During the Committee of Supply Debate in Parliament today, Worker's Party MP Png Eng Huat, raised the issue of crane operators still being mostly foreigners despite Khaw Boon Wan saying last year that they were looking for more local crane operators and advertising that it was a good job that could earn up to $7k.
Png raised the fact that last year, about half of all crane operators in Singapore were locals but due to a new relaxed ruling, companies can now hire 4 foreigners for each Singaporean crane operator that they hire.
This is Png Eng Huat's full speech on the issue:
Madam, in May 2013, the National Development Minister made a call for more local crane operators in the construction sector. It was reported that only half of the 3,600 crane operators here are Singaporeans and there is a need to reduce reliance on foreign workers for good reasons. These are well paying jobs that Singaporeans can do. According to the Minister, a crane operator can earn $4,000 to $7,000 a month with overtime pay and allowance.
A tower crane operator came to my MPS recently and shared his side of the story. He said many companies in the construction sector are still hiring more foreign crane operators not less. These foreign workers are cheaper and can work longer hours. As a result, salaries came down and many of his operator friends are unable to secure full time work. Some of his friends work only 2 times a week. He handed me a letter with the names of 46 tower crane operators pleading for help.
Last night, I met a fellow diner at the hawker centre near my house and I found out he is also a crane operator. He added that foreign construction companies tend to hire their own people to operate cranes. He also felt that the number of foreign crane operators has not come down despite the move to train more local crane operators.
Madam, the reliance on foreign crane operators will never come down despite the call to train and hire more Singaporeans. This is because BCA has launched a temporary initiative to relax the recruitment of foreign crane operators at the same time when it launched an initiative to attract more Singaporeans to join the trade. Under the relaxed ruling, for every 1 new local crane operator hired and trained, a company can now recruit up to 4 new foreign crane operators.
This will probably explain why people are seeing more foreign crane operators and not less. Putting the 2 initiatives side by side, the percentage of Singaporean crane operators in the construction sector will come down significantly over time. So the call to reduce reliance on foreign crane operators will not happen any time soon. I would like to ask the Minister when we can see an improvement in this sector.
Next, major clients like LTA and HDB often require tower crane operators to have at least 5 years of experience to improve safety so the idea of hiring and training new local crane operators is not going to make sense for companies bidding for major public projects.
Some have called for the 5-year experience requirement to be reviewed and replaced with the number of hours an operator clocked at work as a better gauge of safety regulation. This idea is worth exploring because an experience pilot is known for the number of flying hours he clocked and not by how long he had his licence.
I urge the authority to look into this so that more local tower crane operators can qualify to work on major projects sooner rather than later.
Madam, I also urge the minister to look into helping local crane operators find their footing in the industry and if necessary set in place rules to protect them so that they can have job security. It does not make sense for the Government to encourage more locals to become crane operators but there are few jobs for them at the end of the day.
http://wp.sg/2014/03/cos-2014-debate-mom-crane-operators-mp-png-eng-huat/