Construction firms tell of the delays and triumphs in managing workers

Singapore

THE Building and Construction Authority (BCA) on Wednesday announced measures to hasten the restart of on-site construction work, in a bid to end the delays that construction companies have encountered in recent months.

The measures will also allow all firms and their workers to resume work outside construction sites and supply work premises without prior approval from the BCA, as well as suspend the "10 accommodation" requirement.

Previously, each construction project was allowed to deploy workers (from main contractor and subcontractors) from a maximum of 10 different addresses.

Companies The Business Times spoke to said the easing of measures is welcomed but hoped for better implementation going forward. Some expressed unhappiness about how the government agencies have managed the foreign-worker community during the Covid-19 outbreak; other companies acknowledged the logistics of managing the large numbers of workers, and said they had seen improvements.

A main contractor who did not wish to be named blamed the inadequate communication among government agencies for the lack of coordination in giving timely updates on the clearance status of foreign workers.

He said: "Each (entity) is taking (its) own jurisdiction. It is not synchronised and coordinated. As a result, (there's) a lot of red tape, a lot of uncertainty. The picture is not clear."

He said he has been receiving conflicting information on the status of his workers' clearance status "almost every day", and has faced difficulties in getting them out to work.

However, he acknowledged that the situation improved after the removal of the "grey" status in SGWorkPass, an app which foreign workers have installed in their mobile phones. (The "grey" status had meant that the worker's employer had not yet been given clearance to resume work.) The BCA announced on Wednesday that the AccessCode work status for all foreign construction workers will now display "Yes" under the "Approved to Start Work" section.

The contractor also recounted that while three workers in his dormitory, which houses about 200 workers, at first tested positive for Covid-19, testing for the rest of his workers was completed only 1.5 months later.

After he received the test results for his final batch of workers, he was told that another eight workers had tested positive. But upon checking, he found that the eight workers were not even from his company.

This caused confusion, especially when calls and e-mail to the MOM went unanswered, and led to a two-week delay in a project, for which he had been granted approval by the BCA to start work in June.

In response to the latest update from BCA, he said: "It's good that at least now (they) listen to feedback and fine-tune the procedure... But on the other hand, too much damage and suffering has already been incurred over the last few months."

A subcontractor, who also requested anonymity, told BT that he was "shocked" when nine of his 22 workers, who had been confined in the same dormitory for three months, tested positive for the virus in June, when none of them had shown any symptoms previously.

They were held in isolation at care facilities for 17 days, and the subcontractor resumed work only last week - when he had originally been given all-clear to do so at some sites in June.

He added that the numerous guidelines and safety requirements that needed to be followed while working on-site are "just not possible to comply (with)", and that there had been "so many circulars from BCA and MOM (Ministry of Manpower)", making it difficult for them to keep up.

He wrote a letter to BCA in June, offering suggestions on how the on-site safety requirements could be improved, but did not get a response.

"Let the ground people decide how to do it. You give us the guidelines, we will do it. When you control too many things on what we can do or cannot do, that is more dangerous," he said.

The different pace of reopening across sub-sectors in the industry, such as the delay in delivery of building materials and equipment, has delayed many projects.

The subcontractor added: "Construction is an ecosystem. We don't work like that, silos here and there. Every day is money to us. Every day, we are losing money."

A spokesperson from dormitory operator Centurion Corp said technology glitches on the three platforms used - FWMOMCare, SGWorkPass and TraceTogether - were probably the biggest source of confusion for employers and workers alike.

"The process of clearing such large numbers of workers across so many dormitories would be a tremendous logistics exercise in the best of times. With Covid-19 constraints, it has been a daunting challenge."

He noted that thousands of workers have been moved from their past living quarters, and regrouped by health status, by work sites or by employers, to create work group "bubbles" to minimise inter-mixing and cross-contagion. This has required the support and cooperation of employers and workers.

"At the same time, multiple digital platforms were developed or re-purposed to support the tracking of multiple data inputs for hundreds of thousands of individuals. These platforms or technology functions were developed very quickly and put to use with little time for testing and debugging. Some glitches and debugging was to be expected in each platform, and in the integration of the three platforms with each other."

The problem was compounded by the fact that 3 to 5 per cent of foreign workers do not own mobile phones, or phones capable of downloading and accessing the necessary apps.

Training and guidance also needed to be given to employers and these workers on how to use the apps correctly.

As at Wednesday, 70 per cent of the nearly 12,800 migrant worker residents living in Centurion Corp's five Westlite dormitories had been cleared to start work. These workers work for almost 700 companies.

Half of the 70 per cent cleared to work have actually resumed work. Among some of those who have not been cleared to do so, it is because their personal particulars in the various mobile apps and technology platforms are incorrect or inconsistent.

All five Westlite dormitories have been cleared now, except for one block each at Westlite Mandai, Westlite Toh Guan and Westlite Woodlands. These last remaining blocks are expected to be cleared by the middle of this month.

There are companies which have had a more positive experience working with the government to manage their foreign workers.

Early last month, three subcontractors wrote to the BCA and MOM to raise issues that construction companies were then facing, such as cost issues, delays in updates on the test results of their workers, and requests for levy rebates and waivers. More than 100 subcontractors endorsed the letter.

The trio - Thomas Oh, Foong Yu Han and Yee Sern Wei - agreed that they have since seen "a lot of improvement" made, and now take part in weekly dialogue sessions with the BCA and MOM, at which they raise issues subcontractors are facing. (see amendment note)

"We have been fixing things as we go, and up to this stage, I think most of the confusion has been clarified and improved," said Mr Yee, who is also the director of building company Gin Chia Co.

The trio said that the recent updates point to signs of the sector's recovery, and that the agencies are "working hard to remove the hurdles one by one".

For instance, Ms Foong, director of ADF Construction, described the removal of the 10-addresses criterion as a "very, very big booster" for companies.

Fazley Rubel, a Bangladeshi construction worker who founded the Migrant Cultural Show and has been helping to connect troubled foreign workers with relevant non-governmental organisations for help, agreed that while there has been a lot of confusion in the way the foreign worker situation has been handled by the Singapore government, it is not surprising, given how large-scale the problem is.

He added that had this happened in another country, it would probably have been handled worse.

Amendment note: An earlier version of the article spelt Ms Foong's name as Foong Yuhan when it should be Foong Yu Han. The article has been amended to reflect this change.

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