Extract from Singapore Parliament Reports (Hansard), 3 Mar 2010: Minister Without Portfolio Mr Lim Swee Say: We are

e the champion for CBF (Cheaper, Better, Faster) economy. The interviewer asked, "Everybody asked you to stop and come down. Why did you go all the way up?" The frog looked at the reporter and said, "Look. I am deaf. I cannot hear them."
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Parliament No: Session No: Volume No: Sitting No: Sitting Date: Section Name: Title: MPs Speaking:

11 2 86 18 03-03-2010 BUDGET DEBATE ON ANNUAL BUDGET STATEMENT Assoc. Prof. Dr Muhammad Faishal Ibrahim (Marine Parade);Assoc. Prof. Paulin Tay Straughan (Nominated Member);Dr Lim Wee Kiak (Sembawang);Dr Teo Ho Pin (Bukit Panjang);Er Lee Bee Wah (Ang Mo Kio);Mdm Halimah Yacob;Mr Alvin Yeo (Hong Kah);Mr Arthur Fong (West Coast);Mr Christopher de Souza (Holland-Bukit Timah);Mr Laurence Wee Yoke Thong (Nominated Member);Mr Lim Swee Say;Mr Low Thia Khiang (Hougang);Mr Ong Kian Min (Tampines);Mr Seah Kian Peng (Marine Parade);Mr Abdullah Tarmugi (Mr Speaker);Mr Terry Lee (Nominated Member);Mr Viswa Sadasivan (Nominated Member);Mr Wee Siew Kim (Ang Mo Kio);Mr Yeo Guat Kwang (Aljunied);Mr Zainudin Nordin (Bishan-Toa Payoh);Ms Denise Phua Lay Peng;Ms Indranee Rajah (Tanjong Pagar);Ms Irene Ng Phek Hoong (Tampines);Ms Sylvia Lim (Non-Constituency Member);The Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Defence (Mr Teo Chee Hean);The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for National Development (Dr Mohamad Maliki Bin Osman)

Column No : 2614
2.59 pm The Minister, Prime Minister's Office (Mr Lim Swee Say): Mr Speaker, Sir, when I was young, I used to chase after fast ball: basketball, tennis ball, squash ball. But not anymore. Now, that I am not so young, I walk on the golf course with a ball that is not only slow but stationary most of the time. Sir, when I switched to a slow ball, it is not that there was something wrong with the fast ball. But because, at different stages of our life, we just have to adapt to our physical condition and play with the right ball. Sir, the same applies to the economy. The economy goes through different stages of growth as well and at each stage of the growth, you must make sure that the economy grow with the right strategy. From time to time, we need to shift our strategies in response to changes in the external environment and internal conditions. For example, the Singapore economy. Over the years, we have shifted many times from labour intensive to computerisation, automation and mechanisation (CAM), to capital intensive, to technology intensive and now knowledge, skill and innovation intensive. Each time, as we make the shift, instead of asking what is wrong with the past, we should focus on what is right for the future. Some Members criticise that our economic strategies in the last few years were wrong. There were complaints and criticisms. From the labour movement perspective, I would like to share with Members our take on this. Sir, we recognise fully that as we move up the economic ladder, it would get tougher and tougher for the economy to grow. We used to grow at about 8%-8.5% a year in the 1980s and early 1990s, but not anymore.

