Effectiveness of Matching and Retraining under Professional Conversion Programme

19 Mr Zaqy Mohamad asked the Minister for Manpower (a) what is the Ministry's assessment on the take-up of the Professional Conversion Programme; (b) what are the challenges in matching and retraining vulnerable professionals amidst increasing retrenchment; (c) what are the take-up rates by workers from different race groups; and (d) whether the Programme has challenges reaching out to specific groups.

The Minister for Manpower (Mr Lim Swee Say): Mdm Speaker, the Professional Conversion Programme (PCP) was launched in 2007 to help our local PMETs acquire new skills to take on new careers.

With economic restructuring and slowing local workforce growth, the risk of mismatches between jobseekers and jobs created in the labour market has increased. To overcome this challenge, we expanded the scope of PCPs under the Adapt and Grow initiative last year to allow for conversion to different jobs within the same sector, as well as to different jobs within the same company for sectors with high risks of redundancy. We also extended the coverage of PCPs to most sectors − with 50 PCPs at the end of 2016, compared to 22 at the start of the year. Last year alone, we increased the number of PCPs from 22 to 50, covering almost every sector of the economy now.

The result of these changes has been encouraging, with more than 1,300 PMETs securing conversions through PCPs in 2016, which is 20% more than in 2015. Data on take-up by race is not available. However, based on ground observations from our career coaches from e2i and WSG, they have told us that the response across the racial groups is fairly balanced. In other words, there is a good mix of jobseekers from various racial groups.

There remains much to do to support the manpower and skills needs of employers and, at the same time, to help our locals who may not have the relevant skills and experience to seize new job opportunities being created. MOM and WSG will continue to look at ways to strengthen our support for jobseekers under Adapt and Grow, including through PCPs, in close collaboration with our tripartite partners.

Mr Zaqy Mohamad (Chua Chu Kang): I thank the Minister for the explanation. Just two clarifications.

Firstly, the Minister mentioned we had 1,300 workers that were successfully matched. I think that is very good progress. Does the Minister have figures in terms of how many are there who actually applied initially and what proportion was successful that made up this 1,300?

Secondly, it is good the Minister mentioned that, across different racial groups, it is quite evenly distributed. Is there a difference within age groups as well? For example, are seniors more difficult to get matched? I suppose matches for the younger ones would be easier, but are there issues for the senior groups?

Mr Lim Swee Say: Mdm Speaker, firstly, in terms of the mix across the various age groups, I do not have the specific breakdown for the PCP alone. But, on the whole, of all the successful jobseekers we were able to place last year, as I can recall, about close to 40% were more than 50 years old. About one-third of those unemployed and managed to find jobs were unemployed for more than six months, meaning they are long-term unemployed. In terms of breakdown by PMETs and the rank-and-file, again, there is a good balance of about 50:50.

Broadly speaking, our success rate, whether in terms of age breakdown or breakdown by PMETs versus rank-and-file or by long-term unemployed versus unemployed, I would say it has been fairly balanced and fairly inclusive. But, certainly, I would agree with the Member that for professional conversion, it is more likely that the more mature PMETs may find greater difficulties in going through this professional conversion.

For example, one observation we made so far is that the majority of the PCPs start at the entry level. In other words, you move from one profession to another profession, but the majority of them end up starting from the entry level of the new profession. So, this may actually discourage the mature PMETs, because for them to start all over again at the bottom of the new career may be too painful. This is an area that MOM has looked into, whether we should strengthen and enhance the PCPs. You may hear something on this at the COS this year.

In terms of the success rate, again, I have to recall from memory now. Broadly speaking, I would say that the success rate is about 60%. This is for all programmes; we do not keep track of the success rate by individual programme. We look at the number of PMETs who come to us and – I stand to be corrected – we were able to match 60% of them successfully to jobs. But it does not mean that the other 40% are jobless, because many of them will go through their own efforts, such as applying for jobs through the National Jobs Bank.

Mr Desmond Choo (Tampines): Two points of clarification for the Minister. Firstly, for the purpose of job market signalling, which are the top three PCP programmes that have been very successful and which will continue to grow further? Secondly, for the programmes that have not been so well received thus far, how can the tripartite partners work together with MOM to grow the programmes?

Mr Lim Swee Say: Mdm Speaker, the Member is right that the response to the PCP across the 50 PCPs is obviously uneven. In some cases, we have more supply than demand, meaning there were more jobseekers but fewer job openings from employers and, in some cases, the other way around. What MOM, together with our tripartite partners, is trying to do is to minimise this mismatch. Again, at the coming COS, we intend to make known further enhancements to the Adapt and Grow initiatives to minimise this mismatch between supply and demand.