country supports them but singapore believes that they reflect contemporary concerns relating to free trade and investments and specifically on seeker this fda with india benefits singapore in many ways sign in 2005 it was india's first comprehensive bilateral fta with any country and seeker gave singapore a strategic first mover advantage in india just when the continental country was taking off to be an economic powerhouse seeker reduces tariff barriers which made singapore goods more competitive in the indian market and partly because of that bilateral trade between singapore and india has grown by over 80 percent from 20 billion dollars when zika came into force in 205 to 38 billion dollars in 2019 and similarly singapore's direct investment abroad in india grew by 50 times 5-0 from 1.3 billions in dollars to 61 billion zinc dollars during the same period in 2019 660 companies from singapore have investments in india almost double the number a decade ago as these companies grow originally they hire more people back home and in 2019 they employed 97 000 locals despite these significant benefits fdas are controversial in many countries as a trade negotiator i've listened to the problems and sensitivities of many of our fda partners what are these sensitivities some countries wish to protect certain sectors such as agriculture there's a very common one which singapore does not do we have some eggs we have some fish but more for a bit of sauce diversification we never seek to conquer the world with our eggs and our sea buses others could not live up to say the transparency standards of say government procurement or intellectual property disciplines still others are concerned about the influences of foreign culture through industries such as arts and entertainment canada for example very sensitive about this area so the toughest job and the most time consuming job of a negotiator is to identify and understand the sensitivity sector sensitivities of your country and then find ways to protect or to address them how do we do so we find words that give you comfort that address the sensitivity and we call these words in our jargon exceptions or cuff outs when we have a big cough up with strong protection in our sensitively sensitive areas we will say this cuff out is strong and big enough for a jumbo jet to fly through in some sensitive areas it is easy to negotiate exceptions or cough-ups because everyone agrees one example is right of taxation by governments another one is national security a third one is immigration every country holds the view that there cannot be unfettered movement of people across borders every fda partner believed that that would create social unrest and a big public upload governments must retain the ability to impose immigration and border controls and ftas cannot undermine that hence in all ftas and also wto agreements you will find that immigration powers are strongly and prominently preserved and protected you can find such standard clauses in the wto agreement as well as in all our ftas including zika as so many falsehoods have been said about the immigration related parts of seeker let me set out in some detail what is really in the agreement immigration matters are set out in chapter 9 of sika movement of natural persons the legal text is available online so i will only detail the salient points one the chapter makes it clear that government's ability to regulate immigration and foreign manpower is not affected by the agreement the government retains full rights to decide who can enter the country to live to work become prs or become citizens this is clearly set out in two clauses they are standard clauses commonly found in all ftas and they are also the second and third paragraphs of the chapter of sika so it is hard to miss them as you can see them on the first page i will just read them out clause 9.1.2 this chapter shall not apply to measures pertaining to citizenship permanent residence or employment on a permanent basis clause 9.1.3 nothing contained in this chapter shall prevent a party from applying measures to regulate the entry or temporary stay of natural persons of the other party in its territory including measures necessary to protect the integrity of its territory and to ensure the orderly movement of natural persons across its borders that's the first point second point the obligations relating to the movement of natural persons in seeker as in all ftas are not broad principles with wide applications but actually highly specific what are these broad principles that you can find in fda one broad principle is that of national treatment it is found in some chapters of fta such as trade and services and investments this means i mentioned this just now this means you cannot discriminate against foreign service providers and investors whether they are local investors or foreign investors you treat them the same regulations and benefits that apply to local firms must apply evenly to foreign owned ones so if immigration had not been carved out and national treatment principle had been incorporated into chapter 9 of seeker then indeed indian workers would have been treated would have to be treated like singaporeans and would have had free reign to come to live and work in singapore that is what the psp claims except that there is a strong immigration carve-out and national treatment is not found in chapter 9 of seeker nor any other corresponding chapter in the ftas that singapore has entered into mr speaker sir i emphasize and underline and highlight and bow with bigger fonts color rate that nothing in this agreement implies singapore must unconditionally let in pmes from india contrary to psp's claim our ability to impose requirements for immigration and work past has never been in question in seeker or any other fda ftas that we have signed instead then what are the obligations of chapter 9 of sika they are highly specific such as require the parties to process applications for temporary entry with some expedition and with certain transparency such as informing the applicants of the outcome of their applications and not leave them in suspense a very reasonable thing to do and to agree to adhere to we also have to accord a certain duration for the validity of the permits should we approve an approval must be based on them meeting our prevailing work pass conditions also very reasonable such a commitment on duration is also not something unique to seeker because similar commitments exist in other ftas and are also found in wto agreement signed by 164 members including singapore many parties to ftas also commit not to impose labour market tests this is a common clause in our fdas including with india australia china and the us it means we do not insist that companies go through onerous processes and documentation to prove that no suitable locals will take a job before they can hire a foreigner companies in singapore or any other places do not hire this way what they do the common and best practice is to interview suitable candidates consider them all fairly and then make a judgment on the best person and these are all market friendly widely adopted reasonable obligations let me also specifically address two aspects of the chapter on movement of natural person in seeker that has been singled out for criticism first the psp pointed out that seeker listed 127 categories of professionals and hence claim that indian nationals in these professions cannot freely come here to work for a year this is false because as i explained earlier all foreign pmes have to meet our work past conditions in order to come and work here listing then what does it what does the listing then show the listing shows the types of indian professionals who may apply to work in singapore it does not mean that we must approve their application it's just that you can apply india for its own reasons requested for such a list similar to what they have in their ftas with korea and japan in fact even if they had not listed the professions their pmes could still submit work past applications to work here but the list probably meant something to india because there may be countries that will not even let you apply that's how protectionist some countries may become and india is trying to secure their interests there this is in fact how other fta works with or without listing of professions nationals from our fta partners are not precluded from submitting work past applications which will be evaluated based on our prevailing criteria and work past conditions thus the point being made by psp on the list of the 127 profession is a rate herring the list does not confer any free pass to any indian nationals the second common criticism is that intra corporate transferees from india can also freely enter singapore to work based on my explanation on how the chapter works this is again not true intra corporate transferees also have to meet our work past qualifying criteria in any case the total number of intra-corporate transferees from all over the world and not just india that have come to singapore to work is very small in 2020 there were only about 500 intra-corporate transferees from india to singapore in singapore less than 0.3 percent of all employment bus holders or ep holders so mr speaker sir i hope we can put a stop to all this misinformation about our ftas in general and seeker in particular nevertheless it is important that we need to recognize that pmes in singapore do face challenges and i see at least three challenges that they are facing first there is more competition from foreign pmes indeed the number of ep holders has increased from 65 000 in 2005 to 177 000 in 2020 so an increase over 15 years of 112 000 an annual growth rate of just under seven percent over this period however the increase in number of local pmes is much higher by over 380 000. so 380 000 for local pmes 112 000 for ep holders and these numbers underline an important point that competition between foreign and local pmes is not a zero-sum game in fact the converse is often true by combining and complementing local and foreign expertise we can attract more investments and create many more good jobs and career choices for singaporeans the downside is that with more foreign pmes in singapore they can compete for jobs with locals at the company level and at that level there can be a zero sum situation so there is a trade-off at play here if i put it simply a many jobs strong competition b few jobs no competition and we need to find the right balance where there are more jobs some competition and that is the way to advance the interest of singaporeans not swing to any extreme position but strike that careful balance and then adjust if we find that that balance is off but if someone promises you more jobs no competition from foreigners is selling you snake oil it is not possible it cannot be on any government's policy menu i should point out that besides complementing our local workforce to create more opportunities foreign pmes also help question the impact on the local workforce when times are bad because during a downturn foreigners bear the brunt of job losses during covet 19 for the 12 months to april 2021 the number of employment pass holders dropped by about 21 600 and s-pass holders fell by about 26 800 altogether 50 over a thousand four over the 12 months on the other hand local employment has been stable unemployment rate for local pmes in june 2020 this is a labor market survey so it comes only once a year during june so june 2020 unemployment rate for local pmes despite this is immediately after the circuit breaker was at 2.9 percent resident unemployment rate september 2020 was 4.8 may 2021 3.8 came down by one percentage point without the foreign buffer when our economy ran into trouble the situation would have been much worse singaporeans would have lost many more jobs so while the stock of ep and s-bus holders can fluctuate singaporeans enjoy greater security of employment with help from various government measures job support scheme help firm help enterprises keep their workers we have a multi-ministry national jobs council came up with many initiatives to help place display singaporeans into jobs including also a job growth incentive to help to encourage companies to hire local workers so when mr young manual said in his facebook post that we need to recoup a few tens of thousands of jobs from foreign work pass holders he may not know that we have already done so this always happens in a downturn the second challenge is the profile of foreign pmes they are concentrated in certain sectors and from certain countries of origin and indeed as our digital economy and our needs for tech talent grew more pmes from india came into singapore through our ep framework and when that concentration happens in areas such as changi business park some may feel that we have lost a part of singapore members of the house have raised this concern we are taking this seriously and studying what we can do to lessen the problem i hasten to add that dealing with excessive concentration is not a straightforward matter of chopping up the operations of a company here we don't want to unintentionally cause the whole investment to move elsewhere and this will hurt even more singaporeans and this is part of the careful balancing that i talked about earlier third at the company level there may be unfair hiring practices with department heads preferring to hire foreign pmes or even foreign pmes from certain countries and this is not right system we set out there will always be some abuses we must tackle the abuses when they occur as swiftly as possible while continuing to adopt sensible economic policies that are good for singapore and singaporeans mom takes a strong stance against such discriminatory practices and together with our tripartite partners has been actively enforcing against aaron employers the minister for manpower will speak on this further i have explained the underlying reasons for the difficulties faced by our pmes so that we know what it means for us in terms of public policy choices and how we can most effectively address the challenges if we mistakenly blame ftas and seeker for these problems our responses would be disastrously wrong and would make our problems worse mr speaker let me say something in mandarin foreign foreign [Applause] foreign foreign foreign mr speaker sir i'll switch back to english to finish my speech as i explained earlier our fda strategy has benefited singaporeans and singapore so it is disappointing that ftas are now a target of political attacks but perhaps i should not be surprised as this has happened in many countries such debate goes beyond ftas the question of global versus local has emerged as the new dominant political divide in democracies around the world in the u.s labor unions and various industry lobbies are against free trade the trump administration pulled out of the trans-pacific partnership within a week of taking office even though us was the architect of the tpp agreement in the uk brexit was the culmination of a bitter political contest between those who want to be part of the european union and those who wanted out in france the next presidential election is likely to be a face-off between the incumbent president macron and the far-right nationalist candidate these political divides arose because of globalization while globalization presents opportunities and creates jobs it also brings about greater competition displacement of industries and jobs of immigration of immigrants beggar pardon these consequences go beyond the economic sphere and often strike at the heart of a nation and a community sense of identity and security and this is the most unsettling change causing people to become unsure if they are on the whole better with globalization