Variance between Expected and Actual Grants Disbursed to Businesses and Individuals and Steps to Enhance Accessibility and Usage of Unused Funds
Ministry of ManpowerSpeakers
Summary
This question concerns the $3.3 billion lower-than-expected expenditure by the Ministry of Manpower for FY2022/2023, with Mr Derrick Goh inquiring about the reasons for grant disbursement variances and plans for unused funds. Minister for Manpower Dr Tan See Leng explained that the variance was primarily due to significantly lower spending on the Jobs Growth Incentive following a rapid recovery in the labor market. He highlighted that accessibility is enhanced by administering schemes like the Enabling Employment Credit automatically, while manual reviews are maintained for a minority of cases to ensure accountability. Minister for Manpower Dr Tan See Leng stated that unused funds can be redeployed across the Government's term to support priorities such as worker upskilling and boosting productivity for small and medium enterprises. These reallocations are formally managed through the annual Budget process and tabled for Parliamentary approval to ensure the strategic support of local employment.
Transcript
61 Mr Derrick Goh asked the Minister for Manpower in view of the Ministry’s lower-than-expected expenditure for FY2022/2023 by about $3.3 billion (a) what are the reasons for the variance between the expected and actual grants disbursed to businesses and individuals; (b) how have application processes to grants been improved and simplified to enhance their accessibility; and (c) what are the plans to use these unexpected funds available to further support the upskilling of individuals as well as to boost productivity and local employment by our SMEs.
Dr Tan See Leng: The Ministry of Manpower (MOM)’s budget expenditure takes into account COVID-19-related measures. The bulk of this went into providing for the Jobs Growth Incentive (JGI). JGI was an extraordinary measure introduced during COVID-19 to support employers to expand local hiring. MOM took on a more generous stance in providing funding to preserve and increase hiring activity in the labour market, given the uncertainties posed by COVID-19 on the economy. The lower-than-expected budget utilisation for the last financial year was largely due to significantly lower COVID-19-related spending, particularly in the utilisation of JGI. This was due to the rapid recovery in the jobs market and the economy in general.
In processing grants, the Government aims to do so efficiently and expeditiously, while ensuring accountability for funds disbursed. For example, wage support schemes such as JGI, Enabling Employment Credit and Senior Employment Credit, are administered as automatic schemes, where eligible employers will receive support without having to submit an application. At the same time, we have to institute checks to detect possible cases of abuse or error, hence, a minority of cases are picked up for manual review based on a risk management framework.
As we manage our finances across an entire term of Government, the funds not used for JGI can be deployed to other spending plans, which could include, as Mr Derrick Goh suggested, efforts to support our small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and workers. The spending estimates are tabled for Parliament’s approval as part of the annual Budget process.