Nationalities of Engineers Working in Singapore

8 Er Dr Lee Bee Wah asked the Minister for Manpower (a) how many engineers are there currently working in Singapore; and (b) how many of these are Singaporeans and permanent residents, and foreigners respectively.

The Minister of State for Manpower (Mr Teo Ser Luck) (for the Minister for Manpower): Mdm Speaker, as of June 2015, a total of 122,500 professionals were employed as engineers, of which six in 10 were locals.

Engineers play a crucial role in Singapore, and are needed to improve our infrastructure, grow key sectors such as manufacturing and telecommunications and drive the Smart Nation initiative. Sectoral Tripartite Committees (STCs) for sectors such as construction, manufacturing, transport and infocomm technology (ICT) are formulating their respective Sectoral Manpower Plans to enhance sectoral competitiveness and strengthen the Singaporean Core. By developing more attractive career pathways and strengthening the professional recognition and accreditation of engineering skills and expertise, we aim to attract more locals to join the engineering profession.

Engineering will remain a meaningful and respectable profession as we strive for economic and social progress in our next phase of development. The tripartite partners will reach out to more Singaporeans to take up engineering as their career of choice.

Er Dr Lee Bee Wah (Nee Soon): Mdm Speaker, I would like to thank the Minister of State. I have two supplementary questions. Since engineers are so important, I would like to ask how many engineers and engineering positions in Government agencies and Statutory Boards, are filled by foreigners? Is there a plan to just employ Singaporeans in Government agencies and Statutory Boards?

Mr Teo Ser Luck: Employment of engineers will be based on skill sets. Some skill sets are, for example, software skill sets. Some are specialised skill sets which may not be readily available here. But in the public sector, majority of our engineers are locals. We will also do our best to make sure that our local engineers are given a fair chance and opportunity to take up positions.

Engineers have skills that are functional. Their skills are applicable broadly across different sectors. Most of the engineers, if they go to the technical field, they can find job opportunities. Services as well. Many of these jobs are covered by engineers, even including the non-functional skills too. We respect the engineering profession, and we feel that engineering skills and engineers themselves need to be recognised and rewarded. It has to be based on two fronts: to make sure that engineers continue to stay in their sector and to have the technical skills.

From the enterprise perspective, they need to have good human resources (HR) practices. These HR practices could mean identifying these engineers as human capital to be invested in and also to make sure that they can continue to deliver value. They need to have career paths, wage ladders, and good salary and progression plans for them.

Industry as a whole will depend on the Sectoral Manpower Plan and the tripartite committee to look at the skills sets and the skills of the future to cover the skills gaps, so that we can build up the pipeline between schools and institutions with the industry. We need to build up more engineers for the sectors. That is exactly how we have been approaching it.

Er Dr Lee Bee Wah: I think the Minister of State did not answer my first question. How many engineering positions in Government agencies and Statutory Boards are filled by foreigners? Will the Government lead by example? Employ just Singaporeans in Government agencies and Statutory Boards.

Mr Teo Ser Luck: There are many positions with engineering graduates filling up the positions, both engineering jobs and non-engineering jobs. Majority of them are filled by locals. We will do our best, wherever we can, based on merit to give our local engineers and local graduates to be employed in Civil Service.

Mdm Speaker: Mr Desmond Choo. Keep it short, please.

Mr Desmond Choo (Tampines): I just want to ask if the Ministry has any plans to bring back engineers who have left the profession. And what are the incentives and programmes that will attract these engineers back into the profession again?

Mdm Speaker: Short reply, please.

Mr Teo Ser Luck: Yes, we encourage engineers who are not in their profession to come back. There is today, based on feedback from the enterprises and the sector, a lack of engineers in the sectors. We encourage them and through different programmes of support. There are already current programmes in career support to bring them back, especially the matured engineers.

Mdm Speaker: Order. End of Question Time.

[Pursuant to Standing Order No 22(3), provided that Members had not asked for questions standing in their names to be postponed to a later Sitting day or withdrawn, written answers to questions not reached by the end of Question Time are reproduced in the Appendix.]