Some Singapore firms adopt wait-and-see approach to offering extra 2 weeks of paternity leave

SINGAPORE: Some companies in Singapore are hesitating on a blanket implementation of extra paternity leave, citing the need to balance the employee benefit with business considerations.

One suggested tailoring an arrangement to fit both workers and employers, while others told CNA they were waiting to see how the doubling of government-paid leave - from two weeks to four - pans out with other companies.

This additional leave, for fathers of Singaporean children born from the start of 2024, is still voluntary for employers. It will eventually become mandatory, though the government has not said when. 

Subject to mutual agreement between employer and employee, the four weeks of paternity leave can be taken in a continuous block within 16 weeks of the child's birth; a continuous block within 12 months of the birth; or staggered and split up into any combination within those 12 months.

When this was announced at Budget 2023, Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong noted then that more than half of fathers were taking paternity leave.

According to the Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF) and National Population and Talent Division (NPTD), 53 per cent of eligible fathers used government-paid paternity leave in 2021, an increase from around 25 per cent in 2013. 

For the 2021 birth cohort, of those that used the entitlement, around 78 per cent - or over 12,000 fathers - took the full two weeks, while the remainder only used a portion of their paternity leave.  

In response to CNA's queries, MSF and NPTD said the additional two weeks of paternity leave was introduced on a voluntary basis to ease the transition for employers.

Spokespersons said the authorities are aiming to make it mandatory "as soon as possible".

"WHOLE STAFF WIPED OUT"

Businesses pointed to lean manpower as a main challenge in giving extended paternity leave. 

Mr Ronald Soh, the managing director of Win-Pro Consultancy, said the extra leave combined with National Service obligations would result in men being away from work for a longer time.

His small-medium enterprise, which provides IT solutions, has 14 employees in Singapore. Of these, three to four - about a third of his workforce - could be eligible for paternity leave. 

Mr Soh thinks paternity leave could be customised to the needs of both employee and company, taking into account factors such as whether the family is already receiving help from grandparents, of if the mother returns to work after maternity leave.

Being a small company means that Mr Soh can also adopt more flexible arrangements and possibly give more than four weeks of paternity leave if necessary.   

But if the additional two weeks become compulsory, his company may need to hire more people to make up the shortfall, or rely on their Malaysian team, said Mr Soh. 

"Imagine when you have your maternity leave, your paternity leave, your normal medical leave and ... your annual leave ... then you will come to a point (where) your whole staff will be wiped out."

Another small firm said it would have to hire part-timers to make up for staff shortages.

Yacht charter company Wanderlust Adventures hires boat captains who are not so easily replaced when they go on paternity leave.

"When we get part-timers, we have to pay extra," said Mr Quek Wee Teck, its director. "We have our peak seasons, so during peak seasons even the part-timers will not be available. They might be driving other boats as well. So we might have to reject orders due to lack of manpower."

That said, Mr Quek remains open to granting additional paternity leave if distributed over a period of time. 

"We are in the service line. The captain has to be happy himself to make the guests happy, so that's why if we don't have paternity leave and are very (stressed) at home, they will not be able to function."

Faesol, a food technological company with around 20 employees, said it does not foresee extra paternity leave giving rise to manpower issues, due to the way it is structured. 

At least one person can take over when an employee goes on leave, said Mr Lim Ye Sen, co-founder and chief technology officer, adding that the company is waiting to see how longer paternity leave arrangements play out elsewhere in his industry.

"It must indeed become a cultural norm. It shouldn't be that when a person takes paternity leave, everything comes to a halt, and the entire world stops," said Mr Lim.

"There is also a responsibility on the part of company owners to structure certain aspects to ensure the sustainability of the business."

He noted that having more paternity leave could also help mothers be less tired - and in turn help mothers in companies work better. 

Some multinationals and larger employers, including banks, have committed to increasing their paternity leave entitlements. So has IHH Healthcare Singapore, a healthcare provider operating four hospitals here.

"We trust that a supportive leave policy can enhance employee satisfaction and help with attraction and retention in the long run, benefitting the company," said a spokesperson.

Twenty five per cent of its staff are male, and the paternity leave take-up rate in the past few years has been "modest", he added.

The National University of Singapore's Associate Professor Vincent Chua said a family-supportive culture will help companies in the long run, when word goes around that the business cares for parents. 

"There is a generational shift in tolerance for taskmasters; they are going out of fashion. It may have worked in the past, but the logic of 'profits-over-people' is out of sync with more recent cohorts," said Assoc Prof Chua, who is from the department of sociology and anthropology.

DADS WITH "NO REGRETS"

Fathers who had children in recent years told CNA that longer paternity leave would have helped them cope better with the stresses of having a newborn. 

For his first child born in 2020, venture capitalist Looi Qin En took two weeks of annual leave on top of the entitled two weeks of paternity leave.

"Paternity leave was very important as it was a chance for me to support my wife and newborn child through a critical period," the 30-year-old said. 

"As a first-time father, I decided to take a full month off to adjust to parenthood roles, and it was a decision I have no regrets on and highly recommend other parents to (take as much leave as possible)." 

Data analyst Jared Koh, a father to two young daughters, said spreading out an increased length of paternity leave would give dads time to accompany children on medical checkups - and give mothers some breathing space.

The 39-year-old said having four weeks of paternity leave in total also leaves some room for "self-care", especially for first-time parents feeling drained from new responsibilities. 

Agreeing, civil servant Chen Zhang Xiang, 34, said that if given four weeks of paternity leave, he would have staggered it.

"That way (my wife) gets more support when needed, I get to have breaks to catch up on sleep during the day as well, rather than going in work tired every day (after waking up at night to feed my child)," said Mr Chen, whose child was born in 2022.

All three fathers said they had supportive employers who prepared in advance for their absence. However, while on paternity leave, they still ended up working in their spare time.

"PARENTHOOD PENALTY"?

Calling paternity leave a fundamental right for all dads of newborns, NUS' Assoc Prof Chua said: "For fathers who are reluctant to take paternity leave for fear of repercussions, bosses and supervisors need to assure them that they will not be penalised."

Paternity leave entitlements for Singaporean fathers have already risen fairly rapidly in the past 10 years, said Dr Tan Poh Lin, a senior research fellow at the Institute of Policy Studies think-tank.

"At this point, the limiting factor appears to be take-up rates, rather than the maximum length of leave."

The reason why take-up rates are not higher may be due to gender differences in occupations and sectors, with men taking jobs that possibly pay better but are less conducive for families, said Dr Tan. "Fathers often feel the pressure to put in more hours at work after a child is born in order to provide financial security."

Apart from the workplace, experts told CNA that to help Singapore become more family-friendly and improve its flagging total fertility rate, shifts in gender ideology and parenting styles could help.

For Dr Tan, this means placing less weight on the rigid metrics of success and allowing more room for children to fail. 

Assoc Prof Chua, meanwhile, thinks it is critical to re-frame the discussion around total fertility rate, which is the average number of live-births each woman would have during her reproductive years.

As fathers become more involved, the so-called "motherhood penalty" might shift to a “parenthood penalty”, he said, referring to a drop in earnings due to taking care of a child and spending fewer hours at work.

"At this point, total fertility rate becomes less and less an issue of gender per se, and more and more an issue of our relationship with capitalism. 

"It is a good time to interrogate our relationship with work, and to ask ourselves - as a society - have we valued economic survival over national survival?"