2 For the last 10 years, our average growth rate was about 5%. More importantly, the fluctuation is a lot more as well. Some years were good; some years were bad and some years were really bad. So given that backdrop, we see nothing really wrong with the strategy of the last few years. Essentially, what the Government had done and with the full support of the labour movement was trying to build up as much buffer as we can in our economy and our job market. We grew as fast as we could when the condition was right and at the same time, we created the buffer in the workforce by allowing more foreign workers to come in. Members should not forget what had happened to our economy last year during the global recession. Fortunately, because we built the buffer in our employment market through such projects as Integrated Resorts, even during the global recession, there was still job supply in Singapore. The Employment and Employability Institute (e2i) could still maintain a job bank of about 20,000 jobs. If we had not grown as fast as we could during the good time, do you think we could have that 20,000 jobs at e2i during the global recession? At the same time, let us not forget that the number of foreign workers in Singapore actually dropped in the year 2009 and the number of Singaporeans in employment actually went up. In other words, our strategy of growing the foreign worker pool in Singapore as a buffer, in case of a downturn, has actually worked. As a result, Singapore today continues to enjoy one of the lowest unemployment rates in the world. Yes, even though some Members may criticise or take a different view but, as a labour movement, I want to make it very clear that the labour movement supports our past strategies during the last few years because it makes sense, it serves the interest of our workers. Because of the strategy, we succeeded in preventing many low-wage workers and rank-and-file workers from becoming no-wage workers, like what you saw in other parts of the world. For example, today, in US and Europe, the unemployment rate is 9%-10%. So there are many no-wage workers in US and Europe. In OECD, the average unemployment rate is now 8%. Again, there are many nowage workers in OECD. Today, 6.4% unemployment rate globally but, in Singapore, 2.1%. Therefore, if you tell me that the strategy is wrong, I disagree. Another point I want to highlight is that in the last few years, as we continued to build the buffer in our economy and our workforce, at the same time as we captured growth, we did not neglect the upgrading, development and preparation of our workforce because we knew that that strategy would not last forever. We knew that the day will come when it is no longer relevant. Therefore, the tripartite partners worked very closely together to prepare our workforce for the next stage of growth. What did we do? For example, some Members will remember that we started laying the foundation for employability enhancement since 1996 with the launch of the Skills Redevelopment Programme (SRP) targeted at the lower skilled, less employable workers. We have come a long way. For the upgrading of workers, we now have the National Skills Recognition System (NSRS), Employability Skills System (ESS), Workforce Skills Qualification (WSQ), Professional Conversion Programme (PCP) and Professional Skills Programme (PSP). For the upgrading of jobs, we recognised that in order to minimise structural unemployment, besides making the workers more skilful and attractive, we have to make as many of our jobs in Singapore as possible to be more attractive as well. So we launched the Job Re-creation Programme (JRP) to transform the low productivity, low paying jobs through Best Sourcing Initiative (BSI) because we were against the idea of cheap sourcing. The labour movement, with the support of the Government, went on the aggressive campaign on BSI. To improve service quality, the labour movement spearheaded the Customer-Centric Initiative (CCI), again, with the full support of the Government. Today, more than 150,000 service sector workers are participating in the CCI. In order to minimise structural mismatch, we also embarked on the concept of harmonising employment and employability. We established the Employment and Employability Institute (e2i) to match workers to jobs. The e2i was supported fully, firstly, by the Singapore Labour Foundation (SLF), chaired by Minister Mah Bow Tan. At the time when we needed the money to get e2i going, under the chairmanship of Mr Mah Bow Tan, SLF funded $5 million for us to renovate the place to get e2i going and, subsequently, the Government came in very strongly to support the expansion. As a result, last year during the downturn, the e2i played a very important role in helping workers go for training, and then matching with the jobs in the job bank. All these are clear illustrations that on the one hand, we make sure that unemployment in Singapore will remain low and yet, at the same time, we continue to upgrade the employability and skills of the workers.

