In the National Day Rally, PM Lee Hsien Loong addressed a number of issues. One of the topics he talked about was the issue of foreign workers.
On this topic, he highlighted the need to control foreign worker numbers, adding that "it will lead to serious consequences" if we do not start to act.
Mr Lee said that "The Government understands difficulties that businesses have, and we will try our best to help."
He also put a focus on the struggles of Small to Medium Enterprises (SMEs). He said that SMEs face many challenges such as trying to raise productivity, improve service, and reduce labour costs. However, due to their limited resources, these improvements often cannot be made without support.
PM Lee said that the manpower crunch is still the biggest problem facing SMEs as many businesses cannot find workers.
Particularly for SME's, foreign workers are needed but the government will do more to control the number of foreign workers.
Talking further about support options available to SMEs, PM Lee mentioned that the government had rolled our a 3 year transition support package during budget 2013 to help businesses improve productivity.
He also announced that Teo Ser Luck will be meeting with different business representatives to gather more feedback on how to better support them.