and such concerns are genuine and deserve serious and proper attention we are a small country and an unrestricted flow of workers from a large country can change the lived experience of singaporeans alter the character of our society and even overwhelm us but we need to be careful that these valid concerns are not exploited by political groups and intentionally or not end up sowing division stoking fear fanning hatred as representatives of the people we all have a responsibility to realize that our words and deeds can shape public opinion and the direction of our political discourse that is why when mr young man why said in this house some months ago that the naturalized singaporean ceo of dbs was not homegrown and deemed this a failure minister ishwaran responded with a word of caution and i agree with minister ishwaran and feel that members of the house should be very careful about what we say on such matters if we are not to give credence to a very negative even ugly minority view and that is also why we appreciate the leader of the opposition standing up to say that when it comes to racism and xenophobia we all have to reject them and there can be no ifs and buts about it mr speaker sir before i conclude let me remind members that the house has invoked standing order 44 so that the members from the psp can give a full response after doctor don silling's speech but even if mr yangman wai and miss hazel choose not to i will be happy to clarify questions from members the pap always fight for the welfare of singaporeans we have done so for more than 60 years now kept our country safe brought jobs to singaporeans build up our infrastructure and taken care of the welfare of all as a city-state connected to the world we want to welcome diverse talents from all over the world and when they are here we invite them to fit into our society respect our social habits and norms appreciate our multicultural society join us at our hawker centers try some durians try some samba balachan speak a few phrases of singlish and we're in singaporeans we go overseas to live and work and about 200 000 of us do we expect the same of ourselves and hope that we also receive hospitable welcomes from our foreign host too i decided to make this statement today so that we can approach the debate on the psp subsequent motion with the right perspective and motivation the house should continue to debate robustly the pros and cons of various policies to help singapore navigate this balance between global and local but we must not inadvertently shake the big rock that has enabled singapore to succeed we cannot survive we cannot earn a living without being connected to the world without being welcoming to the world without the house unanimously supporting our fta strategy and we must always be a big-hearted people even while we grapple with the significant challenges of globalization to forge the best path forward for singapore thank you mr speaker minister for manpower will be making a related ministerial statement members will be able to seek clarifications on both statements during the debate after this statement minister for manpower [Music] mr speaker in his statement mr ong has explained why fda's are critical to singapore as well as how they have reaped they've helped us reap significant benefits for our single fellow singaporeans the same goes for our openness to foreign workers we take the same approach when we decide on foreign workers coming to work in singapore how does it help singaporeans at the start of the 1970s our gdp was 20 billion dollars now the economy has grown to 454 billion dollars foreign workers account for around one third of our workforce there are more than 2.3 million locals who are employed and our resident unemployment rate is 4.1 half of what it was in 1970 we need to understand the real challenges we are facing today in order to have a constructive debate on the way forward and that is why we're having these two ministerial statements i will explain with data with details as to exactly how our foreign workforce policies are implemented in order to benefit in order to benefit our fellow singaporeans and i will also give our perspective on the real challenges that we face today and the real solutions that is demanded associate professor james slim and mr leung ask for the number of intra-corporate transferees or icts for short professionals and dependents that come in through seeker now let me reiterate a point that minister ong has made and that is none of our ftas including seeker gives intra corporate transferees or icts unfettered access to our labor market so please remember that they all have to meet ministry of manpower's prevailing workcast criteria under the ict route the employer does not have to advertise on my career's future.sg but the icts themselves are subject to additional checks on the seniority on their employment history as well as their work and industry experience they are also subject to more conditions in their eligibility to bring in dependence whether they want to apply for permanent residency or future employment in singapore and if they have brought in dependence the dependents do not have the automatic right to work here they can only do so if they qualify for work pass on their own merits this is a very fundamental point and i hope that everyone will remember this so thus and as mentioned by minister ong the total number of icts has consistently been very small in 2020 last year there were only about 4 200 icts of these about 500 were from india that is 500 out of 177 000 ep holders in singapore as for the number of professional visas issued i'm afraid to disappoint mr leon there is no such category within mom as minister ong explained all 127 categories of professionals under seeker currently come in under a regular wordpass framework now the psp has made indian nationals coming in through seeker a focus of contention but i'm afraid they've been barking up the wrong tree the number of icts coming in under our ftas and in particular seeker is a very very small number relative to the total numbers total number of eps so i suggest we set aside this rate herring and move on more importantly to the heart of the matter the heart of the matter is this how do we as a small country devoid of any natural resources remain open to global talent for us to continue to create opportunities for our fellow country singaporeans while at the same time managing the attendance social repercussions singaporeans are pragmatic they understand we need to remain open to global talent however they also face real challenges in particular they're worried about three things first that the growth in ep holders has come at the expense of our local pmes second that some workplaces have become more concentrated with a single nationality third that there may be discrimination against local job seekers and employees i've come from the private sector and i understand and i empathize with these fears these concerns and these anxieties i would like to address each of them in turn because i want to lay out the facts and also share our approach in dealing with each one of them now i'm not suggesting that all of our approaches are perfect and obviously we are always a works in progress but we will continue to refine them in the light of our experiences always with a focused view to having a system that will and that can deliver good jobs good livelihoods and a thriving economy for singaporeans not just for our generation but for our future generations and i hope this will enable us to arrive at a better understanding of the choices and the trade-offs that we constantly have to make first on increased competition from foreign pmes in singapore today we have one of the best local talent pools in the world but it is insufficient to meet the breadth the debt the needs of the investments that generate the quality and the range of jobs that we have today so when we bring in new investments we will sometimes need to attract foreign expertise foreign talent while we build up our local capabilities ms hazel pua associate professor jim muslim and mr sakyandi supad asked for the breakdown of local and of foreign workforce numbers by sector given the issue at hand let me focus on eps as of 2020 we have around 177 000 eps or employment pass holders in our overall workforce manufacturing and construction account for about 1 10. the rest are in the services sector and if you look at the top three sub-sectors downwards infocom and professional services collectively these two sectors account for around one-fifth each while finance accounts for another one-seventh if you look at the change from 2005 i think that was around the time when seeker was signed to 2020 the total number of eps has increased by around 112 000. this was also mentioned in min aung's speech earlier on over this same period the number of total pmes local the number of local pmes increased significantly by more than 380 000 now there have been questions asked both inside and outside of this house whether most of the growth in local pme jobs was accounted for by singapore citizens if you look at our unemployment statistics we provide the figure for singapore citizens the citizen unemployment rate over the past 10 years has been consistently low at around three percent hence the answer must be a yes now for those of you who have asked how much of this local pme job growth has gone to born and bred singaporeans notwithstanding the divisive intent of this kind of questioning let me state simply that the majority of this growth over the past decade went to singaporeans born in singapore and as we have also shared in response to a written parliamentary question yesterday 87 of singapore citizens were born here so much attention has been placed on the finance and the infocomm sectors which alone accounted for 40 of the increase in ep holders now this is significant but what is even more significant is that these two sectors saw even stronger job creation for local pmes in infocom the number of eps increased by around 25 000 the number of jobs created in this sector alone for local pms was greater at 35 000. in finance the number of eps increased by around 20 000. but the number of jobs created for local pmes was even greater at around 85 000 this is more than four times now we focus on these two sectors because they bring good quality jobs and singapore our beloved singapore can carve out an advantage and value add significantly in these areas and as a result there has been significant job creation now as we attract foreign banks infocom companies to create jobs here they will inevitably need foreign workers to complement the singaporean workforce i want to deal with a fundamental misconception which lies at the heart of some of the things being misconstrued when a company decides to come into singapore to invest and they need about 3 000 people they may be able to find about 2500 of these talents in singapore but they still need to supplement that 2005 with the other additional 500 from overseas now if we object and we insisted that the balance of the 500 must all come from singapore irrespective then how do we expect that investment to take off how do you expect the investment to come in these 2 500 jobs for the locals would be compromised greatly so the simple point is that while we have a good singaporean talent pool our pool is not large enough to fulfill all of the needs the breath and the depth of these enterprises and very often foreigners also bring in skills which complement singaporeans skill sets as well so the misconception is that if we said no to the foreigners coming in and the misconception people think is that these jobs they would have taken would therefore all go to singaporeans how can this be possible i mean this is a misconception how do i know that this is a misconception because today even as we speak we still have 22 000 pme jobs that are not filled companies are desperate to feel these jobs they would love to take in singaporeans if they could because singaporeans are more productive but these jobs up to now are still not failed perhaps mr leong would like to think deeply about that and deliberate and offer us some advice now mr leon also suggests that doing away with foreigners will reduce the displacement of our local of our older pmes i wish that was so but private sector and the real economy do not operate this way there will always be displacement of pmes whether older or younger in any economy why because the business world is never static industries change companies downsize they expand they relocate they pivot they transform now even if regardless of whether a foreigners or not they would not change because this is the function of the business world what matters most for us is whether we are able to find jobs for these displaced pmes and to do this we need an ecosystem where there is also new companies willing to come and start up in singapore new investments new foreign direct investments coming in and expanding multinational corporations so far i think we have done credibly in this regard new jobs created have far exceeded the jobs that have been lost and our employment rate has been kept low and the re-entry rates for displaced pmes are high that's it it is not always easy or possible to find every single displaced pme and equivalent job in the same industry especially if there's a skills mismatch an it sales manager who loses his job may not find a job as a cyber security expert but we do our best to help them find jobs in other growth sectors if we tell companies which want to invest in singapore that they can only employ singaporeans or first employ singaporeans who have been displaced regardless of skills i think the answer will be quite stuck they i think would opt not to come into singapore to invest all companies will want to hire singaporeans but companies will also need to have that flexibility to hire the best available talent from around the world to complement our singaporean workforce now i understand i understand what displaced singaporeans are going through rest assured we are doing our best to help you and your families but it is important that we go into the root cause of the problem we are able to tackle it and we are able to diagnose the situation accurately and not provide treatment to just treat and relieve the symptoms because only when we can identify the right solution we are able to prescribe we are able to provide the precise and the appropriate treatment the fundamental question now is how do we strike a balance between ensuring that businesses have access to skill sets the manpower to grow and succeed whilst creating opportunities for our local workers to grow and to progress our strategy to receive to achieve this has always been two-pronged ensuring that our workers can compete fairly and can compete strongly so the first is to ensure that our local workers can compete fairly we do this through our work past controls our view our prevalent view is that foreign manpower should not come to singapore just because they are cheaper to hire than locals they should complement but not displace our local workforce they should bring in extra skills to help the companies and at the same time create more singaporean jobs in line with these objectives at the work permit and the s-pass level we have quotas and we have levies in place to regulate foreign worker numbers we have been progressively tightening quotas we have been progressively raising levies to reduce manpower reliance spur job redesign push for quality growth in the past over the past decade we have consistently and state fastly help our course in spite of numerous calls from businesses to relax our rules we commit to productivity led growth because we believe many of these jobs have the potential to be