3 Yesterday and today, many Members have expressed their concerns for low-wage workers. Sir, I share everyone's concern. Low-wage workers in fact have received special attention in Singapore. Yesterday, Mrs Josephine Teo mentioned that the issue of low-wage workers is a global challenge. Member Low Thia Khiang challenged her that "Just because it is a global challenge, it does not mean that Singapore can afford to do nothing." I disagree with Member Low Thia Khiang that we as a country and tripartite partners had done nothing for the low-wage workers. It is completely untrue. Let me give Members an example. When I attended the International Labour Congress (ILC) about three years ago, the slogan at that time was decent work, decent pay. Because as Mrs Josephine Teo said yesterday, it is a global issue. All over the world, there are just too many low-wage workers suffering from lousy jobs and lousy pay. So, ILO made it a global agenda. As we listened through the presentation, among the union leaders, we were commenting that in Singapore, we are many steps ahead of the rest of the world. We have many programmes. In 2006, there was a Ministerial Committee on Low-Wage Workers. Some Members may have forgotten. There are many initiatives targeted at the low-wage workers. Of course, the most well-known is the Workfare Income Supplement. Let me also highlight that we recognise that the best way to help the low-wage workers is to upgrade their skills and enhance their jobs. That is the reason why the tripartite partners implemented Job Re-creation Programme and Best Sourcing Initiative. We as Members of Parliament do not just talk about Best Sourcing Initiative (BSI). We do not just talk about taking care of the low-wage workers. We act if we are serious and we are sincere about this. All the 14 PAP Town Councils today are on Best Sourcing Initiative. We employed altogether 2,500 Singapore cleaners in the 14 PAP Town Councils. Since 18 months ago, we progressively put these cleaners through BSI. Take my Town Council, for example, Holland-Bukit Panjang Town Council, chaired by Dr Teo Ho Pin. We have been on the BSI since day one and today, at Buona Vista, as a Member of Parliament, when I walk around, I feel very good. Everyone of our cleaners in Buona Vista is given a piece of equipment it is a labour saving device. Everyone has proper uniform and proper training because all the cleaners must be trained in NSRS to operate the piece of equipment to improve productivity. Their wages have gone up. To the best of my knowledge, not a single full-time cleaner in Buona Vista is paid less than $1,000 because having pushed up his productivity, we are prepared to pay him the wages. Yes, Mr Low Thia Khiang said yesterday that he does not have a Ministry of Manpower under his care. Therefore, he said it is the job of the Government to solve the many problems faced by the low-wage workers. But I do know that Mr Low Thia Khiang is also the Chairman of a Town Council. Why not ask his Town Council to embark on BSI as well, to show his sincerity in taking care of the low-wage workers. Sir, let me move on to talk about what is right for the future. I think that is more important. Yesterday, Mr Low Thia Khiang referred to the initiatives of NTUC on up-skill, re-skill, multi-skill, cheaper, better, faster. If I remember correctly what he said yesterday, "Why is NTUC squeezing every drop of effort out of every worker?" He seems to imply that NTUC has nothing better to do but to make the life of the workers difficult. There is a Chinese saying that "zhi qi ran, bu zhi qi suo yi ran ". In other words, Mr Low Thia Khiang understands that the labour movement champions up-skilling, re-skilling and multi-skilling. We are the

champion for CBF (Cheaper, Better, Faster) economy, but he does not understand why we are doing that.
I have mentioned in this House before that in terms of capability, we are not the best in the world. In terms of cost, we are not the cheapest in the world. And yet, for the last 40 years, we were able to grow our economy. Why? Because if you are cheaper than us, we will try to be better than you. If you are better than us, we will try to be cheaper than you. So by being cheaper than better, better than cheaper; we have succeeded in growing our Singapore economy to where we are today. I have also said in this House that post-global recession, the world has changed. The cheaper is becoming better. If you go to China or India, you will see very clearly how fast the cheaper are getting better. Likewise, the better are also getting cheaper. If you go to USA today, you will see for yourself how cheap things are becoming. Why? USA is trying to grow faster than their potential growth rate so as to lower the unemployment rate. We are therefore squeezed from both sides. The cheaper are getting better, the better are getting cheaper. What options do we have? As a union leader, as a labour movement, we are prepared to bite the bullets. And we say, yes, it is not easy to survive the future, but die, die, must try. And the way to go ahead is to be cheaper, better and faster. There is no other option. That is the reason why when the ESC came up with the recommendations, the labour movement gave our full support

