Workplace Fairness Bill passed in Parliament to protect employees from discrimination

23 January 2025

On 8 January 2025, the Workplace Fairness Bill (“Bill”) was passed in Parliament. This Bill will cover the substantive rights and obligations under the workplace fairness legislation (“WFL”). The Bill is the first of two Bills. The second Bill will pertain more specifically to how private employment claims can be made for workplace discrimination (“Second Bill”). 

If both Bills are passed, the Government intends to implement the WFL sometime in 2026 or 2027. The Bill has been introduced early to give employers more time to prepare themselves for the new WFL. It will also allow the Government some time to work through the details of the Second Bill, which are complex and novel, on how such private employment discrimination claims are adjudicated. 

The Bill was introduced on 12 November 2024 following the Government’s acceptance of the final set of recommendations by the Tripartite Committee on Workplace Fairness on the WFL. The Bill will complement the Tripartite Guidelines on Fair Employment Practices (“TGEFP”) to ensure no worker is left unprotected from workplace discrimination. The TGFEP will be updated in tandem with the implementation of the WFL to ensure alignment. 

In his speech at the second reading of the Bill, Minister for Manpower, Dr Tan See Leng, explained how the Bill will: 

  • strengthen protections for jobseekers and employees against discrimination, while retaining flexibility for employers; 
  • provide grievance handling processes to promote better communication and amicable resolution of issues; and 
  • complement Singapore’s education-first approach with calibrated levers to deal with the small number of bad employers who persist in egregious discrimination.

Set out below is a summary of the main points raised in the Minister’s second reading speech. 

Key worker protections and employer flexibilities 

Types of protections 

The Bill prohibits employers from choosing not to hire someone, giving them a poor performance appraisal, denying a promotion or training opportunity, or dismissing them because the jobseeker or employee has a protected characteristic. The Bill will also prohibit company policies or job advertisements that discriminate on the ground of a protected characteristic. 

Protected characteristics 

The Bill provides that “protected characteristics” are age, nationality, sex, marital status, pregnancy, caregiving responsibilities, race, religion, language ability, disability, and mental health condition.

  • Age: The Bill protects against age discrimination because all workers deserve to be assessed based on how well they do their job rather than their age. 
  • Nationality: The Bill provides that the protected characteristic of nationality refers to an individual’s citizenship of any country or an individual’s status as a resident of any country (including the status as a permanent resident of Singapore). To counter discriminatory practices such as biased employment preferences for specific nationalities and to ensure that locals are treated fairly, the Bill provides for an exception that allows discrimination in favour of Singapore citizens and Singapore permanent residents. This means employers will be given the operational flexibility, based on genuine business needs, to strengthen their local workforce core, to build stronger local networks and greater resilience to disruptions like the recent pandemic, and hence achieve stronger business outcomes.

Separately, the Bill will codify into law the existing Fair Consideration Framework job advertisement requirements and the duty to fairly consider candidates. This will provide the Government with a greater range of enforcement levers calibrated to the severity of the breaches, and further deter discriminatory employers. 

  • Sex, marital status, pregnancy, and caregiving responsibilities: Based on earlier feedback, including from the Conversations on Singapore Women’s Development, these areas are important to ensure fair, merit-based treatment for men and women alike, and to support national marriage and parenthood objectives. Hence, the Bill protects against discrimination on the basis of sex, which under clause 10 of the Bill refers to the sex that is legally assigned to the individual either at birth or post re-assignment. 

The protection for caregivers is in line with the Government’s efforts to build a family-friendly environment in support of both fathers and mothers, in their marriage and parenthood journey, especially to signal the important role fathers play as an equal partner to care for their children. It will also support the greater care needs of the ageing population. 

  • Race, religion, and language: Although racial and religious harmony is part of Singapore’s longstanding societal values, some members of the minority races still face racial discrimination at the workplace. This Bill protects against such discriminatory biases. For instance, employers cannot assume that a person of another race does not know Malay or Mandarin. This will send a strong statement that racial and religious discrimination are not acceptable in Singapore. 

Relatedly, the Bill will provide religious groups with some flexibility to make employment decisions for roles that are religious in nature such as imams and priests, and roles related to the running of religious institutions, while preserving common space for secular jobs. 

  • Disability and mental health conditions: The Bill complements the Government’s Enabling Masterplan 2030 by prohibiting discrimination against disabilities. There will also be an exception under the Bill to facilitate greater employment opportunities for this group by allowing employers to favour persons with disabilities in their hiring decisions.  