transformed into good jobs that provide higher real wages and rewarding careers for singaporeans for eps we do not impose quotas or levies because there is fierce competition for global talent and worldwide shortages in areas such as tech and digital skills a quota would be a hard cap that would limit our ability to compete at the high end of the global economy while for a levy to have any impact or any effect at all on ep numbers it would have to be set very high and would substantially increase business costs instead what we have done is that we have focused on setting and raising the quality bar for ep holders through requirements on salary and qualifications to make sure that the eps who come in at the right level and they bring the right skill sets the necessary expertise and experience to contribute significantly to our economy last year we raised the ep minimum qualifying criteria sorry last year we raised the ep minimum qualifying salary in two steps from three thousand six hundred to three thousand nine hundred dollars and then we raise it again to four thousand five hundred dollars the salary requirement increases with age it's also on a graduated scale which reflects the candidate's experience his length of time in the workforce in order to provide sufficient protection for our mutual workers we also introduce a higher bar of five thousand dollars for applicants in the finance sector to take into account the higher wage norms in that sector we will continue to review we will continue to revise these thresholds regularly to ensure that they remain appropriate and they remain in tandem as our economy develops as our skills as our income levels go up mr leon has also previously raised in this house his concern that foreign eps are cheaper to higher than locals simply because their employers do not make cpf contributions i think he fundamentally misunderstands the purpose of our cpf cpf is set aside for our retirement needs it can also be used for housing as foreign pmes who are not working in singapore on a permanent basis i don't think we should be responsible for their retirement adequacy or home ownership needs hence i don't think it makes sense for us to extend our cpf benefits and coverage to them fundamentally our cpf system is designed to benefit our resident workers not to help attract or deter foreigners instead when reviewing qualifying salary to maintain a level playing field we take into account cpf contributions as part of the cost to employers so that is packaging into the cost to employers now mr leung did not suggest that employers should pay foreign cpf too i think he realizes this instead he says he wants to impose a 1 200 levy on ep holders but as i've just explained a levy is not the most effective or the right way to manage the population of foreign pmes i think that it would be better served better managed by appropriately setting the right salary level for entry into singapore ms hasop has also asked for numbers on dependence in singapore now this is relevant in so far as they are competing with locals for jobs as shared previously the vast majority of dependents and dependent pass holders do not work during their stay in singapore the number of dependent past holders who have sought employment in singapore via a letter of consent so they need for dependent pass holders up to may if they want to work they need to get a letter of consent loc this number constitutes only about one percent of all work pass holders in fact if members would remember we have already regularized the work arrangements of dp holders in may this year and in may this year db holders who wish to work in singapore can no longer obtain the letter of consent instead they will have to qualify for a relevant work pass on their own merit so they go through the normal routes now there will always be calls from workers to tighten our foreign workforce policies further just as there will always be calls from businesses to relax them and i can tell you that in my past life i was also guilty of that i've also lobbied to relax you know what passes you know i mean that was a function of a listed company so it is a constant tight road that the ministry of manpower and the ministry of trade and industry have to constantly navigate very delicately amidst highly competitive global markets for both investments and talent there are limits ladies and gentlemen there are limits as to how far we can tighten our controls without eventually hurting singaporeans with remote working becoming more prevalent companies increasingly do not need to cite their manpower in singapore in fact we may find more businesses simply choosing to move entire business functions offshore if it becomes too difficult onerous or expensive to operate here singaporeans will end up with a shorter end of the stick as well by losing some jobs too and this is precisely why the second prong of our approach that of ensuring that our singaporeans can compete strongly is just as important in an open and globalized labor market like ours competition is intense and stiff there will be some of our fellow singaporeans who are displaced from their jobs and we need to help them find replacement jobs this happens not just because of competition from foreign workers but because of other factors like technological change and industries phasing out and this is why the government invests so heavily in retraining in skills development so that displaced workers can gain new skills and reinvent themselves either by doing a different job in the same industry or transiting to another industry altogether in fact some industries as they get sunsetted we have to help workers to pivot and transform even faster and really that is the subject of the 23 industry transformation maps that have been set up over the last couple of years as mr lim suicide used to say in singapore we are unable to guarantee your employment but rest assured we will work very very very hard to ensure your employability upgrading skills and staying relevant is ultimately our workers best form of protection we do this through our system of education to training and that goes beyond formal schooling we do this via skills future we also help displaced singaporeans through job facilitation and support covet 19 has been an especially difficult time for many singaporeans and therefore we have stepped up support as announced at budget this year we have extended the sg united jobs and skills package the sgujs ministry of finance has set aside an additional 5.4 billion dollars to support the hiring of 200 000 local locals through the jobs growth incentive jgi and provided 35 000 traineeships attachment and training opportunities just this year alone these programs are in addition to long-standing programs such as workforce singapore's wsg's career conversion programmes and to make our career matching services even more accessible to locals wsg has set up 20 in 24 hdb towns this sgu js sees that mr sg united jobs and skill centers in all 24 hdb towns the retrenchment task force led by wsg and supported by ntuc's e2i reached out to nearly all retrench workers in 2020 and of those who took up the task force employment facilitation assistance you'd be happy to note that more than two-thirds of them have found jobs within six months ms marion jaffa asked about the effectiveness of the different capability development schemes in building a local talent pipeline as of n april 2021 more than 110 000 locals have been placed into jobs and skills opportunities as a result of the sg ujs package within the first three months of implementation the jobs growth incentive supported 27 000 employers who hired 130 000 new locals with the support of employers and the unions the policies that we have put up have preserved jobs for singaporeans amidst the crisis of our generation the numbers speak for themselves total employment in 2020 excluding migrant domestic workers shrank by 166 600 employment took the most hit shrinking by 181 500. resident employment on the other hand managed to expand by 14 900 in spite of the downturn we are not quite out of the woods yet and there is more work to be done but ladies and gentlemen let us also build on what we have collectively achieved so far the second part on safeguarding diversity i want to talk about nationality concentration amongst foreign pmes mr leong and miss poa have asked for the nationality profile of our work pass holders and their dependents from china from india from the u.s and from australia miss poa has asked for even more granular data on the sector and jobs commonly held by these same nationalities now mr speaker sir for foreign policy reasons we do not publish detailed statistics on our foreign workforce especially by nationality and i'm not aware of any country that reports at that level of granularity requested but nevertheless we recognize that if misconceptions continue to spread in spite of all of our attempts to address them in many other ways even more damage will be done so i will share some numbers to address the misconceptions and allow for meaningful engagement on the issue at hand the top nationalities that comprise around two-thirds of our ep holders has been consistent since 2005. namely china india japan malaysia philippines and the uk i believe the interest is really in indian ep holders the proportion of ep holders from india has increased from about 1 7 in 2005 to about a quarter in 2020 in comparison the proportion of ep holders from china has remained relatively stable across the same time period now is this the result of more favorable treatment for indian ep holders due to seeker the answer is no as i've shared earlier all work past holders in singapore have to meet the same criteria before they are allowed to enter our local our labour market there is no differentiation based on nationality rather these numbers reflect trends in the global demand and supply of tech talent the larger increases in indian ep holders compared to other nationalities is driven by a result of rapid growth and choices of growing our digital economy and finance as every sector seeks to be digitally enabled their need for tech talent has grown significantly we don't have enough locals to fill the jobs available in the infocomm sector alone today 6 000 jobs currently remain unfilled companies can decide which overseas countries they want to bring in their manpower from based on their needs and the availability of the required talent china and india over the last decade or so are two of the largest suppliers of tech talent but you would have read china has sprouted so many unicorns and they have i mean you know the prc companies themselves have a huge demand of their own so many chinese talent decide to stay in china to work and i can tell you that this is the numbers that we are seeing across the construction industry amongst the migrant workers as well i think prior to my coming on board as manpower minister i think many members here would know that i i deal with the dorms most of the time so i can share with you the same statistics now india's talent on the other hand they've continued to look outwards they've also the advantage of being english speaking now this phenomenon is not unique to singapore it is global today currently sorry india is the largest country of origin for international migrants and this is in the 2021 january un dsa report in 2020 alone it accounted for 18 million international migrants up by 10 million from 2000. india has grown to become the second largest source of immigrants in the us the third largest in the uk and these two countries are also heavily invested in developing the technological capabilities now our companies our industries our enterprises they are both creators they as well as they are creators of technology but they are also adopters of the talent that is needed to create these technologies given our relative shortage of manpower even if the workers don't come from india they will come from somewhere else now i hope that mr liang is not objecting to indians per se the point i think we should ask ourselves is this are they helping our companies are they helping our enterprises are they helping us to grow our economy and create better singaporean jobs the answer is yes it is not surprising however that this increasing concentration has caused some social friction and anxiety to singaporeans in some ways this is understandable and to some we may even say that is expected because these ep holders are transient they work in singapore for a number of years and they contribute to our economic growth apart from some ep holders who settle down and become prs or singapore citizens most of them most ep holders work here for a few years and they either return home or they move on elsewhere so it is to be expected that they are different and we do feel that they are different and this is the challenge of living in our multicultural society and a globalized world as minister lawrence wong spoke about recently this is something that we will have to proactively and we have been constantly monitoring and managing indeed when a single nationality becomes too prominent and that can have a disproportionate impact on our existing culture our beliefs it can cause our fellow singaporeans ourselves included to feel less at home in our workplaces and in our neighborhoods in 2000 in the early 2000s we experienced a similar situation when the share of prcs in our foreign workforce increased significantly before tapering as china's growth took off both then and now the larger numbers do not go did not go unnoticed and they created frictions within our communities we understand these concerns which is why we review and we update our work past policies regularly we always seek to balance the needs of our economy with the needs of our society we have to bring in the talent and the skills to keep our economy growing while tracking that the number of foreigners in our midst stays at a level that we are able to cope with and manage the social frictions that will arise from time to time now this is a series of trade-offs it is not going to be a once-off adjustments it will be a constant balance that we have to continuously monitor and get right today the government does monitor the concentration of nationalities at the firm level mr leung asks whether the threshold percentage of a company's workforce from a single nationality is a criterion for the fair consideration framework or fcf watch list the answer is yes in short listing firms manpower ministry looks at whether they have a high concentration of foreigners from a single nationality source in addition to a high source of foreign pmets relative to their industry peers however being flagged in the fcf watch list is not evidence that the firm has committed any wrongdoing potentially it could be a sign that some unfair hiring may be occurring the purpose of this watch list is to have the tripartite alliance for fair and progressive employment practices or tough app actively engage these companies to review and improve where needed their hiring practices and their human resource capabilities the majority of the firms are cooperative they respond positively and they exit the watch list now for the small minority that are unresponsive they can have their work past privileges curtailed or they can be suspended for specific time period and this is not a small penalty today this is an effective process all be intense resource intensive we currently have about 400 firms placed on the fcf watch list now there are limitations in terms of the to the reach and the number of firms that we can put through this process we will be looking to complement to strengthen the fcf watch list with a more scalable approach as mentioned in mom's committee of supply speech this year we are also exploring