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May 24, 2010
Little protection for older workers
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I REFER to last Thursday's letter, "Less than 3% of private firms cut older workers' wages", sent in jointly by the Singapore National Employers Federation, Ministry of Manpower and National Trades Union Congress.
Employers in Singapore have the flexibility to terminate an older worker for a variety of reasons, including restructuring and outsourcing. This has been practised quite often in the private and public sectors. There is little need for them to keep workers until age 60 to have their wages reduced under the Retirement Age Act. This probably accounts for the low percentage of employers exercising this wage cut.
I cite the case of a friend who has worked for 11 years in regional business development for a local insurance company. He was rated a good performer by the previous management. Recently, with a change of top management, he was asked to leave and was offered a compensation of only three months of salary.
He asked for my assistance on how to make an appeal to the Ministry of Manpower, as he still has a family and a sick elderly mother to support.
I hope that our tripartite partners will recognise this type of difficulty faced by many Singaporeans. The current employment practices offer little protection to workers, especially older ones, when the top management outsources the work to contractors to reduce their costs or replaces senior people with their own buddies.
Tan Kin Lian
Little protection for older workers
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I REFER to last Thursday's letter, "Less than 3% of private firms cut older workers' wages", sent in jointly by the Singapore National Employers Federation, Ministry of Manpower and National Trades Union Congress.
Employers in Singapore have the flexibility to terminate an older worker for a variety of reasons, including restructuring and outsourcing. This has been practised quite often in the private and public sectors. There is little need for them to keep workers until age 60 to have their wages reduced under the Retirement Age Act. This probably accounts for the low percentage of employers exercising this wage cut.
I cite the case of a friend who has worked for 11 years in regional business development for a local insurance company. He was rated a good performer by the previous management. Recently, with a change of top management, he was asked to leave and was offered a compensation of only three months of salary.
He asked for my assistance on how to make an appeal to the Ministry of Manpower, as he still has a family and a sick elderly mother to support.
I hope that our tripartite partners will recognise this type of difficulty faced by many Singaporeans. The current employment practices offer little protection to workers, especially older ones, when the top management outsources the work to contractors to reduce their costs or replaces senior people with their own buddies.
Tan Kin Lian
