By Zakir Hussain

In July, union leader Chua Cher Meng, 50, had to undergo a knee operation after a fall. But she delayed surgery by a week - against doctor's orders - just so that she could attend the first module of an industrial relations course.

Her determination paid off, and yesterday, the Healthcare Services Employees' Union branch assistant secretary graduated with an Advanced Certificate in Industrial Relations from the Ong Teng Cheong Labour Leadership Institute.

Institute chairman Tharman Shanmugaratnam paid tribute to her grit, saying: 'I am not advising anyone to do this, but it shows her determination to finish what she had set out to do.'

He was addressing 118 graduates of the institute's courses at their graduation ceremony at the NTUC Centre.

The institute, an arm of the NTUC, started life in 1990 as the Singapore Institute of Labour Studies to train leaders for the labour movement.

It was renamed the Ong Teng Cheong Institute of Labour Studies in 2002 in memory of the former labour chief who became Singapore's fifth president. It got its present name in July this year after merging with NTUC's leadership development department.

Mr Tharman, who is also Finance Minister, lauded the institute for helping to strengthen the trust between workers, employers and the Government during the global economic crisis by sharing knowledge on behaving responsibly.

Also elaborating on the value of the close three-way partnership was Law and Second Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam, who was guest of honour at the event.

He identified three key lessons from the way the tripartite partners had responded to the downturn:

• One: It is important to build up national reserves and manage them in a disciplined and prudent way.

   

  Sound reserves enabled the Government to introduce the decisive $20.5 billion Resilience Package that included the Jobs Credit wage subsidy for local workers and hefty subsidies for skills upgrading, he noted.

   

• Two: The strong tripartite partnership should be enhanced.

   

  He felt that without mutual trust between parties, the stimulus package would not have been as effective. 'Because unions were able to rally their members to accept a shorter work week, pay cuts and go for skills upgrading, and employers responded by holding on to their work force, we succeeded in minimising job losses,' he said.

  Singapore did not take this partnership for granted, but put in great effort to nurture it, he stressed.

  'Often, we read internationally that unions do not fight for workers' rights in Singapore, but this proceeds from a misunderstanding. To fight for workers' rights, you need empowered unionists who attend courses like these,' he said, referring to the graduates at the ceremony.

   

• Three: Singapore had to continue to anticipate and respond to changing circumstances, just as the labour movement had in redesigning jobs to raise wages and setting up employment institute e2i to help laid-off workers pick up new skills.

   

  Mr Shanmugam added that union leaders will find their roles more challenging as work gets more complex and workers more demanding.

  'It is therefore all the more critical for unions to continue to invest in developing leaders who understand the fundamental principles of Singapore's tripartite system and the labour movement's priorities,' he said.

  Mr G. Rajendran, president of the Chemical Industries Employees' Union who graduated with a Diploma in Employment Relations, agreed with this view.

  During the crisis, some 500 members of his 15,000-strong union lost their jobs and he soon found himself briefing fellow unionists about what he learnt in class on negotiating compensation and helping affected workers train for new jobs.

  'I'm just glad that almost all of them have gone for training and many have landed jobs,' said the 49-year-old.

  This article was first published in The Straits Times.