SINGAPORE: Singapore’s resident female employment rate has risen from 54% in 2010 to 57.7% in 2020 over the past decade, compared with OECD countries, Minister of State for Manpower Gan Siow Huang said on Wednesday (Jan 12). Ranked high.

She was answering a parliamentary question from Ms Cheryl Chan (PAP-East Coast) and Ms Tin Pei Ling (PAP-McPherson) on trends in women’s employment.

Ms Tan asked the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) for its observations on emerging trends of female professionals joining emerging industries such as digitalisation and sustainability. Ms Tian asked which growth areas are currently lacking female talent and leaders the most, and what factors might be contributing to this gender imbalance.

Ms Gan said the share of women among professionals, managers, executives and technicians (PMETs) has increased from 41.1 per cent to 45.6 per cent over the past decade.

“We are seeing more women joining growth fields such as information and communications, financial services, health and social services,” she said. “Across the three industries, women make up a combined 52.8 per cent.”

The share of women in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) jobs, albeit low, has increased from 29.9% in 2015 to 32.4% in 2020.

Ms Gan said a 2019 study of the adjusted gender pay gap in Singapore found that differences in gender ratios across occupations could be due to differences in personality and psychological traits, skills, different values ​​on workplace flexibility and social norms. caused by gender differences.

“We will continue to work with our tripartite partners and community stakeholders to support women’s participation in the workforce and help them enter and remain in careers of their choice, including emerging industries.”

Ms Gan also answered Ms Yeo Wan Ling (People’s Action Party – Pasir-Ris Punggol) and Ms Joan Pereira (People’s Action Party – Tanjong Pagar) about preventing women from taking regular jobs and caring for caregivers’ careers, finances and retirement adequacy.

She listed the various ways the government supports carers and families with care needs, such as through subsidized care services and grants.

“These include directly supporting their care needs, enabling active caregivers to better manage work and their care responsibilities through flexible work arrangements, helping them re-enter the workforce through employment facilitation and training support, and enhancing their retirement adequacy rate,” she said.

Responding to Ms Yang’s question on the controversy over flexible working arrangements, Ms Gan said the government and tripartite partners were stepping up efforts to encourage widespread adoption of the arrangement.

The Tripartite Alliance for Fair and Progressive Employment Practices has not received any cases related to such disputes in 2021, she said.

Ms Gan said there was a small percentage of women who were unable to participate or fully participate in the labour market due to caring responsibilities.

In 2020, 15% of women cited family-related responsibilities as their main reason for leaving the workforce, while 6% took part-time jobs because of family or personal commitments.

“Securing and maintaining employment is key to financial resilience and retirement adequacy,” Ms Gan said.

“With increasing labour force participation and higher wages, today’s peers have been able to accumulate more CPF savings for retirement than they were a decade ago.”

The government has also introduced and stepped up measures in recent years to help Singaporeans, including carers, accumulate enough savings for retirement, she added.

The Silver Support Scheme provides quarterly payouts of up to S$900 for carers who are earning low incomes while working and are now retiring.

“About two-thirds of silver support recipients are women, including many carers,” she said.

She gave examples of other help, such as encouraging carers and their loved ones to top up their CPF with cash, and for older carers, they could take advantage of housing monetization schemes such as the lease buyback scheme and the Silver Home Bonus.

“The government will continue to review our multi-pronged efforts to ensure carers are well supported,” Ms Gan said.

SINGAPORE: Singapore’s Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) Minister of State Sun Xueling told Parliament on Wednesday (Jan 12) that the ministry is working with social service agencies to develop a common assessment and intervention framework to deal with domestic violence cases.

“The framework will enable frontline professionals to better identify domestic violence cases, make timely referrals and facilitate case discussions among relevant agencies, and support agencies in managing risk and addressing the needs of survivors and perpetrators,” said Ms Sun. .”

She answered questions from three MPs who asked about the support available to victims and whether authorities could take a more proactive approach to preventing domestic violence.

The government’s domestic violence task force said last year that the number of domestic violence enquiries and new cases received by social service centres has steadily increased.

