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Oral Answer by Mr Lim Swee Say, Minister for Manpower, to Parliamentary Question on bringing forward roll-out of progressive wage model for landscape workers

Employment practices

Notice Paper No. 240 of 2015 For The Sitting on 17 August 2015 Question No. 732 For Oral Answer

MP: Mr k Karthikeyan

To ask the Minister for Manpower whether the Ministry can bring forward the implementation of the Progressive Wage Model for landscape workers to this year.

Answer

  1. The Progressive Wage Model (or PWM) for landscape workers was announced by the Tripartite Cluster for the Landscape Industry (TCL) in April this year, and will be incorporated as a requirement in the Landscape Company Register (or LCR) administered by the National Parks Board. From June 2016, LCR-registered companies will be required to pay their resident landscape maintenance workers according to the PWM. 
  2. The PWM implementation timeline was developed based on tripartite negotiations, where the industry shared that it would need at least a one-year lead time from the announcement of the PWM framework to make the necessary wage adjustments, and comply with the relevant PWM training requirements. In the cleaning and security sectors, the industry has had longer lead times of about two years given that these sectors have a larger pool of workers to train. The Government is of the view that a lead time of one year is reasonable and practical for the landscape industry, and supports the decision of the TCL.
  3. While the deadline for implementation of the PWM is one year away, progressive companies can move ahead to start adopting the PWM. Funding schemes are available to help incentivise early adoption of the PWM and defray the initial costs of doing so. For example, the Progressive Wage Incentive administered by the Employment and Employability Institute provides grants of up to $150,000 for service buyers that best source from early adopters of the PWM.