MOM penalises 5 firms for age-related discriminatory hiring

FIVE employers in Singapore have been barred from hiring foreigners and renewing the work passes of existing foreign employees for a year with immediate effect.

The penalties were meted out after their hiring practices were found to be discriminatory, the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) said on Friday.

They had either placed job advertisements which indicated a preference for a certain age group or, later in the hiring process, indicated preferences for candidates of a certain age group.

The employers are Wisdomtree Learning Centre, Outshinerz Events, Security & Risk Solutions, Incredible Service Doc and IDOC.

They have breached the Tripartite Guidelines on Fair Employment Practices. Furthermore, the cases also come under the enhanced Fair Consideration Framework. This means they are subject to stiffer administrative penalties MOM put in place from January 2020, the ministry said.

Through education and enforcement, the number of age, race or gender discrimination complaints have decreased from about 240 cases in 2016 to about 125 in 2019, it added.

Age discrimination complaints, which still form the highest share of complaints, were halved from about 100 in 2016 to roughly 50 in 2019.