4 because we believe that the recommendations of the ESC, together with Budget 2010, will enable all of us as tripartite partners to build a better economy, nurture a better workforce and at the same time create a better and brighter future for all. Sir, under the ESC recommendations, we are aiming to improve our productivity by 2%-3% every year. As the Finance Minister Tharman mentioned, 10 years from now, we have the potential of improving our productivity by about one-third and thereby create the space for our wages to go up by the same one-third. The question on the ground is, "Is this good or bad for me?" Some workers are concerned, "Today, I am working up to 10 hours a day. Does it mean that by the year 2010, I have to work for 13.5 hours everyday in order to produce that 35% more in terms of productivity? Even if I work 13.5 hours a day, will my wages go up by onethird because who is going to promise that? How do I be sure that my employer will not exploit me?" The worst thing is that if every worker can be one-third more productive, then three workers in 2020 can perform the job of four workers today. Does this mean that one out of every four workers today will be retrenched by the year 2020? In other words, will unemployment go up? On the part of the employers, some of them are also very concerned. They said, "Look, for the last 10 years or so, our productivity gain was only 1%. Now we set it at 2%-3%. But this 3% will be very hard to achieve." On top of that, they lamented that there are many jobs which are not able to attract Singaporeans to do. So with the tightening of foreign workers inflow, what it means is that employers are going to be faced with shortage of manpower. For some organisations, in particular those in the services sector, some hold the belief that better service means more workers. If you tighten on the foreign workers, and at the same time, they are unable to attract Singaporeans to do the jobs, they are going to have a labour shortage. What it means is that they will not be able to grow. Basically, they are concerned that this strategy may lead to a lose-lose-lose outcome lose for the workers, lose for the company and lose for the Singapore economy. Sir, the question is, "Can this lose-loselose scenario happen in Singapore?" To some extent, such a situation actually happened in USA in the 1990s. In 1996, there was an article in the Harvard Business Review, the title of the article was "The Hollow Ring of the Productivity Revival". The writer, Stephen Roach, Chief Economist of investment bank Morgan Stanley based in New York, noted that during the productivity revival in the USA from the 1980s to the 1990s, three things went wrong. Firstly, he said "a stretched workforce is delivering more because it is working more". In other words, workers are working longer hours to prop up productivity. Secondly, he said productivity was achieved as a result of downsizing. In other words, increasingly hollow companies are now unable to maintain market share in the rapidly growing global economy. According to his observation, many companies in USA actually downsized their manpower in order to achieve the productivity gain, using fewer workers to produce the same outcome. Thirdly, and even more alarmingly, is the growing gap between measured productivity and workers' compensations. And let me quote him, "productivity dividends of the 1990s have flown mainly to owners of capital rather than to workers". According to him, yes, there was productivity gain through downsizing but whatever gain actually went to the shareholders and not to the workers. These three things that went wrong working harder and longer, producing the same with fewer workers and pain-sharing without gain-sharing. As a result, the productivity revival did not last, it could not last. Sir, Singapore today, in a way we are also emabarking on a productivity revival. But it is important to recognise that our same-same productivity revival will have a different action agenda. In the context of Singapore, the tripartite partners, including the labour movement, fully recognise that productivity gain cannot be driven by getting workers to work harder and work longer. If we want production workers to double their output, it cannot mean that we ask the workers to double their working hours. Likewise, a sales person in a retail store, if you think that his productivity is low because he is not making enough sales, you cannot simply force the sales staff to stay longer in order to generate more sales. It does not work that way. To the tripartite partners, productivity is about upping the useful outcome whatever the workers are supposed to produce, we must find ways to help him or her up the outcome and at the same time down the wasteful input. Whatever input needed to produce the outcome, if the input does not add directly to the customers' needs, we should reduce them. Cut wasteful input, at the same time, up the useful outcome. And the best way to achieve that to up the productivity by increasing the useful outcome and reducing the wasteful input is to put in place a system, a culture, a process to help and support the workers. In other words, we should try to make the life of the workers easier rather than more difficult. The labour movement, working with the tripartite partners, is

