More retrenched white-collar workers in Singapore seeking unions’ help

[SINGAPORE] More white-collar workers are seeking help with unions and trade associations after losing their jobs.

The National Trades Union Congress has also seen more cases of retrenchments due to business restructuring recently, said its assistant secretary-general Patrick Tay.

In 2025, NTUC handled over 3,900 retrenchment and termination-related cases for professionals, managers and executives (PMEs), 5 per cent more than in 2024.

Some of these cases were linked to offshoring and relocation as companies face cost pressures, Tay said in an interview with The Straits Times. Offshoring refers to companies relocating parts of their operations overseas, often to reduce costs.

In some instances, roles are being shifted out of Singapore “even when local PMEs are experienced and capable”, he said.

Artificial intelligence has also become a factor, although economy-wide numbers are still scant. Tay said: “We are also seeing businesses cite investments in AI as a factor for workforce restructuring. Some workers find themselves displaced because job roles are changing faster than they can adapt.”

The cases handled by NTUC, which leads 58 affiliated trade unions and six affiliated trade associations, cut across its various bodies, including the Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management@NTUC. The figures do not include cases from its Employment and Employability Institute (e2i).

While total employment in Singapore has grown and the unemployment rate has remained low at 2 per cent in 2024 and 2025, retrenchments have increased over the past few years from 6,440 in 2022 to 13,020 in 2024 and 14,490 in 2025.

NTUC is concerned that many PMEs are not aware they can join unions and be represented by the trade union centre during retrenchments, Tay said.

It is particularly worried about those in the professional services, finance and infocomm and technology sectors as they are most exposed to the effects of generative AI at work, said the Pioneer MP, who is also director of strategy and legal at NTUC.

A recent retrenchment case that NTUC helped to mediate involved an IT worker who wanted to be known only as Benjamin.

Despite what he said were good performance reviews at a non-unionised company for 18 years, his employment was unexpectedly terminated with one month’s notice in February 2026, he told ST in an e-mail interview.

Benjamin tried to negotiate for more with his company, given his long service, but was denied.

He then sought support from NTUC, which he had joined as a general branch member in 2024 after seeing news of job losses online. He filed a case with NTUC’s PME – its department dedicated to providing support for such workers.

A career coach from NTUC, Herjeet Singh, wrote to the company to ask for a mediation on his behalf, and highlighted Benjamin’s long service and performance history.

The company eventually offered six months of ex-gratia payment plus one month’s bonus payment. Through mediation, the matter was resolved amicably with a settlement of S$47,600, said Benjamin.

Rank and file and certain executive employees in a unionised company are entitled to union representation, said Ray Chiang, a senior partner at law firm Dentons Rodyk.

A collective agreement signed between a union and an employer typically sets out the retrenchment benefits workers can expect.

An employee at a non-unionised company can still approach NTUC for support but without a collective agreement, such workers rarely have a contractually enforceable retrenchment benefit, Chiang said.

NTUC can persuade the non-unionised employer to offer adequate benefits, but cannot compel it to.

“The benefits in the tripartite guidelines are followed by a vast majority of employers, but the guidelines are not strictly legally binding,” Chiang said.

The surest protection, he added, is for non-unionised workers to have retrenchment benefits written into their employment contracts – though this currently remains rare in Singapore.

Raghu, a longtime executive in banking technology, had such clauses in his contract but did not originally receive the stated benefits.

The 55-year-old father of two, who gave only his first name, was retrenched in January 2024 from a software firm serving banks, where he ran regional operations.

Losing his job took Raghu by surprise and caused the sole breadwinner a considerable amount of stress.

He had been an NTUC member for years but, like many PMEs, had no idea the union would offer him support, as he assumed it stepped in only at unionised companies.

His employer initially offered him a one-month notice period. After NTUC’s PME unit walked him through his rights, he negotiated that up to three months’ salary in lieu of notice, along with two months’ salary of retrenchment benefit – what he was originally entitled to in his contract.

Many Singaporean PMEs are not emotionally prepared for retrenchment and often are under the impression that it cannot happen to them, said Raghu.

“We are so caught up with working and we don’t think about anything beyond that. Very few of us really think about upskilling, preparing for an alternative career.”

He took six months to find a new job, and spent that time getting certified in coaching – a move encouraged by NTUC’s career coaches.

NTUC is working to do more for PMEs, said Tay, adding that the scope for the unions to act on their behalf has widened over time.

While PMEs previously could be represented only individually on limited matters, amendments to the Industrial Relations Act in 2015 expanded this, allowing rank-and-file unions to represent them collectively as a class.

Now, only employees with a clear conflict of interest – such as those involved in hiring and firing decisions, or with access to confidential personnel and budget information – do not qualify for union representation during a retrenchment.

NTUC is pushing for stronger protections as PMEs grow more exposed to retrenchment as industries transform, said Tay.

These include arguing in Parliament for earlier retrenchment notices and for more of the involuntarily unemployed to benefit from the SkillsFuture Jobseekers’ Support Scheme, he said.

NTUC is also working with the Government and employers on the ongoing review of the Employment Act, and hopes that provisions in the Act can provide more for PMEs, he added.

“We’re trying to get more of the PMEs to be aware that they can be part of a union and that actually we can represent them.”

Labour economist Walter Theseira said making the labour market more rigid by mandating additional worker protections may harm Singapore’s competitiveness, but at the same time workers are currently “too exposed to the risks of retrenchment”.

The associate professor from the Singapore University of Social Sciences noted that benefits are not legally mandated and are subject to the solvency of a company and its willingness to pay.

“The presumption that PMEs can ‘self-insure’ places a burden on families to set aside substantial savings in case of retrenchment,” he said.

Unemployment benefits in the form of the Jobseekers’ Support Scheme are also currently too limited to lower-income workers, Theseira added.

Including higher-income workers with larger payout levels – possibly through a scheme jointly funded by workers and employers – could be useful, he said.

Another solution like retrenchment benefit insurance that companies are required to contribute to could also be useful to provide guaranteed benefits, he suggested.

It could be more efficient to have the retrenchment benefits system be organised with risk pooling than to expect each worker to do it themselves, with safeguards to ensure workers are encouraged to reskill and find suitable employment while receiving benefits, he added. THE STRAITS TIMES