Parliamentary speeches and more

MP Sylvia Lim welcomed the government’s step to legislate against workplace discrimination after years of delay. While noting the Bill’s broad scope and enforcement measures, she raised concerns about delays in implementation, misclassification of workers as contractors, and gaps in protecting "protected characteristics" during hiring.

MP He Ting Ru raised concerns about the exclusion of indirect discrimination, platform workers, and discrimination outside workplaces, urging comprehensive measures to tackle real-world biases and ensure fair treatment of persons with disabilities.

Highlighting a pivotal shift in addressing workplace discrimination, LO Pritam Singh raised concerns about evidence requirements, indirect discrimination, and small firm exclusions, proposing an accreditation scheme to support fair practices in smaller companies.

Highlighting persistent issues, MP Faisal Manap raised concerns about Muslim men facing challenges with Friday prayers and restrictions on hijabs for Muslim women, urging confirmation that such practices are deemed discriminatory under the Bill.

Louis Chua Calls for Stronger Protections in Workplace Fairness Bill. MP Louis Chua highlighted gaps in the Bill, advocating for protections for LGBTQ+ individuals, those with medical conditions or criminal history, and stronger safeguards against indirect discrimination and AI-driven hiring biases.

In his speech on the formation of a new Communicable Diseases Agency, MP Jamus Lim shared that the Workers’ Party supported the move, but stressed the importance of how the new agency should be broadly empowered to tackle emergencies, play a proactive role even in a non-crisis setting, and play a lead in ensuring interagency communication and coordination on matters related to infectious diseases.

MP Dennis Tan called on the government to assure the public that the removal of the mandatory minimum sentence and disqualification period for first time offenders for careless or reckless driving causing grievous hurt will not lead to a relaxation of the law or the enforcement efforts for these offences. While he believes that the court should be given wider discretion to decide on the punishments for these offences, he thinks that it is important for the courts to draw up clear guidelines so that drivers are punished appropriately according to what they have done.

In his speech on the Protection from Scams Bill, MP Jamus Lim shared his concerns about how police-directed restriction orders could be very intrusive and hoped that individuals may retain an option of either opting out of the scheme in advance, or designating trusted family members as administrators, instead. He also called for more action on the Shared Responsibility Framework to make the finance ecosystem more resilient to scams and fraud.

Highlighting the surge in scams and their devastating impact, MP Gerald Giam supported the Protection from Scams Bill while calling for real-time fraud detection, a centralised scam database, and greater accountability from financial institutions and digital platforms.

In his speech on the amendments to the Insolvency Act, MP Jamus Lim explained how the existing corporate insolvency process is already relatively efficient, and expressed his hope that legislative energy could be more focused on streamlining individual bankruptcy procedures.