further refinements to our ep framework today we rely primarily on salary as a gatekeeper to select complementary talent because this is easy to understand and administer but we are also exploring further refinements further additional refinements to achieve our objectives of a strong singaporean core complemented by a diverse foreign workforce i hope to share more details in due course last but not least i want to deal with discrimination we know not all employers play by the rules we have zero tolerance zero tolerance towards discriminatory hiring practices all employers are expected to comply with the requirements of the fcf and not discriminate on characteristics that are not related to the job when it comes to hiring foreign pmes employers must first advertise on my careersfuture.sg and consider all candidates in the local workplace fairly before submitting a work pass application tarfab investigates potential cases of pre-selection based on proactive surveillance we use data analytics and ai as well to to to find out so we actually sort of uh study the data uh quite quite uh aggressively so we also receive complaints from the public and we act on them as well since its introduction in 2014 the ministry of manpower has been progressively enhancing this framework in january 2020 we stiffened penalties further for discrimination cases so that parent employers can have their work pass privileges suspended for at least 12 months and sometimes up to 24 months last year we extended the fcf job advertisement requirements to cover s-passes as well as eps and we doubled the minimum advertisement period from 14 days to 28 days to give local job seekers more time to respond to job openings mr leong has asked mr yang hua has asked about the results of our efforts over the past three years tafe has handled an average of 170 nationality discrimination cases arising from complaints annually the top three sectors making up about half of the complaints are the wholesale and retail trade administrative and support services and other service activities these cases are investigated by tafe and were warranted they are referred to mom for enforcement going forward we will do more to clam down on egregious employers with discriminatory employment practices several mps like mr lewis um mr patrick tay and mr vikram nair had earlier suggested strengthening our levers to give more bite to our tripartite guidelines on fair employment practices we take these suggestions seriously and we have been studying various options ladies and gentlemen on a fundamental level the government's goal has always been to create a better life and a future for singaporeans we do that through growing the economy through enlarging the pie so that more locals can enjoy better jobs and a higher standard of living we do that by tirelessly building up the singaporean core through a world-class education system through continuous upskilling and re-skilling and we do that through working closely with all stakeholders involved to stamp out discriminatory employment practices and ensure a fair playing field to protect our singaporean workers there are careful balances and trade-offs to be made all the time the government is intent on keeping this balance right to achieve the goal of achieve of creating win-win outcomes for all mom will always be pro both pro worker and pro business and this is necessarily a joint effort the power and the responsibility to make this happen does not lie with the government alone businesses must be fair and progressive employers they must win the confidence and the trust of the employees and the wider public by investing in a strong singaporean call even as they complement it with a diverse foreign workforce workers too must adopt a growth mindset and continuously develop their skills this is the spirit of our pioneers who are resilient in the face of challenges and daring in new opportunities unions and trade associations and chambers or tacs must continue to serve as multipliers of these positive changes they help us they help to build the bridge between government and businesses and workers and they have spearheaded important initiatives to help our businesses and workers transform and upskill and i hope members of all parties take their responsibility they must take their responsibility as representatives of the people seriously and work towards constructive solutions and avoid exploiting divisive fault lines the tripartite partnership between unions employers and the government is the real reason why we have managed to succeed over the years we are at a critical inflection point in our economic development the pandemic has caused significant economic damage the world over we face many challenges in the post-pandemic era but there are also abundant opportunities if we play our cards right with it distinguish ourselves internationally with how we manage covet and we have enhanced our trust premium many businesses are now looking seriously at investing more in singapore which will create good jobs but only if they get can get enough workers foreign workers as well to supplement our local workforce if we can bring them in we can continue to grow our economy for another five to ten years but if we lose this opportunity we will not only take longer to recover the impact will be borne by our older workers and also by our youth who will graduate into the workforce over the next few years this is a golden opportunity for singapore to pool ahead but if we turn protectionists and we make it difficult for companies to hire talent from around the world then we will lose this opportunity a business hub means being cosmopolitan having people from around the world doing business with the whole world and creating more opportunities for singaporeans it will bring in competition but if the competition is not here it will be outside the competition will be in helping other companies in other countries to beat hours here and displace our workers let us work together to continue improving singaporeans lives and building a better future for all mr speaker sir can i just take a couple more minutes in mandarin please [Music] foreign somehow it it sounds different when i speak in mandarin you're supposed to to sing it in hokkien you know two on the end line i think even mr pritam saying no it's a hokkien song two on the end [Music] foreign mr speaker sir pursuant to standing order number 44 i beg to move that the two ministerial statements made by me and minister for manpower on free trade agreements and foreign manpower be considered by parliament the question is that the two minister of statements made by minister for health and minister for manpower and free trade agreements and foreign manpower be considered by parliament to proceed with the debate clarifications speeches it's patrick day [Music] mr speaker sir i thank our both ministers for their statements and wish to provide my comments clarifications and suggestions on this sensitive and important topic which concerns singaporean workers especially our professionals managers and executives i co-chair the ntuc snap bme task force set up by ntuc last year to look into the concerns of pmes and to flesh out a set of recommendations later this year in relation to employment employability of pmes in singapore in the past six months we have surveyed and engaged through more than 15 focus group sessions about 8 000 professionals managed executives to better understand their concerns fears and anxiety and ideate proposals to overcome them we have heard ground sentiments on a platoon of issues challenges faced by singaporean pmes on the top of their mind is job security amidst this covit 19 pandemic one concern amongst others which will serve as intense competition from the influx of foreign manpower and anecdotes of unfair employment practices by employers who favor hiring foreigners and discriminate against our locals some pmes share ivastia personal experiences of foreign hiring managers bringing in co-workers of the same nationality while others have shared about disguised discriminatory practices at work where they felt ostracized when their foreign colleagues who formed majority of the team communicate in their native language at work and through the unfair allocation of off-days given to their foreign colleagues during public holidays by their supervisors of the same nationality while it is clear only a minority engages in such unacceptable practices the concerns are legitimate and we should not ignore it pmes i spoke to acknowledge the need for ftas and foreign manpower in this age of globalization global competition and economic survival and success but we must recognize the need to support our local workforce's aspirations and to address their concerns and anxieties one singaporean pme who is an asia pacific sales director as well as many other pmes in those sectors with a higher proportion of foreign pme such as the financial ict and professional services sectors shared with me that we should not allow the import of non-specialized and non-highly skilled foreign manpower to compete against singaporeans for well-paying jobs which many singaporeans can do i think this principle of complementarity and not direct competition is an important concept which we need to continue to embrace and strengthen in other words we need to strike a balance between being open and having a level playing field for our locals with fair opportunities and fair treatment this balance is not easy to achieve and it's going to be an involving process together with fellow labour and pap mps i've been speaking and lobbying on this important area in and outside of this house the past decade to ensure fairness equity and leveling the playing field especially for singaporean pms since 2011 i've been pushing for stronger enforcement against employers who discriminate against or unfairly treat singaporean pmes a foreign pme dependency ratio labour market testing which subsequently came in the form of the fair consideration framework the national jobs bank as well as many other policy measures from employment past qualifying salaries to regular tightening of the fcf and prosecution of companies were recalcitrant we even set up the employment claims tribunal the tropolite lines for fair employment practices as well as the tribal alliance for disputes management and issued many tripartite advisories standards guidelines to strengthen the singaporean core i'm heartened that in these past 10 years of lobbying and advocating for a stronger singaporean core many of these measures have been put in place as shared by minister tanziling earlier with support of ultrapolite partners and other economic agencies such as mes and edb to better support and protect our singaporean workforce and provide them with a fair and level playing field in the job market in fact less than a year ago in the midst of the pandemic and worsening of economy the labour movement lobbied and the trapatha partners reacted and updated the tropical advisory of managing excess manpower and responsible retrenchment with key principles on fair retrenchment which provides added safeguards to preserve our singaporean core in our companies when they carry out retracement exercises that's it more needs to be done to strengthen the singaporean core further develop our local workforce's capabilities and protect our locals from being unfairly discriminated it is important to recognize the role that foreign manpower plays which is to complement and enhance the capabilities of the local workforce and not to replace or displace it in this vein i would like to put forth some proposals to minister that aims to address fairness and localization of pme jobs first we can enhance fair hiring practices to strengthening enforcement and imposing stiffer penalties for airing companies with discriminatory hiring practices i previously submitted in this house on revealing or even publishing the triple week watch list which ministry of manpower and tufa maintains so that the potential reputational laws would serve as a deterrence we should not allow a few black sheep to weaken our entire working structure i further submit that mom should consider giving tufa even more teeth and bite true expanded powers of investigation enforcement and even meeting out punishment second we can level the playing field for local pmes by enhancing the ep application review process to move beyond looking at individual applicants educational qualification and salaries and play close swatch pay close watch to sectors with particular imbalance finally we need to ensure that locals have fair access to pme roles and progression opportunities to improve localization of jobs in high growth sectors as i have lobbied before in this house is imperative that we ensure concerted structured institutionalized and mandatory skills and knowledge transfer from these foreign pmes to our local pmes within a stipulated and agreed time frame as employers bring in forum pms to fill skills or knowledge gaps in their current workforce this will help to develop a pipeline of local talent and at the same time we will also need to build our leadership bench strength to ensure that singaporeans can benefit and take up leadership roles in multinational corporations that we bring into singapore to sum up to say that we have found the silver bullet or antidote will not be an easy one as it's going to be a treadmill journey a treadmill we need to constantly watch our step keep pace and stay in touch with the pulse pay close watch of the economic competition and competitors keep pace with a changing demographic profile and the future of work and stay in touch with the pulse and heartbeat of singaporeans their stresses aspirations interest and well-being because every worker matters thank you professor hunyantek mr speaker sir an issue that has surfaced in the debate on free trade agreements fdas such as a comprehensive economic cooperation agreement zika is that of the impact on jobs it is important to state at the outset that the number of jobs in an economy is not an immutable datum rather it is variable and it is the result of the net effect of the pace of job creation which adds to the number of job vacancies and the pace of job destruction which reduces the number of job vacancies in the first few decades after gaining independence the world trading system under the general agreement on tariffs and trade get steadily reduced tariff rates and lower trade barriers the world trade organization wto was established in 1995 as a multilateral institution that facilitated the signing of agreements in areas such as services investment and intellectual property this enabled the singapore economy to attract multinational corporations mncs to base production in singapore thus creating jobs and sell into the world market with increased protectionist sentiments expressed in many advanced countries in recent years so that the wto has had difficulty in reaching new agreements it has been necessary for singapore to turn to fda's to provide a means to enlarge markets for singapore-based firms by negotiating and signing ftas that enable our firms to export to destination markets at lower or zero tariff rates singapore can attract foreign capital to work in singapore to employ singapore-based workers and pull up their wages with singapore's total fertility rate consistently below the replacement rate of 2.1 since the mid-1970s the size of the citizen labor force will begin to shrink with more people retiring than the number of new entrants into the workforce a shrinking workforce will put downward pressure on gdp growth because productivity growth is unlikely to fully compensate for the labor force shrinkage singapore's rise in living standards over the past decades has been facilitated by a steady