5 committed to delivering a four-action agenda for the workers of Singapore. It will be different from the USA approach. Our first-action agenda is to pursue total productivity not just labour productivity but total productivity. In other words, not by loading more stress on the workers, because if we keep doing that, one day, the workers themselves will become the bottleneck. Instead we want to help the workers break the bottleneck at the workplace. I will give you one example. In the services sector, how do you improve the productivity of the sales person? The job of the sales person is to generate sales. In other words, if I am a sales person, standing on the shop floor for eight hours, I may serve many customers but if none of them buy anything from me, my productivity for that day is zero. If my employer wants to help me to improve my productivity, then my employer the organisation must find a way to help me sell easier and help the customer buy faster. That is the concept. Members may say this sounds very theoretical. How can it be done? One company in Singapore has done it. Triumph is a company that sells undergarments for women. We had a Learning Journey to Triumph because Triumph is an active participant of Customer Centric Initiative (CCI). We asked Triumph, "What are you trying do?" They said, "Under CCI, our main purpose is to keep the customer happy so that we can sell more, so that we can improve the productivity of our service staff." And they observe that women like to look good and feel good but they take a long time to make up their mind. They look at the items that come in many colours. They are not so sure which will look better, when the lights are bright and when the lights are not so bright. Triumph decided that one way to help the women make up their minds faster is to have six different moods of lighting in the changing room. The women inside the changing room can try the items under the different mood of lighting. And true enough, Triumph found that the customer actually made faster decision. Secondly, Triumph realised that sometimes if the husband and wife come together, they make an even faster decision. So, Triumph converted the changing room to a couple changing room. The husband and the wife can go in together so that they can decide. Later on, Triumph discovered that, yes, when the wife is accompanied by the husband, they make a faster purchase, but if the husband comes alone, he makes the purchase even faster. So, what Triumph did was if I am not wrong once a month, Triumph sets aside a day just for the men. The men will come once a month to buy these items to surprise their loved ones. As a result, sales went up. This is a very good illustration. When we talk about improving productivity, we are not trying to get the workers to work longer hours and make life difficult for the person but, rather, make it easier for the sales persons to perform their job. Triumph is a very good example. Likewise in a factory, the workers' job is to produce items. For example, at battery manufacturer Energizer, over 10 years ago, every worker in the factory was able to produce one million batteries a year. Over the last 10 years, they have increased the productivity of these workers by 100%. So, today, each worker is able to produce two million batteries per year. How did they do it? They did not ask the workers to work twice the duration but, instead, they asked the workers to work on the concept called "SQDC". "S" do your job Safer. "Q" higher Quality, make fewer mistakes. "D" timely Delivery if you need to produce certain amount by certain date, make sure you meet the time-frame, and "C" cost cutting. In the management terminology, "SQDC" is equivalent to cheaper, better, faster and, on top of that, safer as well. And they achieved this because they went through a process known as "lean transformation". Every worker has to come up with two small improvements every month. It is a requirement. They call it "xiao gai shan " meaning a small improvement. It is a total effort. Mr Speaker, Sir, there are many ways to improve productivity. The labour movement combs our unionised sector and discovers many examples. In the 14th February issue of the NTUC This Week, there must be about 10 to 15 examples of productivity gains. We can send a copy to Members who are interested. The bottomline is this when we talk about total productivity, our first commitment is to the workers of Singapore. We are committed to work at the company, the industry and the cluster levels to find ways to make workers' job easier, more effective, so that they can produce more, hopefully, without having to be like the case of USA where workers have to work very long hours. We hope that all sectors of the economy, all enterprises and all workers, will come together to contribute to the 3% improvement in 100% of the things we do. What we call the "triple As" approach of "all" sectors, "all" enterprises and "all" workers. By speeding up this productivity train in Singapore, we hope to be recognised worldwide as one of the most innovative nations in the way we improve productivity through total productivity one day. The second area of focus is pervasive innovation. Mr Speaker, Sir, it is very important that we pursue a 3% improvement in everything we do. But, at the same time, we need to go for 100% breakthrough in some of the things we do too. One company we can learn a lot from is 3M. We went on a learning journey to 3M and we

6 found out the twin-efforts at 3M. On the one hand, they have a "LSS" strategy. "LSS" stands for Lean Six Sigma a strategy to get every worker to improve productivity. Yet, at the same time, they have an innovation management system known as "15% time". Every worker is encouraged to use 15% of the time to think of breakthrough ideas. By bringing the two together in 3M, they are able to ensure that innovation is not an accident. Innovation is a conscious outcome of putting in place a system, a culture, a process, so that all staff are encouraged, at all levels, to come up with new ideas. So, with Lean Six Sigma, they are able to be innovative in productivity. At the same time, through its innovation management culture, they are able to be productive in innovation as well. And I think this is what made 3M so successful. The third area is inclusive workforce. The labour movement is committed to pursuing this vision of total productivity and pervasive innovation, and to do so through an inclusive workforce. In other words "all can". "All can" means all collars of workers, all ages of workers and all nationalities of workers. 3M is a very good example because they believe that innovation is a team effort. Every person in 3M, regardless of your collar, your age, your nationality, can be creative and innovative in his own way. In 3M, there is a culture to bring people together to perform. Likewise in Energizer, their slogan is that no one should be left behind as they pursue lean transformation. Sir, last but not least, the fourth area of commitment is the concept of gain sharing. Gain sharing is very important. We must not repeat the mistake seen in the USA where the productivity dividends went to the capital owners and not to the workers. A few days ago, we had a learning journey to SIA Engineering Company (SIAEC). SIA Engineering Company is a billion-dollar company, doing very well. Member Charles Chong works there, so he knows very well. As a billion-dollar company, even though the company is doing very well today, the management and the union are not complacent. They looked ahead to the future and asked where would the competition come from? It may come from the Middle East, it may come from China. They are not taking the future competition lightly. As a result, SIA Engineering has decided to embark on a cheaper, better, faster journey. The management and the union work together to look for ways to cut costs, to upgrade capabilities and, at the same time, to be more responsive to changes in the marketplace. They came up with this idea whereby the union and management worked together to identify the areas for cost-saving and for productivity gain. In Phase One of the effort, they work on six projects three in the areas of line maintenance, three in the areas of base maintenance. Altogether they saved $10 million a year. The management and the union then agreed that 24% to 33% of that saving would be shared with the workers in the form of quarterly productivity bonus. Today, the staff, having contributed to the productivity gain, are enjoying the quarterly payment. The company is now embarking on Phase Two. They aim to save another $15 million and for the whole year their aim is to save $50 million. And if they can achieve the $50 million saving for a year, the staff is expected to receive a quarterly bonus productivity bonus of $1,000 per quarter. This is a win-win outcome and I think it is the best way to sustain the effort. Next, I want to share with you the views of the labour movement regarding foreign workers. Again, it is an issue discussed a lot yesterday and today. Basically, on the part of the labour movement, when we look ahead, there are three options in terms of foreign workers. First option is to send back all the foreign workers so that Singapore will be a nation with no foreign workers. If we pursue this option, the workforce of today will drop by one-third. So we will have to downsize our national workforce to about 65%. Assuming that we grow our workforce by about 2% every year, by 2020, our workforce will still be only about 80% of today. In other words, if we send back all the foreign workers and by growing local workers, 10 years from now, we still have a workforce which is 20% smaller than the workforce of today. As a labour movement, we do not think this is a good idea. The second option is to continue to grow as before, like what happened in the past few years. Again, this is something we are not comfortable with. As ESC mentioned, if we keep growing our economy based on workforce expansion, it will not be sustainable. Therefore, the third option, which is what the ESC has recommended, is to maintain the share of foreign workers in Singapore, at about one-third of the workforce. In other words, we are not saying that we are anti-foreign workers and that we want to reduce the number of foreign workers to zero. That is not what we are saying. Yet, at the same time, we are also saying that we must not keep maintaining the mindset that there are many jobs that Singaporeans are not prepared to do and, therefore, as a first solution, as an easy solution, let us go for more foreign workers. Between the two, we have to find a way forward. As a labour movement, we are very concerned that if we are not able to achieve our productivity target, what will be the implication for our workers? If we grow our local workforce at 1%-2%, and in tandem, foreign workers at 1%-2%, the entire workforce will grow at 1%-2%. If we are not able to up

