Singapore plans to limit foreign workers alarm Jakarta

Lilian Budianto ,  The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Fri, 02/12/2010 9:43 AM  |  Headlines

Indonesia is monitoring Singapore’s plan to limit the employment of skilled foreign workers, anticipating it may need to protect its 16,000 professionals working in the city state, the government says.

Indonesian Ambassador to Singapore Wardhana said the government had been monitoring the new measure.

“As we know Singapore is a wide open country that host many foreign workers. Their economy is also supported by a flow of foreign workers and we have yet to see how [Singapore] will work out the restrictions [for each country that sends professional migrants],” he said.

“[The restrictions] have not been finalized… and we don’t see them as a threat at this stage,” he said.

Observers, however, have warned that once the limits are introduced, some of the Indonesian professionals based in Singapore may lose their jobs.

A committee led by Singapore Finance minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam recommended earlier this month that the Singapore government should no longer increase the number of foreign workers, seeking to maintain the number at one-third of the total workforce in Singapore.

“We cannot increase the number of foreign workers as liberally as we did over the last decade, or else we will run up against real physical and social limits,” the government’s economic strategies committee said in a report quoted by Reuters.

The report did not make specific recommendations for how much the number of foreign workers could increase or quotas to be imposed on countries sending skilled workers.

Wardhana said professional Indonesian migrants had formed dozens of associations in Singapore and were also keeping an eye on the plan.

Berly Martawardaya, a lecturer at the University of Indonesia’s school of economics, said that while the Singapore government was coping with domestic pressure to provide jobs, it was also bound by commitments to guarantee a free flow of skilled workers as enshrined in the ASEAN Charter that Singapore ratified.

“Singapore and other ASEAN countries have to clear up rules on the mobility of skilled workers and make sure they hold up commitments despite economic problems,” he said, referring to the 10-member of Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

The committee reports say an increase in the number of foreign workers would impact not only the employment of locals but also domestic demand for goods, services and housing — in a country that has in the past tried to attract as many foreign workers as possible to fill its vacancies.

The recommendations of the report will be deliberated during the upcoming budget meetings in parliament on Feb. 22.

“I can understand that the government wants to protect locals, but new restrictions might harm competition in the job market. I wonder how the government will balance between protecting locals in a way that doesn’t have adverse impacts on us,” said Silvia, an Indonesian who has worked in a consultancy company in Singapore for 2 years.

Related posts:

1. Extend skills upgrading to foreign workers (Today Online)
2. Foreign workers: Figures can be so deceptive
3. Top 10 reasons why Singapore is the BEST place to work in for foreign workers
4. Eight Reasons Why Foreign Workers Are Preferred Over Local Ones
5. Singapore may reduce foreign workers, boost social spending after opposition makes gains
6. “Foreign workers help create good jobs for S’poreans: PM” – Really?