Following feedback on the importance of employers making accommodations for persons with disabilities to participate in the workforce, the Government is working on a Tripartite Advisory for Reasonable Accommodations to raise awareness and provide practical guidance to employers. 

The Bill defines the protected characteristic of mental health condition, which, in relation to an individual, means the fact that the individual has been diagnosed with any mental disorder by a medical practitioner registered under the Medical Registration Act 1997. 

Meeting business needs 

The Bill provides for ways that employers can legitimately consider protected characteristics when making employment decisions. Some examples include:

  • For the reasonable performance of the job;
  • For health and safety reasons, to protect employees and the people around them;
  • For privacy reasons; and
  • For legal and regulatory reasons.

Channels to resolve disputes amicably 

The Bill will require employers to put in place grievance handling processes and provide stronger protection from retaliation for employees who step forward. 

Grievance handling 

The Bill requires firms to inquire into the grievance they have received, review it, and inform the employee of the result. Throughout the process, the employer must also protect the employee’s confidentiality to the extent possible. The Bill focuses on ensuring that employers have a grievance handling process in place, and refrain from being overly prescriptive on the detailed requirements. 

For firms that do not already have such processes in place, the Tripartite Alliance for Fair and Progressive Employment Practices (“TAFEP”) has prepared accessible and practical resources and templates. TAFEP is also working on new e-learning courseware to guide employers on implementing a grievance handling process. 

Protections against retaliation 

The Bill will prohibit employers from retaliating against those that file complaints and claims. 

Beyond these formal legal protections, the Ministry of Manpower (“MOM”) and TAFEP will continue their longer-term educational efforts so that employers and employees see the value of keeping communications and attitudes open. 

Workplace harassment 

Beyond grievance handling and retaliation, the Government has also received suggestions on including workplace harassment issues in the WFL. Singapore has a multi-pronged approach to address harassment issues, including in the workplace. There are criminal offences under the Protection from Harassment Act 2019 and the Penal Code 1871. There is also a Tripartite Advisory on Managing Workplace Harassment. The grievance handling processes required under this Bill can also be used by victims of workplace harassment, to surface their cases to employers for resolution. Beyond this, the tripartite partners have agreed to develop a Tripartite Standard to complement the existing Tripartite Advisory, that will guide and encourage employers to adopt best practices in this area. 

Mediation-centred approach and employment claims 

Generally, for cases that cannot be resolved through the firms’ grievance handling process, parties should go through mediation before a workplace discrimination claim proceeds. 

Currently, the Employment Claims Tribunals (“ECT”) already hears employment claims, such as for wrongful dismissals. It adopts a judge-led approach focused on resolving the dispute quickly, privately, and amicably. The Government is studying how the ECT can be empowered to hear workplace discrimination claims with the same principles as far as possible, while deterring frivolous and vexatious claims against employers with appropriate safeguards. 

When the Second Bill is introduced, an employee will have the option to make a private employment claim in a situation where an employer and an employee are unable to settle their differences within the firm. 

Education and enforcement approach 

The Government will educate on what is discrimination, what is not discrimination such as when language proficiency is a business requirement, and what to do where there is discrimination. On the education and capability building front, TAFEP is working closely with partners like the Singapore National Employers Federation, the Institute for Human Resource Professionals, Singapore Human Resources Institute, and the Association of Small and Medium Enterprises. TAFEP has set up a one-stop resource webpage for employers, employees, and human resource (“HR”) professionals. There will also be briefings, clinics, and webinars. Finally, there will be training resources which companies and HR may incorporate into their own in-house corporate training. 

In line with the Government’s educational approach, the Government will provide time for employers to prepare themselves for the new legislation. Under the Bill, firms with fewer than 25 employees will be given more time to build up their capabilities before the WFL requirements apply to them. This will be reviewed in five years’ time after the law is implemented. In the meantime, the TGFEP will continue to apply to these small firms. 

For the small number of errant employers that blatantly flout the rules, the Bill empowers the Government to take enforcement action based on the severity of the breach. To clarify, these are enforcement actions that the Government can take, which are in addition to the private claims that employees can make. 

Employers should take early and proactive steps to review their employment practices and educate their employees. This will help to ensure compliance when the WFL is implemented in 2026/2027. 

Reference materials 

The following materials are available on the MOM website www.mom.gov.sg and Singapore Statutes Online sso.agc.gov.sg: