The "WorkRight" initiative: Raising compliance A case of the Central Provident Fund Board, Ministry of Manpower

Transcription

1 Good Practices in Social Security Good practice in operation since: 2012 The "WorkRight" initiative: Raising compliance A case of the Central Provident Fund Board, Ministry of Manpower Special mention, ISSA Good Practice Award - Asia and Pacific competition 2015 Ministry of Manpower Singapore Published

2 1 Summary The "WorkRight" initiative is a national employment rights protection campaign which aims to uplift low-wage Singaporeans by ensuring good employment standards and retirement adequacy. To achieve these outcomes, the "WorkRight" initiative raises workers' awareness of their employment rights, ensures employers fulfill their obligations under Singapore's employment laws, and targets improving compliance levels in low-wage sectors (retail, food and beverage, cleaning and security services). Beyond public education via TV commercials, advertisements at bus-interchanges and newspapers, as well as the inaugural series of 1cWorkRight 1d roadshows in the heartlands, the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) and the Central Provident Fund (CPF) Board have also stepped up joint inspections to 5,000 per year. To date, over 12,000 inspections have been conducted to check employers' compliance with employment laws. These efforts have helped about 50,000 Singaporeans (over half of them in the low-wage bracket). A dedicated hotline for members of the public to lodge their feedback on employment and contribution non-compliance has also been set up. In 2013, the number of enquiries and/or complaints peaked at 3,270 which was a 65% increase compared to CRITERIA 1 What was the issue/problem/challenge addressed by your good practice? Singapore's Employment Act sets out the basic terms and conditions of employment, to ensure that employees enjoy basic employment protection such as salary and overtime payments and other employment benefits including annual and medical leave. The Central Provident Fund (CPF), a mandatory social security savings scheme funded by contributions from employers and employees, is a key component of Singapore's social security system, helping meet citizens' retirement, housing and healthcare needs. If employers fulfill their legal obligations under the Employment Act and CPF Act, workers should have employment protection and retirement security. Problem: Not All Low-Wage Workers Enjoy Basic Employment Protection Singapore's approach has been to focus on growing the economy, generating good jobs, keeping the unemployment rate low and the labour market vibrant. The thinking is that if these

3 2 conditions are met, workers' wages and employment terms will naturally be uplifted and that economic imperatives will motivate companies to become progressive and great workplaces. Despite this strategy, there remain low-wage Singaporean workers who tend to be older, less educated, and mainly employed by micro-enterprises in industries such as cleaning, security, retail, food and beverage and landscaping. Not all enjoy basic employment terms and conditions or have their salaries paid regularly and on time. In particular, informal workers do not receive employers' contributions to the Central Provident Fund, compromising their retirement security. These vulnerable workers are often not aware of their employment rights, or are unable to voice out against poor employment conditions for fear of reprisal by employers. As they are lowerskilled, they also experience difficulties finding employment. The "WorkRight" initiative was launched by MOM and CPF Board in September 2012 with the objectives to (i) raise and sustain awareness of employment rights amongst low-wage workers; and (ii) better ensure retirement security for this group of workers, who tend to be economically vulnerable. This is achieved through a 2-prong approach of (a) education and (b) enforcement. a Education Through heightened awareness, low-wage workers who have not paid or have under-paid CPF contributions could whistle-blow non-compliant employers, allowing us to focus efforts on effective CPF collection. b Enforcement To detect CPF non-compliance, we have also stepped up checks on employers to 5,000 inspections per year allowing us to cover more employers, thereby establishing a stronger deterrent effect. CRITERIA 2 What were the main objectives and the expected outcomes? (A) Heightening public awareness which allowed workers to report non-compliance (i) WorkRight TV Commercial reached out to over 2 million viewers A publicity campaign was launched in Oct A commercial was produced and screened in the major TV channels reaching out to over 2 million viewers during its one month of screening in 2013 and The TV Commercial was also uploaded on YouTube ( and up to mid Oct 2014 had garnered over 15,000 hits.

