SINGAPORE: A younger and more gender-diverse Parliament, which opens on Monday (Aug 24), will have its hands full with one important job in the ...
SINGAPORE: A younger and more gender-diverse Parliament, which opens on Monday , will have its hands full with one important job in the near future: creating and matching employment opportunities for Singaporeans.
“We have schemes like SkillsFuture and Singaporeans are also learning new skills. But how then do you ensure that they are relevant to the job?” said Mr Tan, pointing out that an additional challenge is in ensuring employers are aware of potential employees with the right skill sets.Another rookie MP who also plans to put the limelight on job concerns - especially the plight of older workers - is former health and social services sector veteran Ng Ling Ling from Ang Mo Kio GRC.
“I think support for job redesign must also look into the softer aspect of work inclusivity of more senior workers. In this area, I think social service agencies and professionals are adept,” Ms Ng told CNA. “There is a lot of talk in the press about how COVID-19 has exposed the underbelly of society ... inequality, poverty, social mobility. These are issues that are perennial issues and that have to be addressed,” said Dr Tan.
CNA analysed the Presidents’ Addresses and subsequent MPs’ debates for all previous Parliaments and found two particular instances where the first sittings of previous Parliaments bore a resemblance to the “crisis” nature of the current time. Keywords used in late president Benjamin Sheares’ 1977 President’s Address at the first sitting of the 4th Parliament. The size of words correspond to how often they are mentioned in the address.
Then-president S R Nathan’s address to Parliament placed heavy emphasis on the economy, highlighting increasing global competitiveness that Singapore would have to contend with in sectors like electronics and finance, as well as the need to restructure the economy to sustain growth. In the ensuing MPs’ debate, the 10th Parliament had much the same focus, with the top keywords of the debate being “economy”, “jobs” and “workers”.The analysis of past Parliament sittings was featured in a news report on Sunday night as the last of a three-part series on the 14th Parliament, with the first two focused on the age and gender profile of the parliamentarians.
“It helps that we have a young team of our own, facing the sort of challenges young parents face: waking up in the middle of the night to comfort a crying child, looking for school placements, concerns about the highly competitive educational system that our children will face,” said the economics lecturer in a written response to CNA.
“We need to be cognisant that when we talk about youth, the spectrum of youth is broad. There are youth who are still in secondary school and beyond that institutes of higher learning: polytechnics, ITE, universities. “And these are issues such as caregiving, elder care, which affects women's lives in a very significant manner. And the fact that we have to face work-care conflict, which is something that bears more attention on the policy making front,” said the PAP’s Ms Carrie Tan, 38, a first-time MP from Nee Soon GRC.
Even with the uptick in the number of female lawmakers, Ms Lim cautioned that there still remain significant structural barriers that prevent women from entering the domain of politics.
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