Remarks by Minister Ong Ye Kung on Salary Increases for Allied Health Professionals, Pharmacists & Admin, Ancillary & Support Staff

1.            Good morning. Happy New Year everyone. It is a tradition that the Minister for Health visits hospitals and our healthcare workers, as well as patients, on the first day of Chinese New Year. This year, I am at Singapore General Hospital and Outram Community Hospital.

2.            I am very thankful to all our healthcare workers for working round the clock – 365 days a year, 24 hours a day, including all festivities. Thank you very much for your dedication and commitment. As for our patients, I wish them a fast recovery. Many of them need some rehabilitation, so I wish them all the best, and a good year ahead.

3.            In the new year, people have all kinds of hope. They hope for health and happiness. Of course, they also hope for salary increases and big bonuses. Some of it will depend on the economic performance. But in the case of the healthcare sector, because of the rising demand for healthcare, an ageing population, as well as competition for manpower around the world, we have been upping and upgrading the salaries of our healthcare workers.

4.            So last year, we did a lot. We did for doctors and dentists. We also implemented the ANGEL scheme, which is a long-term incentive scheme for our nurses. Big numbers will be benefiting. We also provided support to the community care sector. They are privately run, mostly by VWOs, but we provided support for them, and by so doing, they can also raise the salaries of the community care workers.

5.            Of course, there is a big group that has been asking, “What about me?”. This is a diverse group, and there are mainly three categories. The first is the administrative, ancillary and support staff, the second are the pharmacists, and the third are the allied health professionals, such as physiotherapists, occupational therapists and dietitians. So all in, this is quite a big group. I want to assure them that we have certainly not forgotten them, and in fact, we are working on the salary increase for them this year.

6.            We have discussed with the Union. We hope to finalise some details, and sometime in the middle of the year, we hope to implement for them. All in all, there are 37,000 of them. A very diverse group, but they are a very important part of our system. But like all things, we need to work methodologically, step by step, group by group. I think this year is the year for these three groups, so I hope to have good news to announce to them in the coming months, around the middle of the year.