4 3 Subsequent TV campaigns ( were launched in 2014 with targeted messages highlighting the key employment terms which workers should be getting. To appeal to low-wage workers who were more endeared to dialect languages, a MTV ( featuring a popular dialect musical was produced. Both videos have garnered over 34,000 views as of mid Oct (ii) Availing quadri-lingual WorkRight guidebooks online WorkRight guidebooks for employers and workers, detailing the key employment provisions were also made available online to allow easy access to knowledge of employment rights. (B) Nudging employers to comply with employment laws (i) WorkRight helped about 50,000 Singaporeans affected by under-payment of salary, CPF and/or overtime (OT) payment issues, out of which over half were low-wage workers. With WorkRight, inspections were stepped up ten-fold, from 500 employment inspections which the Government used to conduct, to 5,000 inspections per year. The vastly increased inspections were achieved by outsourcing the detection work to a contractor who conducts employment inspections on employers. The increased number of inspections allows us to cover more employers, establishing a stronger deterrent effect. Cases of employers found to be in serious violation of employment laws are escalated for further investigation by internal government officers. Since WorkRight inspections started in November 2012, more than 42,000 local workers have benefitted from our enforcement efforts and salary payments due to these workers were rectified following our intervention. (ii) WorkRight halved the non-compliance rate from 33% to 15% Since the inception of WorkRight inspections, more than 12,000 inspections have been conducted to low-wage sectors to date. Comparing the non-compliance rate for the first 5,000 inspections with the subsequent inspections, the non-compliance rate has been reduced from 33% to 15%. CRITERIA 3 What is the innovative approach/strategy followed to achieve the objectives? The WorkRight Initiative is unique in a few regards:

5 4 1. Educating non-english educated, low-wage workers about employment rights through "getai" (boisterous live stage performances in Chinese dialects). "WorkRight" jingles in Singlish (an English-based creole language spoken in Singapore) also helped the local community to enhance recall of the important employment terms and conditions. This helps low-wage workers understand their employment entitlements and allow them to whistle-blow non-compliance when employers short-change them. 2. Institutionalizing a whistle-blowing framework that gives vulnerable workers a voice is a creative and credible enabler. It is now easy for low-wage workers with a low education level to call a toll-free number and register their complaints. 3. Harnessing the strengths of public, private and people sectors to improve the employment and living standards of low-wage workers is a first whole-of-singapore joint compliance effort. The public sector contributed the strategies and resources to jump start the initiative; the private sector (such as industry associations, employers' federation) played a key role in educating employers how to be compliant with the employment laws; the people sector provided the touch points for the government to effectively reach out to low-wage workers. CRITERIA 4 Have the resources and inputs been used in an optimal way to achieve the set objectives and the expected outcomes? Please specify what internal or external evaluations of the practice have taken place and what impact/results have been identified/achieved so far. 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 The number of calls and s to the WorkRight whistle-blowing hotline were also closely monitored to discern common misconceptions which employees and employers have about employment rights. Such misconceptions are addressed in subsequent rounds of publicity. Calls Received CPF/EA enquiries and/or complaint 1,983 3,270 2,305 Other calls 4,269 10,123 7,551 Total Calls Received 6,252 13,393 9,856

6 5 WorkRight inspections have also made a point of re-visiting formerly non-compliant companies, to monitor if they have corrected their employment practices ensuring that companies which were given a chance to self-rectify really did so. Employers found not to have corrected their employment practices are subjected to further investigations which may result in prosecution. CPF Contributions Non and Under Payment from Complaints and Audits Before WorkRight After WorkRight (after September 2012) $9,549,154 $9,507,045 $9,367,006 $16,620,336 $13,969,702 Late Payment $228,924,165 $283,139,746 $283,677,747 $406,579,580 $309,551,863 Total CPF Contributions Recovered $238,473,319 $292,646,790 $293,044,753 $423,199,916 $323,521,565 CRITERIA 5 What lessons have been learned? To what extent would your good practice be appropriate for replication by other social security institutions? We learnt that it is important to foster close collaboration between different agencies to ensure that different perspectives and inputs can be taken into account when jointly formulating strategies, planning for implementation, actual implementation and review of outcomes. To foster close collaboration between agencies, a WorkRight Steering Committee consisting of top management from participating agencies was formed to provide strategic direction and oversee planning. Workgroups under the Steering Committee were also set up to streamline the operations to more effectively enforce and engage our target groups. Processes were also streamlined to ensure that participating agencies were able to collaborate and roll out initiatives. We have also collaborated with MOM to follow up on the Labour Court (LC) orders issued by them since July 2013 (most of the claims are in respect of salary arrears which are also subject to CPF contributions. CPFB follows up on the cases to see if employers have paid up the CPF contributions. If not, the Board will enforce the payments from the employers directly and

7 6 ensure that the affected employees get their rightful CPF contributions. As at 31st July, we have successfully ensured that CPF contributions have been paid or recovered for 85% of the LC orders referred by MOM. 13% of the orders are non CPF payable (i.e. compensation) and investigations are still on-going for the remaining 2%.