28 October 2021
There are a few important employment law developments on the horizon: anti-discrimination legislation expected to be introduced in due course, potential legislation or guidance relating to protections for gig workers, higher salary thresholds to be met for hiring foreign employees, the increases to the minimum retirement age and re-employment age to 65 and 70, and the mandatory requirement to notify the Ministry of Manpower of all retrenchments taking place. Save for the full-scale mandatory retrenchment notification (which takes effect on 1 November 2021) and the retirement and re-employment age (the first increases to 63 and 68 respectively will take effect from 1 July 2022), the other developments remain in the works with no firm implementation date.
Prudent employers should start laying the groundwork for future developments. It is far better to plan ahead than to take reactive steps in the rush to comply with the new legislative framework.
For example,
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In anticipation of anti-discrimination legislation, it is perhaps time to review internal hiring practices – the way HR drafts job advertisements, the questions asked of candidates at interviews, selection criteria – do existing practices contain discriminatory elements which can be addressed early?
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You may wish to start embracing policies on inclusion, equality and diversity in line with the global focus on the ethical workplace. This is a good start to developing workplace culture that will contribute to compliance objectives down the road.
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Employers who rely heavily on platform workers may wish to start the process of engagement with their platform workers in meaningful conversations on how gaps in expectations may be filled. If platform workers attain protected status by way of future legislation, employers will benefit from early attempts to build trust and confidence for a mutually beneficial relationship in the long term.
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Employers who rely heavily on foreign employees may wish to consider the following alternatives to higher payroll costs – investing in the training, promotion and upskilling its local employees, restructure its operations with a view to becoming less labour intensive and remote working from overseas.
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With the increases to the minimum retirement and re-employment age, the wait-and-see approach may not serve employers as well. Career and succession planning, training and re-deployment will become key areas of focus. Employers should begin identifying areas of work which mature employees are able to take up and arrange for internal policies and management practices that continue to retain mature talent while also being able to engage newer talent within the workforce.
With the full-scale mandatory retrenchment notification requirement coming into effect and the growing theme of anti-workplace discrimination, employers planning retrenchment exercises should do so in accordance with the Tripartite Advisory on Managing Excess Manpower and Responsible Retrenchment. In our view, an employer’s ability to demonstrate that it has applied objective selection criteria and sensitive handling of the retrenchment exercise will be key to avoiding legal and reputational risks.
For further information, please contact:
Natasha Cheng, Bird & Bird