7 the productivity of the entire workforce, both local workers and foreign workers in Singapore, the Singapore's economic growth will be slow. One day, we may wake up and see Singapore having a slow GDP growth and, at the same time, low productivity gain. When that happens, we think that will be a deadly combination for a small and export-oriented economy like Singapore. We must not allow that to happen. For the labour movement, zero foreign workers is not an option and continued rapid expansion of foreign workers is also not an option. Also, low productivity and slow growth, likewise is not an option. The only option available to Singapore workers is one of going for high productivity. Just think about this. If we can rally all our workers the Singapore workers as well as foreign workers in Singapore rally the entire three million workers together, for every 1% improvement in productivity, we will be able to produce an equivalent of 30,000 workers. So that is the power of productivity gain. That is the power of teamwork. This is very important because by 2020, it is possible and likely that our workforce of three million today may grow to about 3.6 million. And if we can ensure that every one of this 3.6 million workers by 2020 will be one-third more productive than today, the 3.6 million workforce in 2020 can produce an equivalent of 4.8 million workers of output of today. This is the power of productivity gain and teamwork. If we can do that, our GDP in 2020 will be 50% bigger than today, even though workforce will only be 20% bigger. With a bigger GDP, there will be more jobs and, at the same time, workers will be upgraded and have higher salary.

Sir, in conclusion, the labour movement has embarked on the "Cheaper, Better, Faster" journey since August last year. We welcome the ESC's recommendation to pursue Skill,
Innovation, and Productivity (SIP). As Mr Yeo Guat Kwang said earlier, it may be the use of different terminologies but same-same outcome that we are going for. Basically what we are working together is to achieve a healthy economic growth, a situation whereby there will be low unemployment and high employment rates across all age groups of Singaporeans. We hope to arrive at the future where there will be good jobs, better skills, higher productivity and high wages for all workers of Singapore. The labour movement will give 100% commitment to support the ESC's direction. We hope that the tripartite partners will work very closely with us because at the end of the day, let us keep reminding ourselves that job is the best welfare and full employment is the best protection for workers, and productivity gain is the best driver for wage increases in the future. With that, thank you, Sir. [Applause.]

Mr Speaker: Yes. Mr Low. Mr Low Thia Khiang: Sir, the labour chief showed us the magazine published by NTUC This Week. Yes, I have read it but I find it quite confusing because everything was interpreted as productivity. There is even supply and demand productivity, for instance. Sir, the Minister also referred to Hougang Town Council. We are not on BSI but I would like to clarify that notwithstanding that, we have built the requirement into the contract with the contractor, demanding them to raise productivity by mechanisation and by employing Singaporeans. And they are given incentives for that. But we do not have to be on BSI. Sir, the labour chief also elaborated on what NTUC has done in looking at the low-wage workers' plight and trying to upgrade them. I am not denying that the NTUC has done its part. But whatever he has done, the outcome remains that low-wage workers continue to draw a low wage and this is not satisfactory, although he has done his part. Secondly, the low-wage workers today, especially working in certain industries, are facing a threat from foreign workers. They feel that their jobs can be taken away anytime. And that, despite whatever schemes that you have to upgrade their skills or to re-skill, that is the outcome the workers today face. Perhaps, NTUC may want to do better and work harder.

8 Lastly, the labour chief defended the economic growth strategy of the Government for the past five to 10 years. He said we wanted to build a buffer and whatsoever. From the economic point of view, I am not sure whether he has realised the outcome of this strategy and the impact on our people and our society. Perhaps, I should draw his attention to an article written by a Zaobao reporter, Zeng Shaopeng. I will quote part of what he says: (In Mandarin): "Holding onto personal memories and affections and not wishing any changes to the environment is a selfish and unrealistic mindset. The development speed of a place can make a person feel lost. Spectacular growth figures and grand visions will not stop people from feeling a loss of identification. What purpose does this kind of development have? At least in Singapore, this doubt is not entirely anti-foreign, instead it is more about questioning the economic development model." (In English ): This is what I think many Singaporeans asked, whatever the defence of your economic growth model in the past.