inflow of foreign direct investment which brought technology and good jobs so continuing to attract multinational corporations to base their production here even as we become more service oriented than manufacturing hiring a smaller share of labour force yet doing this is likely to require a complementary set of skills that can be offered only by a combination of local and foreign workers given the low fertility rate at this stage of our development were indigenous innovation must contribute to productivity growth fdas also allow new startups and both large and local enterprises lles as well as small and medium-sized enterprises smes to face lower trade barriers when selling into particular overseas markets so we continue to need to rely on mncs because they are large they pay better wages but we also at a stage where we need to stimulate engineer indigenous innovation and they'll start small many will fail but they need to have the capacity to be able to sell abroad and therefore establishing ftas that allow the partner signatories to the agreement to lower the tariff rates enlarges the market for our new start-ups and smes as well as lles the increased international competition to be clear faced by our local firms also means there will be some job destruction because with increased competition some of our smes may fail nevertheless the creative destruction resulting from ftas is likely to leave the economy overall with more productive firms that are able to pay better wages so a steeper competition some will not survive and they have to try again but overall for the economy the level of productivity is higher as we seek to generate indigenous innovation as a source of productivity growth so fdas are helpful both from the point of view of continuing to attract mncs to place the production here but it is also important as a way of giving a leave to our more productive local firms smes to break into potentially neighboring markets and further overseas the derived demand for workers resulting from the need to meet this external demand for our goods and services by foreign firms and consumers in the partner countries who are signatories of the fdas will translate into the creation of new job slots in particular tasks because what is a job a job is a combination of tasks that we create so the allocation of workers with the right skill set to fill these job slots in this particular set of tasks is necessary in order to maximize this singapore based firm's profit only then is productivity of the firm boosted and the salaries correspondingly as the local workforce raises its human capital because of the huge investment we have made from the beginning in education the the proportion of the cohort living primary school that goes to university has gone up so i think that from the point of view of increased human capital as well as the investment in skills future to allow learning on the job i think there is every reason to have confidence that our local workforce will both have a higher level of human capital as well as have the ability to acquire new skills to function in an age of digital transformation if we succeed in doing that then our resident workers will have the comparative advantage to fill these new jobs laws the sort of thing that mr patrick they talk about so so i think going back to mr ong's analogy a of more job slot but more competition on the other hand less competition of future jobs loss he talked about being somewhere in between then i think there's good reason given our history the ability to ultimately compete in the world market says there's something positive of a tilting toward the direction of increased competition but we make investment in our local workforce starting from the primary school and there's every good reason to believe that even as we transit to a phase of of of the country's development where you're not going to have the five percent growth per year because there's catch-up growth you're now at the stage where the potential for growth has to come from innovation driving productivity i believe that there's every good reason to think that ultimately many of these jobs that our locals take they graduate from a university they perhaps start off with an app in an mnc at a lower managerial position but with the the sort of human capital with the sort of ability to adjust and compete there's every good reason to believe that many of them on their own merits have the potential to fill in these new jobs laws because there's local advantage mr speaker sir to conclude in the absence of a vibrant international trading system that can conclude new agreements to further liberalize trade in goods and services i believe that the signing of fda's overall provides the singapore economy a means for its firms to expand their market despite the job churning and the creative destruction that ultimately i believe has positive need net impact for our labour market thank you mr lewison thank you sir not a speech but just a clarification if i could ask minister tan whether moving forward we will consider legislating the tropath guidelines on fair employment practice and i think that's important because it's not just discrimination based on nationality but also on based on race religion gender family responsibility disability amongst many others so i really hope we'll consider legislating those guidelines thank you i thank um i thank the honourable member lewis for his suggestion as i've shared in my speech earlier on we're looking at refining we're looking at um strengthening um the not just tarfab itself but also the fair consideration framework itself uh give us a bit of time i think we're reviewing it with the the different um parties because it's a tripartite nature and in the months forward i should be able to come back and update this house again thank you miss hazel i thank the two ministers for their ministerial statements providing a wide range of information and explanation and for this additional opportunity for us to seek clarifications on an issue that is of that's of great concern to many singaporeans i will an open debate based on the right information can only be beneficial to all parties involved whether in or out of this house i'd like to seek a few clarifications the first one relates to minister aung's claim that psp has made false allegations that ceca is allowing a free flow of indian pmes can i ask the minister to provide the specifics of this false allegations that he mentioned including details like when and where and who he gave partial quotes but partial quotes can be taken out of context and if he can provide the specifics we can look into it further secondly minister ong said that at the beginning of his statement that he would be happy to provide all information that we request for in order to have a more robust debate on the motion subsequently but at the end of the ministry the two ministerial statements unfortunately uh the bulk of the information that we have requested for in our nine parliamentary questions are not released so will there be any more data forthcoming in the form of written answers thirdly we agree that ftas are important to singapore's economy and we're not calling for the abolition of ftas our concern is over specific provisions in ftas relating to the movement of natural persons in in ceca just now minister al mentioned that the listing of the 127 professions does not mean that anybody who applies under this will be approved but it can be rejected even if they apply now article 9.5 clause 2 under the heading of professional states that each party shall grant temporary entry and stay for up to a year and it goes on to list several conditions so my question here is because it says shall grant temporary entry and stay for up to a year if an applicant meets the criteria that is listed in this clause namely proof of nationality [Music] letter of contract or similar documentation educational certificates or similar documentation as well as the minimum salary requirements for e-pass for anybody who satisfies these conditions are we obliged to approve their application and fourthly under this clause thus and temporary entry and stay is up to one year i would like to see clarification can this uh entry and stay be further extended or renewed or reapplied thank you and so on thank you mr speaker let me try to answer the honorable members for question i hope i got them all correct proof of the allegations of psp 3rd of august 2019 dr tan changbok i think he was second then of psp stated on the online citizen asia facebook page i quote psp will call for a review of the india singapore comprehensive economic corporation agreement known as seeker this agreement you must understand was negotiated by our current dpm hence wicked and signed in 2005 amongst the terms of the seeker it allowed the free movement of professionals in 127 sectors to enter and work in singapore unquote 7th july 2020 dr tan in an interview with mothership said i quote seeker is an agreement between singapore and india to bring in to allow i think 127 categories of professionals to come to singapore and be given that free hand actually practically free hand to come and work here unquote 31st august 2020 mr francis jen on the psp facebook page and website he urged the government to release more data on the matter which is fair enough but then went on to state that the government i quote could not share the next level of details including the number of indian nationals converted to pr and those who subsequently gotten citizenships within the eight years under the intra-corporate transferee provision of the agreement i think that unquote and then that agreement starts to suggest that they come in and then become prn citizens as well most recently 22nd june 2021 in a facebook post mr leong manuei said the most important economic policies that have affected the jobs and livelihoods of singaporeans relate to foreign pmes and free trade agreements in particular a comprehensive economic cooperation agreement with india as members of the public as members of the house we were also members of public using our headphones we would also have received many other unattributable divisive messages coming through our feeds and chat messages and i think these quotes and all these messages you receive if you are singaporeans especially one facing challenges at the workplace feeling insecure you're bound to feel upset and angry you want to feel that i don't want to welcome foreign pmes you will grow suspicious of them even reject them and it will be a natural reaction because the messages feed on our worries and our fears we have seen how this has turned out in so many other countries how the extreme right nativist populist parties have grown in strength just by tapping into that fear and insecurity because of globalization it's there but these far-right nationalist parties or natives parties they have been growing stronger in many places around the world and created divisions in societies sometimes they have replaced the government who take a more moderate policy and i really hope that it doesn't happen here because if it happens in singapore as it happened elsewhere our policies our politics would have gone disastrously wrong misesopha said that i promise to give all the data they requested we tried we tried our best but as dr dan siling explained no countries release data to that level of granularity but if i just go back to my speech what i said is dr tan will provide more details detailed answers to the specific questions including providing the data which will be useful for our subsequent debate and putting that data in context i i didn't promise that all the data will be tabulated and provided and dr tan explained why we try to provide as much as we can but i think there's a limit to what we can do um ms hazel paul also asked about article nine article nine as a trade negotiator you always look up sorry chapter nine i'm sorry chapter nine of seeker as a trade negotiator we always look out for the word shell and here and you see shell means you must do something you don't do you are in breach of the agreement so what is the shell here you shall grant temporary entry and stay up to one year for the duration of contract that's what we agreed to that means if we approve if you meet our condition work past conditions we shall grant you one year of admission i think it's very reasonable imagine you apply for something for the government and then they tell you i approve but i don't know how long tomorrow revoked can't be here it's not not market friendly at all so this is what we have agreed to remember the ordering of the clauses matter as well i was mentioning page one i printed a copy i highlighted it second paragraph that paragraph are what i call the kavauts so cover-ups come in the beginning you read this chapter you know that this chapter does not apply to immigration measures governments policy on immigration on the granting work pass granting pr granting citizenship does not cover this chapter and then it goes on to say what then the government what then the parties must do so you shall grant one year of approval should you approve that's how you read the agreement i hope i have answered all this hazel pass question but i do have some question too for psp if i may left my papers there i'm going to pick it up [Music] i tried to correct the falsehoods of seeker but the whole purpose of this statement is that i know psp is preparing for motion debate but i'm also hoping that we all go into the debate with some common ground yeah and i think first of all common ground must be let's put aside the falsehoods and therefore i clarified which are the false words and let's put them aside and don't bring them into the motion what are the first falsehood first seeker does not allow a free flow of intra corporate transfers to singapore and most companies prefer to apply for eps than to use the intra corporate transfer route which actually is more cumbersome and hence i mentioned as of 2020 there were only 500 intra-corporate transferees from singapore ins from india in singapore second falsehood seeker also does not give indian nationals from 127 professions a free hand to come to singapore to live and work seeker allows them to apply for eps does not oblige singapore to approve the applications approval is subject to them meeting our criteria immigration measures are cuffed out from the agreement like all fdas but in the spirit of seeking common ground we come to this house the floor and we recognize that globalization is a difficult thing there are lots of pros there's also cons in the case of singapore globalization has allowed us to grow to create a lot of good jobs and benefited many singaporeans if we have not done that today we will be having a very different kind of debate of massive unemployment or stagnating wages graduates not being able to find jobs but we also recognize there are downsides and there are two social downsides other than the increased competition first while foreign ep holders have come in to help us sustain our growth and though the growth in local pmes outnumbered that of foreign ep holders the presence of foreign eps have nevertheless created more competition discomfort and social issues and we must manage this and second singaporeans want to know that they will be given fair treatment at the workplace it is entirely justified and we have rules to achieve such fairness and we will continually review these rules and framework how they are implemented to ensure that fairness is assured so this is what the government part have done in the spirit of trying to achieve some common ground as we go into due to the debate so may i ask the psp our two honorable ncmps from the psp after hearing all the explanation from dr dan and i will you agree to