On November 26, 2014, the Ministry of Manpower ("MOM"), the Singapore National Employers Federation ("SNEF"), and the National Trades Union Congress ("NTUC") jointly released a set of guidelines on extending and expanding the scope of union representation for executives. The guidelines were introduced in the run-up to the amendment of the Industrial Relations Act, which is expected to be passed by the second quarter of 2015.
The Guidelines allow rank-and-file trade unions to represent executives as a group, whereas currently executives can only be represented as individuals and do not hold any rights to engage in collective bargaining. However, senior management and certain other categories of executives are still excluded from rights to collective representation.
The Guidelines also prescribe two broad benchmarks, which were deliberately kept flexible, for unions and firms to refer to when deciding which executives can be represented as a group by trade unions. These benchmarks are salary level and the ratio of executive/managerial employees to rank-and-file employees within the organization.
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