| 4. In which ways is the initiative creative and innovative?
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The WorkRight Initiative focused on strong collaboration of the Public, Private and People sectors, to achieve a virtuous circle of improving workers’ awareness and better employers’ self-regulation of employment laws. On effectively implementing the “WorkRight Initiative”, three key steps were taken:
(a) Inform the workers’ and employers’ of their employment rights and obligations respectively, mainly through broad-based publicity and community engagement activities, from September 2012. These efforts are aimed at reaching out to vulnerable workers (primary audience) as well as family and friends (multipliers). With correct and easy to understand information, workers, or their family members and friends, would know about employment protection. Employers would also be more aware of their legal obligations, and have the knowledge to do the right things.
(b) Involve stakeholders, industry partners, worker unions and grassroots (from November 2012). We did targeted engagement of relevant stakeholders in the high-risk sectors to address issues on non-compliance. Since 2012, WorkRight has built up an extensive network of stakeholders which include industry and business associations, unions, grassroots touch points as well as other government agencies. For instance, we conducted customised briefings on the employment laws with restaurant associations and merchant associations in the food and beverage sectors. Engagements with such business clusters help our messages to be disseminated to a wider spread of business owners who are then able to reform their employment practices to be in line with the laws.
(c) Include low-wage workers, who are beneficiaries of the WorkRight initiatives, as advocates in our public outreach, since June 2013. These advocates join us in sharing about the WorkRight initiative at road shows and at “employment law clinics” where we provide free advice to workers on basic employment terms and conditions.
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| 5. Who implemented the initiative and what is the size of the population affected by this initiative?
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The WorkRight Initiative consciously invokes a whole-of-Singapore approach to help vulnerable workers. This involves close collaboration of several government agencies, worker unions, grassroots organisations, industry associations, employers federation, such as the following:
a. Ministry of Manpower (MOM) and Central Provident Fund (CPF) Board. The WorkRight Programme Office, which is jointly staffed by the MOM and CPF Board, takes the lead in developing strategies and championing initiatives to achieve the desired outcomes. Between the two organisations, processes are streamlined and integrated to ensure no duplication of efforts.
b. National Environment Agency (NEA) and Ministry of Home Affairs. The cleaning and security industries hire a high proportion of low-wage workers. Industry-specific Progressive Wage Models for these two industries were recently launched as part of strengthening the objectives of the WorkRight Initiative, particularly with respect to uplifting the employment standards of workers.
c. National Trades Union Congress (NTUC) and grassroots organisations. Through job fairs and social events, the NTUC “U Care Centre” (for the low-wage workers) and grassroots organisations inform all workers (i.e., not restricted to unionised workers) in the heartlands about their employment rights and statutory benefits. The Union of Security Employees also co-launched a Security Officer Handbook (on employment rights) with WorkRight Programme Office.
d. Singapore National Employers Federation (SNEF). The SNEF website puts up hyperlinks to WorkRight webpage, which contains information resources on employment laws for its 3,000-strong members to access/download. Its industry group meetings are also appropriate platforms for MOM and CPF Board officers to explain common misconceptions of the Employment Act and CPF Act to employers and human resource practitioners.
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| 6. How was the strategy implemented and what resources were mobilized?
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The WorkRight initiative was funded by the Government to uplift low-wage workers to ensure that they are able to achieve the objectives (i) to raise and sustain awareness of employment rights amongst the low-wage workers; and (ii) to better ensure retirement security for this group of workers, who tend to be economically vulnerable
The initiative was granted a total of US$20 million (inclusive of human resources, project planning and execution costs) over a period of 5 years to achieve the outcomes of helping Singaporeans and low-wage workers achieve financial security, income growth and enjoy good employment standards.
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| 7. Who were the stakeholders involved in the design of the initiative and in its implementation?
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Strong collaboration of the Public, Private and People sectors, to achieve a virtuous circle of improving workers’ awareness and better employers’ self-regulation of employment laws:
Through focusing on 3Ps (People, Public, Private) and getting the three groups to collaborate through tighter partnership, a virtuous cycle of improving awareness and better employer self-regulation was achieved. Through raising awareness, the public sector helps employers improve the employment conditions of workers. Workers who enjoy working in the job help employers with profit margins and business sustainability. This continues to support the ecosystem of harmonious employment in Singapore.
Sustained publicity presence:
The various publicity efforts through mass and social media are vital in creating public awareness of the employment rights messages under WorkRight. These include a mix of above-the-line publicity platforms like TV, newspaper, social and digital media. The team also actively taps on grassroots events held by union partners and other stakeholders in reaching out to lower wage workers.
Brand marketing:
The creation of a catchy TV advertisement slogan (“I know my rights”) and amusing TV advertisement characters who recite nuggets of information on the employment laws have led to wider public interest in the WorkRight initiative. Higher public interest translates to more whistle-blowing from the public, especially civic-conscious members of the public who come forward to report on people they know who are missing out on the statutory benefits.
We have also produced WorkRight merchandise that are targeted at lower wage consumers. These include pocket calendars and towels with the WorkRight hotline number. Such merchandise create visibility for the campaign and also helps people to register the important bits of information like the hotline number.
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| 8. What were the most successful outputs and why was the initiative effective?
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To ensure that our education and publicity is effective, regular surveys were conducted with the public to assess if the education campaign is meeting its objectives of raising public awareness especially among our target audiences. The survey results were closely monitored to make continual refinements to the education strategy.
The number of calls to and emails sent to the WorkRight whistle-blowing hotline to enquire on employment entitlements or complaint against non-compliant employers were also closely monitored. By further evaluating the statistics, common misconceptions which employees and employers have on the employment laws and be discerned. Such misconceptions are addressed in subsequent rounds of publicity.
WorkRight inspections has also made it a point to re-visit formerly inspected companies which were found to have less serious infringements, to monitor if these employers have corrected their employment practices. This ensures that companies which were given a chance to self-rectify really did so. Employers found not to have corrected their employment practices to comply with employment laws subjected to further investigative actions which may result in prosecution.
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| 9. What were the main obstacles encountered and how were they overcome?
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(1) Difficulty in inducing business compliance
Despite the educational efforts, a key challenge is in helping businesses accurately apply the knowledge on employment laws. In this way, WorkRight enforcement is crucial in nudging businesses to comply with the employment guidelines. The WorkRight team fitted an educative element in the inspections, where inspectors will brief the business owners on their weaker areas in their compliance to the employment laws and iterate the statutory requirements. This ensures that the messages from the public education are not forgotten or cast aside and business owners will correctly apply the knowledge in their employment practices.
(2) Difficulty in reaching out to employers and employees who have difficulty understanding English
Employers in the Small and Medium Enterprise as well as low-wage workers, may have some difficulty understanding the English language. They tend to be more comfortable with Mandarin or their dialects. As such, educational campaigns to reach out to this group of employers and employees may not be effective in conveying the messages if it were only pitched in the English language. To appeal to employers and employees, we have adapted our educational materials to multiple languages so that it is easily understood. For example, the WorkRight guidebooks detailing key employment provisions and an MTV (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ak3fVFhpmeg) featuring a popular dialect musical was produced elaborating on employment rights, are adapted to different languages to ensure that it is easily understood by everyone.
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