[Parliament]Forward Party recommends increasing the 11-day public holiday to 14 days and legislate to achieve “offline right”

In order to create a family-friendly environment, the Forward Party recommends increasing the 11-day public holiday to 14 days and legislating to realize the “offline right” so that Chinese people have the right not to reply to work-related text messages and emails outside of vacation or normal working hours.

When non-constituency MP and Secretary-General of the Forward Party Pan Qunqin was debating the government's fiscal policy for the new fiscal year in Congress on Wednesday (February 26), he pointed out through a bilingual Chinese-English speech that my country needs more structural changes to create a family-friendly environment so that Chinese people can better balance their lives and work.

The Forward Party proposes to increase the 11-day public holiday to 14 days. Pan Qunqin said that as early as 1968, in order to enhance Singapore's competitiveness, the government reduced the 16-day public holiday to 11 days, and has maintained it since then.

She said Singaporeans have been working hard since then and the country has flourished, but now we are facing new problems such as lack of life-work balance and excessive work, which is not conducive to family life.

The Forward Party proposed to add three days to the public holidays, and suggested that the three major races add one more day each, considering listing the Lunar New Year's Eve, the following day of Eid and the Dabaosen Festival as public holidays.

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Even if it increases to 14 days of public holidays, she said, it still meets regional and global public holiday standards.

Regarding the “offline right,” Pan Qunqin said: “Singapore employees have long working hours compared to other parts of the world, but this does not include the time to reply to work-related text messages and emails at home, which prevents employees from spending good time with their families.”

The Forward Party recommends that the “offline right” legislation can be implemented from employees who are receiving paid leave, and ultimately expanded to “offline right” from 7 pm to 7 AM or outside of employees' normal working hours, which will allow employers and employees to gradually adapt to the new workplace norms.