the following first the fdas including zika are fundamental to singapore's economic survival and our ability to earn a living and we should not shake this bedrock for political purposes second seeker does not allow a free flow of indian pmes into singapore and this is a gross misunderstanding of the agreement and ftas in general nor is zika the cause of the challenges faced by our pmes and we must put a stop to the spreading of the false foods and if you agree to this and i think we have a good chance to have some common ground that we come into the house again for debate on the motion we can have a meaningful and constructive debate if i may seek the clarifications of our two members from psp please so you're my why thank you speaker and thank you minister on yikang for the clarifications on our position and also thanks uh minister on yikang and minister tan si for detailed explanation of the situation on foreign pmets foreign manpower and the free trade agreements and seca as to dr uh sorry as to uh minister onji khan's uh questions i will leave it to the last or we will leave it to be answered you know uh in the debate that we are going to conduct later on but there are a few things i like to bring out here or a few questions i'd like to ask to clarify the situation further one we are not against ftas we know the importance of fda for singapore as an open economy and especially as a small city state however what we are concerned is what price we are paying so one of the so the first question i want to ask is that in the process of negotiating an fta what is our position what are the bargaining positions that we can give because i read things like because we don't have much many bargaining chips so we have to be the implication is that we may have been we may have to be a bit more relaxed with the movement of people so one qualification one question i want to ask is that are the movement of people or natural persons use as one of the bargaining chip when we are negotiating the fda excuse me i need some water the whole purpose of the psp and hazard and i to bring up the issue about foreign manpower or foreign pmeds or foreign talent whatever term is used and the ftas it is about people's singaporeans jobs and livelihood so when psp dr tan qingbok raised the issue at the august 2019 launch of the psp party it is due to the huge amount of feedback that we got from the ground by raising the issue we had hoped it would get some response from the government to explain more about what are ftas in particular seca okay indeed you would admit that no other fda has given and stated specifically the 127 professions can come into work you may say that oh no one has come in through the secret route but the cross is there it is up to the other party whether they want to use it or not and most importantly up to our government to administer our employment policies because our employment policies are already quite relaxed in granting work passes to foreigners so the nationals the indian nationals don't have to come into singapore through the seca route so the first question on the ask is that whether the movement of people is used as a bargaining chip the second question i want to ask is we should not focus just on the number of people that got into our job market through the fta or seca they have provided some conditions most importantly is how those conditions under the ftas interplay with our domestic employment policies so the number to focus on is how many of the respective fta's nationals in the case of seca's indian nationals have come into singapore and take up our pmet jobs and what is the share of debt as a percentage of our total or the foreign pmeds and then our total pmbd jobs that is the second question the next point i want to bring out a question under us is that the government has admitted that something needs to be done there are concerns by singaporeans regarding jobs and livelihood so but this thing has been going on and on has sufficient measures been taken to address all this one of the things i want to ask is has the government actually try to find out what is the total number of display singaporeans i would think that you can't deny that their singaporeans are displaced your narrative is that oh they are all because they don't have the skills let's not push the blame to the universities and the polytechnics so easily it has been 20 years since we started the foreign talent policy within 20 years we still haven't got our act together in training our people that is the third question what is the total number of singaporeans that are displaced over the last 10 years they would like to have the job taken up by a foreigner but he was not able to he lost the job he lost his current job and then when he wanted to when he get into another job he got lower pay and there are a significant number of singaporeans who are under employed you look at the growth of the grab drivers the growth of the um our trainer traineeship program um and the um uh many of our independent workers okay are they voluntarily opting for independent lifestyle or are they facing a difficulty in getting into a permanent job has the manpower ministry done a study on those things have you got the statistics there's a third question the fourth question is of course we are particularly concerned about the finance and the i.t sectors minister dan ceiling has given some numbers unfortunately we don't have enough time to digest those numbers so we will maybe discuss that in our debate in the future but the fourth question i want to ask is really how many uh uh foreign how many foreigners are there in our i.t and for in our finance sectors versus the number of singaporeans and pr that's the fourth question i think minister might have given some figures just now the fifth question is you say that we are not competitive singaporeans are not competitive but mr leon i would urge you to stick to the facts i think we've all been participation participating in this debate and listening intently so i do suggest that you keep to what has been said a lot of questions have been answered as well so the idea of the debate is to debate the issues have been raised so please do that uh mr speaker sir um i'm raising questions so am i can you remember you are free to raise questions some of these points have been covered so we'll be happy to take the time to debate whatever is meaningful but please make it meaningful i i do understand what you mean by meaningful because i'm going through those points um okay okay nevermind i'll try okay the fifth question is the mom of has been we have this again we have this foreign talent policy for 20 years but if you look at the way mom has administered and regulate the flow of foreign pmets in singapore you find that the policies of course over time there's a bit of tightening at a time but generally it seems to be too little and too late for example the foreign talent policy has started in the late 90s or around the year 2000 but the fair consideration framework was only introduced in 2014 and then only in 2016 i was told you have started the fair consideration framework watch list you mean the one and a half decades before that there were no problems at all and the threshold salaries that you have just ep alone up to 2020 last year it was still 3 600 at that kind of threshold salary plus no cpf do you think we are attracting the right foreign talent in the singapore that is my fourth fifth question my sixth sixth question is i totally agree with minister tanzi ling about what we are driving at is not abolishing things it's not totally eradicating things we are also talking about a rebalancing but the rebalancing cannot come as a result of a natural attrition from kovac there must be a policy recognition that whether our past foreign policy our foreign talent policy was on the right track or not if we review the policy and we think that oh there are certain things that we need to change then make it a policy point don't allow natural attrition to come by and say oh tens of thousands have left singapore already that is not the way we conduct policy so it's about repo rebalancing and but when he thought rebalancing minister dan also said one thing is to ensure that singaporeans can compete fairly or there's no unfair competition and he explained that not having to pay cpf for the employment pass holder is not a disadvantage or as an employer i respect you for your experience in the private sector mr minister tan as an employer isn't that a wage concession so how can we say that singaporeans are not being treated fair and unfairly in the in the job market competition that is my uh sixth question my second question is you said minister tan say that there's simply not enough local talent again i will raise the point which i've said just now also then what happened to our education system what happened after 20 years you're still telling singaporeans that we're not enough talent we of course we are not saying that we can substitute the foreign the foreign pmets completely but at least there can be some rebalancing and we get back to my question just now and if you admit that there's some displacement of singaporeans then that rebalancing means we must slowly allow singaporeans to be given the first opportunity to take up the jobs first that is my last question is you talk about diversity but here again isn't it something that the moms have done long ago about diversity in the workforce when we introduce our foreign talent policy we also know because we work in international environment before the group dynamics at the workplace can change very fast with changes in the the nationality composition in the company so especially when the mom is monitoring and regulating the grunting of the work passes you mean you have not at the beginning taken that as an important consideration and today then you have to say that oh on my uh watch list i have this number of companies that have a very large concentration of pmets from a single nationality so so we must we really want to understand how mom actually administer this whole foreign pmet policy okay afterwards maybe i will add a few more points uh i will ask a few more questions about the approval process some of the experiences i had in the private sector with regards to what how mom has the approve work process but my questions are these questions for now thank you it's a long list of questions which i'm not sure help us bring the discussion forward let me take questions three two eight and then one two three yeah three to eight is really on the ministry of manpower but i think let's not prolong this because as speaker i've noticed many of the questions are actually in our speeches but if you don't accept what we say there's very little room for us to further explain long and short is we have been extremely successful and i have explained this in my ministerial statement in growing the singapore economy creating this multitude of jobs i gave examples of our port airport financial services ict manufacturing you name it we are hubs of our hubs and all this would not have been possible if we have not ride on the wave of globalization welcome foreign talent and give our own people very good training education to rise up and take the positions i mentioned that our only problem is there's not enough of us investors come here they want to hire singaporeans they know our education system is solid and we have such a wonderful reputation around the world something that as singaporeans we should be proud of a bit stressful this education system a bit stressful still but we should be very proud of that but the problem is there's still not enough of us there are some questions you say we have given figures so i don't think i answered those um you mentioned a whole series of procedural policy how come the fair consideration framework coming so late why is the bar for entry entry salary raised only later we've been reviewing policies mom successive minis manpower ministers have been reviewing policies all the while policies are never static it worked for a period of time then when china india grow you've got a different influx of workers you need to have you need to adjust your position then you review and this process will continue and we will continue to debate in this house on the pros and cons you can't say because we implement something new now to respond to the situation therefore we have failed why didn't you do it five years ago it doesn't work like that that's not policy making that's not how this house work then every bill that's tabled in this house is you have failed you should table this bill five years ago it doesn't make sense um but more importantly is to go back to the first three questions that you post to me but actually i post to you first because we say so part actually at one point if i heard correctly she said we are not against fta we support fta i thought we start to have some common ground and then when she asked me about chapter nine she's not a trait negotiator so i think those are fair questions i have been trait negotiator for many years i explained how the chapter ought to be read and i hope that she asked that i hope is because they you might have read the chapter wrongly to think that singapore shall allow 127 or professionals from 127 categories to enter no question ask after my explanation i was hoping that she come to the conclusion that they might have interpreted the chapter wrongly but i think after hearing mr young man why i think my assumptions are all wrong so let me change my question i had two questions first and i was hoping to hear yes and i think first after hearing mr leung although he said he's not against fta but then he went on to say that you use freedom movement of natural person as a bargaining chip and sell away our rights for immigration which i've explained is untrue so after all the explanation you still come to that conclusion then i say this number one psp you are against globalization you are against fta even though i've gone to great length to explain that this is the bit rock of singapore's economic survival number two you are really not taking back the falsehoods and the allegations after i quoted everything i don't think you are taking it back you do feel that the fda and seeker despite our explanation let in indian professionals freely into singapore i think those are your position please prove me wrong but after hearing you i'm afraid these are your positions mr speaker i i must admit that notwithstanding the fact that this is my first ministerial statement i i find it i mean i actually struggle um you know to to follow uh mr leung's uh line of reasoning um i guess because of the fact that um um quite a number of the the issues i think is um he's looking at it from first and foremost a hindsight kind of a perspective itself where why is it that you didn't do this why is it that we we didn't do that i think um if you look at the at the entire sort of uh um time and i'm going to take a bit of time on this thing itself to try and gather my thoughts to to to connect his thoughts together which like i said i'm struggling so please be patient with me i think what is important is that if we look at the evolution of our our industry how we started in the 70s in my in the very early part of my speech at the time we were about 20 billion uh gdp i think we're at 454 billion now we started with a very conscious effort in the 70s to go and build heavy industries so we developed jurong island there was all these heavy industries that we put up i think our pioneer founding generation leaders under mm mr lee dr go and all that i think at the time when we first started we were very very heavy in all these heavy industries we went on then into manufacturing in the 80s we went into electronics we did this drives uh wafer fab and then eventually we pivoted into into um i think in in the early part of 2000 we went into uh services we went into biopharma life sciences and so on and so forth and now we are into tech went to infocomm when finance now at every 10 to 15 years we've seen fairly dramatic transformation i think it's inconceivable that you would expect that policies that you would enact do not get refined do not get tweaked and do not do not get adjusted over time so i i guess to his point about the fact that why is it that we we didn't do this and so on i think in the last 15 20 years and he has sort of pointed the fact that i've i i've been from the private sector perhaps i've not been in the government long enough i i mean if anything at all for the last 20 years change was a constant change is a constant and change will be a constant we will continually face disruption we will face transformation so i mean to his other point about why is it that we're not able to to have all this workforce ready in spite of all of our education upgrades and so on i think if we all had a crystal ball 20 30 years ago we could gaze so you know sort of um clearly into the future itself um perhaps even for himself i mean as a as a ceo of a private equity firm you know i think all the necessary investments made would have been perfect and spot on but i guess perhaps i think hindsight like what they always say is is perfect now to the other point about private sector how we package the the cpf into it indeed i can share with you perhaps my experience is very limited i've just been in healthcare all my life but the fact is that and i do admit that um i lobbied at that time five six years ago for an increase in the number of s-passes because of the fact that i needed to deliver a certain level of of nursing care i just couldn't hire enough of the nurses to come in and help me and while we don't pay cpf the cost of actually bringing them in is higher because we have to package in housing allowance and and really because of the fact that they know the employer part of it is imputed into our course and i can tell you with conviction because i've done it for many many years in my life that that that package that we actually pay out is higher than what we do pay uh local the only difference of course is the the overtime charges and so on but i think that's another uh sort of a thing altogether to your point about the education system part i just want to share one bit in the early 2000s our universities our institution of higher learnings the number of of it graduates that they produce at that particular point in time today we are actually training up four times more what we used to be training from before the entry levels in terms of the of the of the grades the the credits and so on that the students required to make it to get into into the universities itself is also significantly higher so i guess the point of of of this this thing is that every thing we could every every single initiative every single policy we can always do better and that's something that i've acknowledged but the point is this we are not that far worse off today if you look at the absolute numbers three quarters of our population of our pmes are in good jobs one quarter of them are in are filled by foreign work pass holders our glass is not even half full our glass is three quarters full and we're looking at it from that perspective are you saying that we should even adjust that of course we should try to bring it up to to the fact that it would be 90 100 full but let's also be mindful of the sentiment the worries and also the hard work of the other three quarters in the glass that's three quarter i think thank you very much i i look forward to to uh do a robust debate with mr leon with miss poa um i think when they can put up the the questions uh where i don't struggle so hard to to follow i think that would be very welcoming thank you very much thank you i think mr speaker you agree with me we really need to move on and to move on can i go back to my two questions for the two honorable members from the psp one that do they not agree fta including seeker are fundamental to singapore's economic survival yes or no two seeker does not allow a free flow of indian pmes into singapore and this is a falsehood and a gross misunderstanding of the agreement if they agree i think we can have a meaningful debate when they taper the motion mr leon thank you speaker thank you minister for the two questions as i said the answers to the two questions actually requires a bit more debate and study but first i want to say that psp and jesus and i we are for fdas and having heard that the jobs and livelihood of people are not being used as a bargaining chip we are very reassured that our interests the singaporean interests are being taken care of however whether sika has contributed to the overall influx of nationals from the country i think we need to study a bit more because we have to go back and look at the numbers provided by the two ministers uh to to see what is the share of the indian pmets in our overall pmet workforce and to take into consideration what minister tanzi ling has said about the about we really need them then we would like to know whether they are skills transfer program uh whether really our education system is really catching up fast enough before we can make and also the various practices in the market before we can make a final conclusion that zika is really neutral too beneficial for singapore thank you mr thank you for that uh mr leung so i will just summarize that yes the psp now agrees that ftas are fundamental to singapore's economic survivor and that includes seeker so at least that is a common ground that we have established i think that's useful and thank you mr leong for that and second the psp now agrees net movement of natural person chapter 9 is not used as a chip and we're not giving away our rights for immigration and there is no free flow of indian professionals into singapore i read i hear i hear him right i think he's confirming that he is not sure about the overall balance of the free trade agreement i think we'll leave it there for our debate later on but i think this too i would say from quite good common ground but it also means it will also mean mr leon i will call you when your time is when it's time to call you and it will also mean naturally that must mean the psb psp will take back the allegations that seeker has led to an unfettered flow of indian professionals into singapore thank you mr leon speaker to what the minister have said just now i think there's a bit of a misinterpretation what i've said is that we are in we fully support fdas we know that that's important for singapore and we appreciate the point that we we are not using the movement of people as a bargaining chip in the negotiation of the fdas but as to whether zika has contributed to the influx of some of the pmets in singapore in relation to our overall foreign talent policy we have to explore that and we we don't agree that uh zika is not beneficial to singapore at this stage minister ong i think mr yang is waffling yes no yes no it's quite hard to catch i think that you are not withdrawing your allegation and so be it and i think that would be well at least we got you to say fda and seeker is fundamental to our survival but if you continue to allege notwithstanding our explanation i think there is no choice we have to leave it as such it is regrettable because generations of fta negotiators worked very hard to make sure our interests are all protected and this is not a backdoor this is not an avenue for any professionals from any country to enter singapore in uh with a free hand and unfettered but i i think that this is psp's position notwithstanding hearing all our explanation is most regrettable but we will have to accept what how they feel is gender done mr speaker i guess on this topic you may remove the mask sorry yeah i would like to declare that i'm a council member of the singapore business federation i thank you know on behalf of uh the business community both ministers ministerial con statement and um yeah of course you know contrary to you're closing the doors the businesses are begging please open the doors we need workers otherwise who's going to do the work but nonetheless if i may you know i am a product of singapore's mnc strategy and during the budget debate and cos i have shared my views regards embracing diversity of talents from all over the world so that we can be uniquely competitive so you know for today i will not go there i will talk more about ftas in support of fdas and a lot have been said but perhaps yeah if you all can bear with me a while you know from the business community why is this important now as a small and open economy without natural resources we are of course highly dependent on international trade and highly integrated well-functioning global value chains and international trade not only provides us with the products that we import and consume but also connects us to the global market that supports our businesses and sustains our economy creating the good jobs that singaporeans have enjoyed in the past and aspire to in for the future so with singapore's international trade more than three times as gross gdp our livelihoods and prosperity depend heavily on international trade and for singapore businesses free and open trade premise on the foundation of a rules-based multilateral trading system is crucial to ensuring a conducive stable and predictable environment this is particularly important for us considering that we are just a little red dot hence the importance of free trade agreements so as minister ong has earlier said we have over 26 ftas and our network of free trade agreements covers about 85 percent of global gdp enhancing the value proposition of countries and economies that sit at the notes of these networks and singapore is one of them so the fdas yield tangible value to our companies in 2018 alone i understand that our companies enjoyed more than 1.1 billion in terrorist savings these fdas accord our businesses preferential market access into the markets of our major trading partners lowering entry barriers for the export of goods and services as well as protecting their investments in other countries so the strong fta network can be a tool for our businesses not only in reducing their cost and time to market but also in ensuring a predictable trading environment despite the pandemic singapore's total services trade exports in 2020 amounted to 259 billion dollars with china us eu and malaysia as our top trading partners i would dare say that because our singapore businesses remain very plugged into our fta network we have been able to ride the storm of covet 19 a little better than if we were disconnected now we should know firsthand what is like to be disconnected considering the impact we experience in aviation and tourism because of border closures trade along with foreign direct investments into singapore will drive our economic recovery and the resumption of business activities post covet 19 even as we restlessly reinvent our industries chains partly by exploring new markets and supply sources and many have shifted away from lean supply chain models to adopt agile supply chain strategies and the fdas are even more relevant than ever before for our businesses the covet 19 pandemic has dramatically accelerated digital transformation to the top of the board's agenda in every company and singapore's digital economic economy agreements deas with chile new zealand australia and potentially the uk look to provide frameworks for regulatory cooperation in support of trade and business in the digital economy and address issues arising from these emerging technologies and as we have heard from minister of trade and industry yesterday you know mti and government agencies have been hard at work looking into various new opportunities for us to enter into new trade agreements including for renewable energy green economy etc and you know so on that count you know frank frankly speaking on behalf of the business community you know i'd like to acknowledge all the efforts by mti and you know mof and all the government agencies for their efforts in helping our businesses to be competitive now it's all about team work so in order to help our companies familiarize themselves with singapore ftas and improve their global competitiveness you know the business community supported by singapore business federation hosts regular workshops as well as seminars and provides complementary advisory services to assist the singapore companies on fta related enquiries and businesses can utilize these available resources and leverage sbf to provide feedback on how existing and future ftas can better serve their needs and will continually do so so to conclude singapore businesses in our opinion cannot afford to take a wait and see approach we will need to navigate the pressing issues that adversely impact supply chains and business processes singapore businesses need to be born international across industries developing the dna to tap into overseas markets and to trade with multilateral partners is critical for businesses to be successful given singapore's limited domestic market so ftas offer a key tool for businesses to expand into new markets enhancing accessibility of different markets by allowing businesses to export more freely and easing some of the regulations but singapore and singaporeans must humbly recognize that we are vulnerable past success does not guarantee future success we need to exercise humility and restlessly reinvent ourselves some areas of concern highlighted in the recent world competitiveness report in my opinion is rather worrisome these include potential relocation of businesses being a threat to the singapore economy perception of singapore's changing attitude towards globalization which minister ong has also highlighted earlier the availability of skilled labour qualified engineers and competent senior and managers in singapore regardless of you know nationality so the availability of skilled labor and competent senior managers is a concern and as well as our immigration laws preventing hiring of foreign labor now such perceptions could erode singapore's attractiveness as a business capital and our businesses are concerned and i'm sure the government is equally concerned and i believe singaporeans we should be concerned as well singapore's miracle has been attributed to our leaders deciding on a few right strategies generation upon generation and then together with the support and passion of all singapore businesses and workforce executing those strategies brilliantly with humility but with pride and solidarity at singaporeans we believed in each other we have done it before we can do it again thank you mr speaker mr speaker thank you well i wasn't intending to speak but i just want to since minister angie kang mentioned that i was the chief negotiator for seeker i thought i must put on record the question that mr young manual asked let me first say that i'm terribly troubled by the way that the psp has taken this and i want to put on record clearly that the movement of natural persons is a very important chapter but it was not used as a bargaining chip to trade for what else we got it was not so let me give you a very brief history of ftas because i was in the ministry of trade industry at that time as first as a deputy secretary and then as a permanent secretary in 2000 the doha round of wto negotiation was launched and minister giorgio then and i were at doha we saw the entry of china into the wto but soon after the launch our assessment and minister george hill's assessment then was dead it looks like doha round will not go very far and indeed