According to the task force’s report, the PAVE Integrated Services Center, a domestic violence specialist center and a personal and family protection integrated service specialist center, received 1,103 new cases in fiscal 2020, an increase from 966 in fiscal 2019 and 891 in fiscal 2018 .

Support for Survivors
Ms Sun said on Wednesday MSF was working closely with community-based domestic violence specialist centres (FVSC) and PAVE to provide support to people experiencing any form of violence, regardless of gender.

These include safety planning to reduce the risk of recurrence of violence, providing survivors with alternative safe housing and supporting them through the Personal Protection Order application process.

In addition to addressing immediate safety risks, these centers provide counseling for survivors, such as those traumatized by violence.

“The community has also opened a variety of support and treatment groups, including FVSC and PAVE for survivors of domestic or sexual violence, to allow them to talk about their experiences in a safe and supportive environment,” Ms Sun said.

She added that survivors with mental health or trauma needs can also seek services from professionals at restructured hospitals, including those with specialized trauma clinics.

Ms Sun said MSF would continue to strengthen support for families traumatised by domestic violence, as recommended by the task force.

She added: “We will serve forensic-trained psychologists at each FVSC and PAVE, enabling them to work more effectively with survivors and perpetrators.”

“This includes addressing trauma and mental health issues, providing assessments and interventions to identify and address risk factors and needs associated with abuse by abusers. And working with social workers to develop safety plans for survivors.

“In combination, assessment, intervention and safety planning can help reduce the risk of recurring violence.”

There are currently three domestic violence specialist centres. Ms Sun said two of them, Care Corner Project Start and PAVE, have been able to provide comprehensive social and emotional support, including counselling and other interventions, to survivors of various forms of domestic and external violence, including sexual violence.

She added that MSF was working with a third centre, TRANS SAFE, to enhance its capacity and capacity to provide “similarly comprehensive support” to survivors of sexual harassment and violence in the second half of the year.

Responding to a supplementary question from MP Carrie Tan (PAP-Nee Soon) about the manpower of these centres, Ms Sun said MSF was prepared to increase the overall capacity of these facilities so that it could effectively assist survivors and perpetrators. domestic violence.

SINGAPORE: The unemployment rate in Singapore continued to decline in November 2021, statistics from the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) on Thursday (Dec 6) showed.

The data showed that the resident unemployment rate fell to 3.2% in November 2021 from 3.4% the previous month.

The citizen unemployment rate was 3.5%, down slightly from the previous 3.6%. The overall unemployment rate fell from 2.6% to 2.5%.

Manpower Minister Tan See Leng said in a Facebook post that the continued decline showed that Singapore’s labor market is “recovering steadily, with the economy rebounding from the recession of 2020, with GDP growing by 7.2% last year”.

Dr Tan said industries hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic, such as food service and air transport, were able to increase capacity again as more people dining out and more vaccinated travel routes opened.

“We expect the domestic sector to see a pickup in hiring demand as community measures are gradually eased,” he added.

However, he cautioned that “the road to recovery remains bumpy and uncertain”.

“Singapore is likely to see a new wave of cases in the coming weeks as the Omicron variant spreads around the world,” he wrote in the post. “As the COVID-19 situation changes, businesses and workers will need to adapt. Sex and flexibility.”

He added that the ministry and Workforce Singapore will support employers and employees.

Dr Tan also encouraged employers with hiring needs to “consider more candidates” and invest in upskilling new hires.

“The SGUnited Jobs and Skills Package provides generous support to employers. I also encourage job seekers to remain open to new opportunities.

“Job-seekers in need of support can seek career matching services from WSG and NTUC’s Institute of Employment and Employability.”

The SGUnited Jobs and Skills Package was launched in May 2020 to help workers in Singapore affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

It received an additional S$5.4 billion in Budget 2021 to support hiring 200,000 locals and providing up to 35,000 internship and training opportunities.

As of the end of September 2021, more than 146,000 people have been offered jobs or internships and training opportunities under the SGUnited Jobs and Skills Package.