SINGAPORE: Associate Professor Jamus Lim, Workers’ Party Member of Parliament for Sengkang GRC, has offered his take on the SkillsFuture Jobseeker Support Scheme (JSS), which he describes as the People’s Action Party’s (PAP) equivalent of unemployment insurance.

The JSS, unveiled with more details during Prime Minister Lawrence Wong’s National Day Rally speech on 18 August, has sparked comparisons with the Workers’ Party’s own long-standing proposal for redundancy insurance (RI), first introduced in its 2006 manifesto.

In a 12 September Facebook post, Assoc Prof Lim emphasised that the WP had been advocating for a redundancy insurance scheme for almost two decades, providing substantial details on it in their 2016 policy paper.

“We’ve been thinking about the issue for a while now,” Lim stated, adding that the WP’s proposal has been part of global best practices for advanced economies for nearly a century.

Assoc Prof Lim dismissed the PAP’s argument that the JSS is not unemployment insurance.

He pointed out that the differences the PAP cites—such as JSS being tied to job-seeking conditions and funded from general revenue rather than payroll taxes—are inconsequential.

“Tax revenue is fungible, so it all comes from the people anyway,” Assoc Prof Lim explained.

He argued that funding the scheme from general revenue might even make it less equitable, as it could potentially shift the burden onto non-workers to subsidise workers.

The Workers’ Party’s version of redundancy insurance, Assoc Prof Lim highlighted, envisioned a shared responsibility between employers, employees, and the government to ensure fairness and sustainability.

“We do believe in tripartism,” he remarked, underscoring that society should bear the responsibility for protecting its workers.

One of the central points in Assoc Prof Lim’s critique was that tying financial support to job-seeking efforts is standard in unemployment schemes globally, including in Singapore.

Assoc Prof Lim Addresses Concerns of Dependency, Calling Them Overblown

He acknowledged concerns that such a scheme might lead to dependency, but deemed these fears exaggerated.

“Most people, even in the West, do find value and meaning in some form of work,” he noted.

In discussing the design of unemployment insurance systems, Assoc Prof Lim pointed to the importance of balancing the duration of support with the amount provided.

While too long a tenure or too large a payout could discourage a return to the workforce and allow skills to erode, too little would leave workers struggling to cover household expenses during critical periods.

The WP’s redundancy insurance proposal included a payout of 40% of the last drawn income for up to six months, which Lim described as a “solid-but-not-excessively-generous” sum.

Although this amount is lower than what is typically found in advanced economies, and the duration is shorter than the OECD average of one year, he highlighted that it reflects Singapore’s shorter unemployment spells of around two months.

Assoc Prof Lim also suggested the introduction of greater flexibility in accessing redundancy insurance funds.

By allowing the unemployed to “front-load” their payouts, households would have more breathing room to adjust their expenses during difficult transitions.

With the JSS set to be debated in Parliament, Assoc Prof Lim reaffirmed the Workers’ Party’s commitment to advocating for expanded safety nets for Singapore’s workers.

“Whether you call it JSS or RI or something else, expanding the safety net for our workers is something that the Workers’ Party will always be fighting for,” he concluded.

SINGAPORE: Former Singapore President Halimah Yaacob has lauded the recently passed Platform Workers Bill as a “good start ” in protecting gig economy workers.

However, she suggested that a more straightforward approach would have been to classify platform workers who meet certain criteria as employees, thereby granting them automatic coverage under labour laws, social security protections, and union representation—an approach already adopted by some countries.

In her Facebook post, Halimah acknowledged the Bill’s role in addressing the vulnerabilities of platform work.

The legislation, effective from 2025, mandates increased Central Provident Fund (CPF) contributions for platform workers and provides enhanced work injury compensation and representation through union-like associations.

The parliamentary debate on September 9 and 10 centered on the distribution of costs—whether they will fall on platform workers, companies, or consumers.

Concerns were raised about the potential impact on consumers and the financial burden on platform companies.

Several MPs expressed worries about discrimination against workers who choose higher contributions and advocated for expanding the law to include other platform services such as domestic cleaning and caregiving.

Senior Minister of State for Manpower Koh Poh Koon reiterated that the protections are meant to level the playing field for businesses and ensure fair competition, while also preventing platform operators from passing the costs unfairly onto consumers or workers.

Madam Halimah highlighted how platform work can distort the pricing of goods and services, with consumers expecting low-cost, fast deliveries.

She noted that if platform workers were classified as employees, the costs of their protection—such as for sickness, business downtime, and social security—would be borne by employers and partially passed on to consumers.

She said It’s then up to us to decide whether to make use of such great convenience but at a certain price.

“It’s then up to the companies to properly factor in their costs to remain competitive as all other businesses are doing. It’s all about the business operating model that has fundamentally changed with the availability of platforms.”

Madam Halimah argued that since platform workers are essentially employees subject to company conditions, they should receive the same protections as other employees in terms of health, social security, and business downtime.

She pointed out that platform workers have been shouldering all the risks and costs, which is not sustainable and affects their ability to secure homes and plan for the future, impacting their families and future generations.

She also discussed the negative aspects of information technology and algorithms, referencing a case from a US fast-food chain where algorithms disrupt workers’ rest periods based on fluctuating customer demand.

The Platform Workers Bill defines platform workers as individuals who provide ride-hailing or delivery services for an online platform and are under the platform’s control.

According to data from the Ministry of Manpower (MOM), there were approximately 70,500 platform workers in Singapore in 2023, accounting for about 3 percent of the workforce.

This total includes 22,200 taxi drivers, 33,600 private-hire drivers, and 14,700 delivery workers.