Mr Lim Swee Say: There is a story about this little frog. In the kingdom of frogs, every year, there is a carnival/competition. They will build the tallest tower in the world and they challenge the frogs to climb up to the top of the tower. It is very difficult, challenging and very dangerous. Every year, hundreds of frogs, would try their skills to be the champion. One year, it happened again. These frogs kept climbing, but the other frogs down there kept shouting, "It is too dangerous. Come down. Stop climbing. Come down! Come down!" And one by one, the frogs went up half way, looked up, still a long way to go; looked down, "Wow! I am quite far from the ground." So one by one, they started to retreat, except for one little frog. It just went on and on and no amount of discouragement could get him to turn his way. He went to the top and the whole town cheered, "Wow! Well done! Little frog!" When he came down, a reporter interviewed the frog. Before the interview, the frog signalled to the interviewer to face him while interviewing him. The interviewer asked, "Everybody asked

you to stop and come down. Why did you go all the way up?" The frog looked at the reporter and said, "Look. I am deaf. I cannot hear them."
As a labour movement and tripartite partners working on the issue of low-wage workers, we face many difficulties. We get many discouragements including from hon. Member Low Thia Khiang. But we do not look at the cup and say that it is empty or half-empty. We look at the cup as half-full. Mr Low said that low-wage workers today are still suffering the fate of low wages. But let me share with him about the progress of the security industry. Four years ago, Prime Minister launched the Job Re-creation Programme (JRP) at the NTUC. After the launch, two security guards came to me at the reception one young man and one lady. They like this JRP, and shared that the pay of security guards was too low. They hope we would help to up their salary at about $850 to $900 per month. This was four years ago. So we invited the SIRD, MHA, the union, the association and MOM for a dialogue. We embarked on a job re-creation exercise together. Today, four years later, the starting pay of security guards is $1,500-$1,700. Why? Because every security guard under the JRP must go through NSRS. If you do not pass the NSRS, you cannot be a security guard. And the entire industry went through the test and at the end of the day, more than 90% passed the test. Today, they are enjoying a better pay and a better job. For landscaping, it is the same. Seventy percent of landscaping workers were foreign workers because Singaporeans found the job to be tough and pay was too low. So we worked with NParks. Under the leadership of NParks, we went on JRP. We sent the workers for skill qualification under WSQ. Who launched the WSQ? The Prime Minister did. That is the kind of commitment all the way from the top to do whatever we can to upgrade the skills of the workers, to redesign the job of the workers so that they can earn a higher salary. Today, they are earning $1,100-$1,300. They are multi-tasked and multi-skilled. As for cleaners, as I have just mentioned, we work on BSI.

9 Sir, it is not easy to crack these problems faced by our low-wage workers. But as a labour movement and as tripartite partners, we never give up. We are like the little frog, we are deaf to all these criticisms. You cannot hope for big changes. To change the plight of the low-wage workers, first, there must be short-term solutions the Workfare Income Supplement (WIS). Do not underestimate how much support we are giving to the lowwage workers. Their annual salaries go up by about 20%-25% under the WIS. This is not a small sum. On top of that, we have all kinds of training. Just two days ago, there was another announcement of the Workfare Training Scheme (WTS). In other words, we are sparing no effort. Instead of telling us that low-wage workers are having problems, why not be part of the solution? Yes, I am happy to hear that Hougang Town Council is paying attention to low-wage workers. I hope we can engage in healthy competition PAP Town Council running as fast as we can to upgrade skills, jobs and welfare for the cleaners. Likewise, the Opposition ward to do the same. So that at the end of the day, the lowwage workers in Singapore will gain. I hope that it is not just the cleaning sector. Every sector of the economy can go through the same process.