Introduction
Mr Deputy Speaker, Sir, no woman enters into marriage expecting it to one day end in divorce. While divorce is never easy, it can be especially challenging for women who often find themselves struggling to manage their livelihoods while ensuring the wellbeing of their charges, especially children in their custody or part custody.
When women, especially mothers, go through a divorce, they are often left to manage the household and take care of the children on their own. They need financial stability and independence to rebuild their lives after a divorce. However, for many women, this is easier said than done, especially if their spouses were the sole-breadwinners in their households.
Supporting Women through Better Enforcement of Maintenance Orders
According to the Ministry of Manpower's Labour Force Survey in 2022, there are approximately a quarter of a million women of economic age who are not participating in the workforce due to caregiving responsibilities. These women are often sandwiched, caring for their young children, elderly parents and households, and they find it challenging to balance their caregiving responsibilities with the need to provide for their families financially. The situation becomes even
more complicated for women who are going through a divorce. The circumstances in which these women’s lives have not changed, the young are still young, the elderly, elderly, and the infirmed, infirmed. The only thing that has changed is the added complexity of livelihoods and financial stability, that our women now have to take care of. It could be a classic case of out of the pan into the fire for many women caught in these double binds.
In my work in the constituency and in NTUC’s Women & Family Unit, I often meet women in such double binds, seeking help and support, sometimes with their young children, often in tears and at a loss of what to do, with no jobs, no CPF, and no savings. Many a times, their ex-husbands have gone missing, and with that too, all hope and promise of any maintenance orders due to these women through their divorce settlements. I sometimes also meet women, who hide their shame of being stuck in an abusive marriage, unable to move on, as they are financially unable to care for themselves and their children, and are afraid if they do indeed get divorced, that their ex-husbands will not fulfil their maintenance orders.
I met Emily – not her real name – many times over the past 2 years. Initially, Emily’s issues pertained to financial assistance she needed for her 4 children, the oldest who is just 14 years old when I met them. As we got to know each other better over the months, Emily shared that she had a rocky and high-tension marriage with her husband and thought long and seriously about leaving the marriage. However, she continued being a dutiful wife, taking care of the household, their 4 children, and her in-laws who were both staying with her. She has a part time job, earning less than $2000, and this is barely enough to cover for her household of eight. Earlier this year, Emily reached out once again, distraught that her husband had gone MIA, and his last known location was in Malaysia. He had abandoned the family, leaving her to take care of the family, the flat mortgage, and even his business debts. Emily is seeking for a divorce, but is worried that her husband would not pay maintenance, and should the divorce be granted, that she would be forced to sell her marital home, leaving her and her family with no roof over their heads.
Sadly, Emily’s case, or variations of her case, are not unique, and I support the changes of better enforcement of Maintenance Orders, and I call on the government, in the execution of the enforcement, a cost-efficient, and simplified process.
Greater Support for Balanced Lives and Livelihoods
I am pleased to note from Minister Shanmugam that the enforcement process is now online and a new enforcement process.
Mr Deputy Speaker, I believe that it is our duty as lawmakers to ensure that women who are going through a divorce have access to the support and resources they need to manage their caregiving responsibilities and become financially independent. We must work towards creating a family justice system that is not just fair but enabling for all.
The NTUC’s Women and Family Unit is committed to supporting women, including single mothers and divorcees, to return to work. We believe that empowering and enabling women to be financially independent is a very important part of the support network needed, especially after a divorce. Indeed, we had launched with our unionised companies, many creative programs that supports our women in transition, the most recent being the CUBack @Work – or CUB Programme. This combines a 6-weeks paid flexible training programme with a transition into a flexible work arrangement with good salaries and clear career pathways. It is essential that as a community, we create the right conditions for women to transit into the workforce smoothly, and to help to retain them in the workforce, by recognising the need to balance livelihoods with caregiving responsibilities.
I would like to ask Minister of State Sun Xueling, what programmes Ministry of Social and Family Development has looked into to assist our women to rejoin the workforce in the Maintenance Enforcement Officer (MEO) process and if the Labour Movement can be key partner to these programmes.
Conclusion
In the larger context of Family Justice, I call upon our Singaporean community – social and business – to come together to enable our sisters to be financially independent, above and beyond the protections of the improvements to this Reform Bill. Companies must redesign their jobs such that Flexible Work Arrangements become a business and social norm. The Family Courts can consider, in addition, to specifying clinical and therapeutic intervention sessions, also to job and upskilling workshops to ensure that women have access to the resources and the support they need to rebuild their lives. We must equip our women with means to long term financial stability, a peace of mind in managing their caregiving responsibilities, and the choice to return to the workforce. I support the Bill.
