During a National University of Singapore Society (NUSS) 60th anniversary lecture on Friday, PM Lee commented on many issues and at one point, suggest that the Workers’ Party had been arguing for a “zero growth” in foreign worker numbers during the debate on the Population White Paper debate.
Using this point, PM Lee had said that we could not have “zero growth” and he criticised the Workers’ Party.
In response to media queries about this point, The Workers’ Party’s media team chairman, Gerald Giam explained that:
"WP said during and after the Population White Paper debate in 2013 that we should focus on restructuring the economy to become more productivity- and innovation-driven, rather than being overly dependent on foreign labour. We said Singapore should aim to grow the local workforce by, for example, helping more women and senior citizens to enter or re-enter the workforce. This, together with the Government's target of 2-3% productivity growth per annum, would enable us to hold the foreign worker numbers constant, while still achieving GDP growth of 2.5-3.5%."