Parliamentary Reply by DPM Gan Kim Yong on Extended Childcare Leave and Caregiving Leave

FIFTEENTH PARLIAMENT OF SINGAPORE

WRITTEN REPLY 

TUESDAY, 14 OCTOBER 2025

Mr Patrick Tay Teck Guan:

To ask the Prime Minister and Minister for Finance whether the Ministry will consider (i) reviewing the Extended Childcare Leave (ECL) scheme to increase the number of leave days reimbursed by the Government and (ii) introducing a Paid Caregiving Leave scheme similar to the Government-paid Childcare Leave scheme, for caregivers of elderly parents and other family dependents.

Mr Gan Kim Yong (for the Prime Minister):

The Government provides a wide range of support for parents and caregivers to manage both caregiving and work responsibilities.

We have been progressively enhancing parental leave provisions to support working parents in managing their work and caregiving responsibilities, including recent enhancements to Government-Paid Paternity Leave and the introduction of the new Shared Parental Leave (SPL) scheme. We recognise that parents continue to require time-off from work to care for their children beyond the early years and will study how to better support them to do so, as part of our regular review of policies.

Apart from childcare, we also recognise that employees may have other caregiving needs such as care for elderly parents and other family dependents. Even without any legislated requirement, many progressive employers have stepped up to introduce caregiving-related leave provisions, as part of their strategy to attract and retain good workers.

In considering further enhancements to legislated leave provisions, we will need to strike a balance between the caregiving needs of employees and the business costs and manpower needs of employers. We also need to provide employers with some time to adjust to the new SPL scheme which took effect in April this year and will only be fully implemented from April next year.

Beyond leave provisions, working caregivers have highlighted that flexible work arrangements (FWAs) have been useful in helping them manage work and caregiving responsibilities. The Tripartite Guidelines on FWA Requests were therefore implemented in December 2024 to set norms and expectations on how employees should request for FWAs and use them responsibly, as well as how employers should consider and respond to such requests properly.

The Government will continue to assess the current leave provisions. The Government remains committed to supporting the needs of working caregivers and will continue to work with the tripartite partners to foster more family-friendly workplaces.