he was proven correct and he said what does singapore need to do to ensure our continued survival so minister angie earlier mentioned about the importance of free trade to singapore trade is more than three times our gdp and will continue to be so so he decided that we should pursue free trade agreement and our very first free trade agreement was with new zealand two small little economies and i must say that i can tell you that people are laughing that what could do small trade little economies do to advance the cost of free trade well we persisted and we got the first agreement done and thereafter we went on to do a number of other agreements and when i was permanent secretary i was in the trenches negotiating many agreements with asean counterparts and that's how we had asean economic free trade agreement that was in enhanced the asean economic community and then after it was not just asean there were two things that we did one was free trade agreement between singapore and other countries far bigger economies japan australia us and then more recently you know the european union now you asked quite correctly what is singapore's bargaining chip the honest answer is very little we only have terrorists on three items beer stout samsu and what is that as a bargaining chip but i think a very important quality for the our public policy is that we must be creative and we must learn to meet the needs of other countries to see what may be in the agreement that has been of benefit to them so how do we manage to negotiate trade agreements with big economies that are ex have a lot of concerns for example japan was very concerned about agriculture and in the case of india there was an even wider range of concern so let me tell mr leong and your team that i spent three years of my life negotiating this agreement because although i was a permanent secretary and permanent secretary usually just supervised they don't get into the trenches the indian side decided that it was an important agreement they would have a pump sack and minister george will say well you have no choice so i ended up being the chief negotiator for seeker and i can tell you the amount of homework i had to do to look at how we can come to an agreement i went to different parts of india because there was objection from every part of india from business group to states and i i can share a few long stories about some of those most well most intriguing demands which i managed to explain why we can't do that so the movement of natural person was a chapter which indeed the indian negotiators were very keen because they said what do we get well i said no because this is of great importance to singapore you have a population that's over a billion singapore has a population of at that time probably about 300 million and i say will be easily swamped so we must have very strict agreements on this and that was in fact one among the last chapter there were two chapters that were the most difficult to conclude for which i never let go and we got what we needed so i think mr leong must not think that you said i hope that you know the government has a people's interest at heart of course why do we negotiate free trade agreements and why do we do this public service if it's not without its interests for people at heart and why do i spend three years of my life doing the agreement so please be reasonable and don't mislead singaporean now i want to raise two other issues which are very important too first you said that why is it that we don't have talents and what happened to our university education minister so was i and all our education ministers are sitting here i must say that i'm extremely proud of what our schools and our hl's have done over the years to groom singaporeans the world bank has ranked singapore the best in the world in educating our people so please do not go around thinking that you know we have not put in enough effort and in fact we have increased cohort participation rates from 20 of cohort to now 40 percent government funded we now have six universities we have polytechnics and ites which provide the most valuable practice oriented learning we have done enhancing with skills future we have now work and work and learn earn and learn program and a whole range of programs so i think mr leung you will better serve singaporeans if you help singaporeans understand how changes are taking place so quickly and you must help to encourage people to upgrade and learn and learn new skills and work to support our unions in forming company training committees and job security council and the like in order to raise the ability of singaporeans to compete so i think to say that our education system has not done a good job or the government has not put enough i would seriously ask you to rethink that and come back and debate us on that let me also end by mentioning two very important points which our two mps have just raised professor hunientek who made an excellent point that the future of competition will be a future of competition of innovation and technology and it is very important for us to bring in some of the best people to watch singaporeans grow singaporeans to be able to excel in that new room it's going to be a different world so please do not get stuck in the over and think that you know we can excel all on our own let us have an open attitude to work with countries around the world who are willing to cooperate and work with us i just last week had a very good session with the minister of higher education research and innovation of france and we talk about what france and singapore can do together in our research agenda in our innovation agenda and france is not a small country and they had a long history of science and innovation so there's a very important point that professor hunientek had made and the other important point ms janet ang will talk about the digital opportunities and the new market no sector in our economy is going to be immune from competition economies used to have this concept of tradable and non-tribal sector non-tradable sectors are naturally protected because they are in your neighborhood your neighborhood shops who is going to compete with you today with e-commerce our neighborhood shops are under stress and that is why we have a program as part of our industry transformation to help our neighborhood shops upgrade that is why imda has putting so much effort on this sme gold digital and and so on so i think it is very important for the right policy in singapore a to stay open b to learn how to cope with changes which will be accelerating and see make the best use of science technology and innovation to allow us to move forward and fourthly maintain unity so that businesses unions workers and the government work closely together to make the very significant changes that you need to make thank you mr predicting is it pretty damn sick thank you mr speaker i just have two um supplementary questions one for minister ong and one for uh minister foreign minister ong in 2016 um my parliamentary colleague workers party mp leon pereira asked the then minister of manpower and this was a rising out of feedback from the ground about about zika issues of a lot of indian nationals working on the ground and the question mr leonpro asked was about the number of icts that were working in singapore through zika and at that point the reply that came was the ministry does not disclose data on foreign power with breakdown by nationality including data on icts in february this year mr yangman why of the psp asked a question about the ic number of icts working in singapore this time the government disclosed overall ict numbers uh over employment pass holders and the number was i think something like five percent five percent of ep holders today we have more information that about that last year at least 500 for last year at least 500 of these icts originated from from india the point i want to make to minister to the government at large largest there is opportunity to quell or at least to nip some of these issues in the bud when they start moving into the realm of xenophobia native nativism and one important outlet for that is information and in august 2020 a straits times reporter mentioned that and i quote icts were a key bone of contention with respect to zika and if this information had been made known earlier it does occur to me whether a lot of the misunderstanding the reaction we see on seeker could have been addressed and actually nipped in the butt and so i hope the government understands that with more information actually we can hold the line better in terms of some of these discussions moving into a realm of uh xenophobia and so forth my question to um uh dr tansi amir tan silang pertains to tafap in the strengthening of the enforcement arm of tafe we had this we had an exchange in the opening of parliament about this and i'd just like to confirm with dr tan whether raising the number the enforcement arm of tawfab is on the cards and what extent has what discussions have taken place since august last year in so far as how tafe will be beefed up the wp has a position about anti-discrimination legislation is that something that mom will be prepared to look into thank you mr speaker i thank the leader of the opposition mr pritam for his question we are reviewing our existing frameworks and um the suggestion that you've talked about um the position um that you have alluded to in terms of uh legislation and all that it's not something that has just come out from the workers party if you go back in terms of the um the past uh um proceedings and so on i believe that um quite a number of the labour mps um including mr patrick tay i believe that um a non-labor mp i think even mr lewis had also raised it um at the same time or over different times one of the things that the assurance i want to give to the house um to everyone who has raced it and who's concerned about this is to allow myself together with the team together with the tripartite partners to go deep look at all the different implications look at also the various options that we have to see how we can strengthen it and as i've alluded to in my speech mr singh i think you appreciate the fact that given where we are today it's a very tight rope that we are navigating on the one hand we want to continue to strengthen to tighten on the other hand businesses um you know have this competing interest of asking us to to to to be a lit a bit more likes one of the reassurance that i want to and our ministry wants to reassure members of the house here is our consistent focus on and we have never divided our attention away or diverted our attention from developing the singaporean call we are fully cognizant of the angst the fears the worries about making sure that there's fair there's equal opportunity in terms of even the development to capability transfers capability development fair hiring promotion and so on and so forth all those things we will be reviewing in order for us to strengthen that framework so i don't want to to sort of go down a prescribed route today because we are exploring the entire uh universe i hope that answers your question thank you mr aung [Music] mr speaker our answer mr the leader of the opposition's question and then seek to conclude this debate um i think to heart what the leader of opposition said that with information we can quell such false foods much earlier we work in the bureaucracy some data is classified secret confidential so on so we are not at liberty to always disclose them but what you say is true some information is better to come out early and then we can move on and especially as you say when it concerns issues like racism or xenophobia it's much better to quell it early and i take comfort that based on what you say i think you do agree that fta seeker is fundamental to our survivor and that really i hope you heard our explanation and is convinced that seeker chapter 9 does not allow an affected inflow of indian professionals if you disagree and i misrepresented you please jump up and correct me i don't think you will yeah um dpm hang myself we are former trade negotiators fighting in the trenches with our fellow teammates which is why i think we both felt compelled to say something today negotiating an fda requires a lot of dedication and hard work it takes a toll on the family because you are out of country all the time our negotiators we are up against very formidable partners sometimes our job is to advance singapore's interests while protecting our areas of sensitivities but we work hard at it nevertheless because we know it makes a huge difference to singapore benefit industries and companies create jobs for our people secure our place in the world this is where we are coming from so i felt sad somewhat that the psp did not withdraw their allegations yeah this how when we explain how fta works and how chapter 9 work it is a statement of fact this is how it works it's not a matter of your opinion or your perspective so the logical thing for psp to do i felt is to withdraw the allegations then we can discuss employment policies how we can better protect educate train our workers and these are very legitimate questions but psp did not do the logical thing i couldn't hear a definitive position from mr leon or miss hazel poa waffle a bit and then i think what i heard was they cannot conclude either way now whether seeker is better or worse for our workers but if you cannot conclude either way then the honorable thing is to also withdraw the allegations while you figure out which way you want to lean but i don't think we saw what was logical nor honorable a successful fta strategy is not just about negotiating skills it's important but fundamentally it requires us to be broad-minded and able to cast our sites far and wide to the whole world and work with like-minded partners out there and that is why covet 19 is such an existential crisis for us he has forced us to close our borders but i'm confident that once we get the great majority of population vaccinated control the epi pandemic we can reopen the borders progressively again but what i'm worried about that even when our borders are reopened what about our hearts and our minds will they be reopened if because of covet or during the during the covet pandemic anti-foreign sentiments xenophobia creeps into our collective psyche and even if our borders are open hearts and minds are not and will remain close then we will not recover from covet 19 then we will truly have a long covenant of all times this is the worst time in the middle of a crippling pandemic to talk about turning inwards to reject ftas reject globalization i say we should emerge from covet nighting announcing to the world that singapore continued to be that shining jewel in southeast asia the largest transshipment port in the world the special changi experience a financial services hub and i.t capital a hub for manufacturing hospitality mind so on here the world converges you can experience the richness of many cultures and also the uniquely singapore character singaporeans will benefit immensely from this and most importantly we will be more united and we must be more united than ever and every one of us know that because we all did our part whether it's getting vaccinated undergoing regular testing observe safe management measures helping others in need taking care of patients all of us did our part we stayed united and the unity is what helped us conquer and overcome this pandemic thank you mr speaker sir person descending order number 44 ii the motion to consider two ministerial statements on free trade agreements and foreign power lapses at the conclusion of debate

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Length: 206min 2sec (12362 seconds)

Published: Tue Jul 06 2021