Singapore Work Permit Revamp: Longer Tenure, New Sources
Read the Straits Times news article by Tay Hong Yi published on 19 March 2025.
An upcoming revamp of the work permit framework is set to reduce the costs and time needed to train new migrant workers. This will help firms carve out higher-value jobs for locals while meeting the demand for rank-and-file workers, industry players told The Straits Times.
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Companies in services and manufacturing also welcomed an expansion to a list of occupations for which they can hire work permit holders from more locations, with more job roles and more locations added to the list. The surprise addition of Bhutan as one of the new places where employees can be recruited will let firms access a whole new profile of workers, observers said.
Minister for Manpower Tan See Leng had announced on March 6 that from July 1, there will be no hard cap on the maximum duration that work permit holders can work here – a move that industry players said is one of the furthest-reaching labour policy changes in recent years.
Currently, these workers can work in Singapore for only between 14 and 26 years, depending on their skill level and country of origin.
With the change, work permit holders – aside from migrant domestic workers, who fall under a slightly different regime – will be able to work till the prevailing retirement age, which is now 63.
One worker who will benefit from the lifted cap is Mr Sethu Rajinikanth, a facility executive at Singapore shipbuilder Strategic Marine.
If this cap were not lifted, Mr Rajinikanth, who has worked for the company since he came to Singapore 17 years ago, would be able to work here for only another nine years due to the 26year limit on his work permit.
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Under the new rules, Mr Rajinikanth, who is 48, will be allowed to continue working here for about five years longer.
He said he feels greater job security with the pressure of the employment limit lifted, as he can continue building his career in Singapore and save up more for his future.
“Otherwise, I might have to go home or find work in another country,” he said, adding that he enjoys the variety of tasks he gets to do, which includes overseeing repairs and coordinating the work of contractors.
Mr Rajinikanth, who is an Indian national, also said he looks forward to mentoring younger workers at his workplace.
Mr Ivan Koh, Strategic Marine’s chief corporate finance officer, said these changes will help the firm maintain a higher level of experienced staff, making the company’s operations more stable and efficient.
That said, Mr Koh noted some potential challenges, such as managing higher healthcare costs and adapting work processes to these workers’ physical capabilities.
“Nonetheless, the benefits of preserving institutional knowledge and enhancing workforce continuity far outweigh these challenges,” he said.
By reducing the required frequency of recruiting and training new hires, the move will also let the firm better plan its workforce development and pipeline of skilled workers for the long term, he said.
Out of 238 work permit holders currently employed by Strategic Marine, 12 of them are aged 50 and above.
Many have a maximum tenure of 26 years, in view of their higher skill levels, with five workers having worked for Strategic Marine for more than 14 years already, Mr Koh said.
Meanwhile, the removal of employment duration limits for work permit holders will especially help employers in the process industry retain welders, equipment fitters and field supervisors.
The process industry includes manufacturers of petroleum, petrochemicals, speciality chemicals and pharmaceutical products, as well as firms that build and maintain the plants of these manufacturers.
“These jobs require deep technical expertise and years of hands-on experience yet remain hard to fill with local workers due to their specialised nature,” said Mr Wayne Yap, executive director of the Association of Process Industry.
Despite the latest rule change, Mr Yap said manpower constraints remain a challenge. Foreign worker quota and levy requirements for the sector were recently tightened in 2024. “This (new) policy provides much-needed flexibility, but companies must continue adapting to ensure sustainable workforce planning.”
The moves help address persistent manpower shortages that manufacturing firms face, while enabling continued investments in automation, advanced manufacturing technologies and innovation, said Mr Lennon Tan, president of the Singapore Manufacturing Federation (SMF).
Beyond the changes to maximum tenure and maximum age, the sector will also get to tap the Non-Traditional Sources Occupation List to a greater degree.
The list was introduced in September 2023 to let services and manufacturing employers hire manual labour on work permits from a wider range of locations, rather than employing them under an S Pass, to ensure a higher skills bar for the S Pass as originally intended.
However, employers must pay those hired on the list at least $2,000, and these workers must account for 8 per cent or less of the employer’s total headcount, excluding Employment Pass holders.
A range of manufacturing operator roles will be among those added to the list come Sept 1, though exactly which roles these are, remains to be seen.
Mr Tan said: “We also appreciate the government’s balanced approach in complementing foreign manpower policies with ongoing efforts to develop local talent through initiatives like SkillsFuture.
“This ensures that Singaporeans continue to take on higher-value roles while foreign workers help sustain essential operations.”
He also said the inclusion of manufacturing operator roles on the list fulfils a “longstanding request from the industry”.
“Manufacturing segments such as precision engineering, electronics, aerospace and medical technology stand to benefit the most,” Mr Tan added, saying that these segments have faced manpower challenges that affect productivity and competitiveness.
I. Task
The objective of this assignment is to explore how government policies on foreign workers impact businesses operating in Singapore. More specifically, the assignment needs to appraise, using available published information, how workforce planning is affected as businesses grapple with the supply of certain groups of workers to address possible shortages of labour. As mentioned in the news article, there are persistent manpower shortages in some industries. Some jobs in these industries require deep technical skills which take time to build, and the retention of trained manpower remain challenges for companies in industries mentioned in the news article. This assignment requires recent and current secondary research on the challenges in building a sustainable labour supply and the appropriate government initiatives and policies in balancing the manpower needs of organisations and at the same time create better jobs for Singaporeans.
For this assignment, you are required to:
Research and select a company, with operations in Singapore, in any ONE (1) of the FEC (Future Economy Council) Cluster and FEC ITMs (Industry Transformation Maps). The company selected must be related to the news article above.
- Describe the profile of the selected company.
- Nature of business
- Geographical presence
- Overall business strategy
- Major competitors
- Annual revenue/turnover and employee headcount
- Product life cycle/Industry life cycle
- The FEC cluster and the FEC ITM the company operates in
(10 marks)
- For the industry the selected company operates in, identify, and describe TWO (2) external factors to explain what is described in the news article. Discuss how each of these TWO (2) external factors will affect workforce planning within the industry. Secondary research is expected to support this discussion.
(25 marks)
- Based on secondary research, select and describe appropriate government initiatives introduced to improve labour supply for the industry the company operates in. Evaluate how the selected government initiatives and regulations impact the selected company’s workforce planning. It is necessary to identify specific jobs in the selected organisation impacted by the appropriate government initiatives. Additional secondary research is required to complement the information in the news article.
(30 marks)
- Formulate a workforce planning framework that the company is adopting with considerations from your discussions in (1), (2) & (3). Support your framework with research evidence and details of each planning process, examples of the specific forecasting tools used, workforce planning gaps and possible action plans using information from Q3. Omit the part of the workforce planning process that covers monitoring and evaluation.
(25 marks)