Speech by Minister Chee Hong Tat at the Singapore Contractors’ Association Limited (SCAL) Annual Dinner 2026

SCAL Council Members,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Introduction

A very good evening to everyone. I am happy to join you tonight as we celebrate SCAL’s achievements and its contributions to Singapore.

Before I continue my speech, I would like to touch on the haze situation. We may have to expect the situation to worsen before it becomes better, so I would like to urge everybody to keep well, stay safe, and keep our workers safe.

For almost nine decades, SCAL has been a strong advocate for our contractors. You have championed the industry’s interests, strengthened its capabilities and developed talent for the Built Environment or BE sector. You have also worked closely with the Government to highlight challenges on the ground and to work with us to jointly develop practical solutions. Through these efforts, SCAL and its members have played an important role in building Singapore – our homes, our workplaces, and the buildings and infrastructure that Singaporeans live, work, and play in every day.

Looking ahead, we have a strong pipeline of projects, from HDB BTO flats, MRT lines, to major undertakings such as Changi Airport Terminal 5 and Long Island. We must therefore work together to deliver this ambitious pipeline of projects well, even as our sector faces manpower and resource constraints.

We must find better ways to build, deploy our manpower more productively, and reduce unnecessary inefficiencies and red tape, while upholding our high standards of safety and quality.

Tonight, I would like to suggest three priorities for the BE sector: how we improve productivity together, how we can better organise and deliver our projects, and how we must continue to invest in our people to improve talent attraction and retention.

Improving BE Productivity

Let me begin with productivity. At the opening of the new SCAL Construction Hub earlier this year, I announced that we would set up the Action Team to Improve Built Environment Productivity.

Since then, we have had eight Action Team meetings and many more smaller-group engagements, where we heard valuable perspectives from SCAL and our industry partners on the challenges that firms face, and what are some of the areas that we can collectively do better.

Our work is still ongoing, but we have started translating industry feedback that we have received, into practical changes that can we hope can help our companies to save time, reduce cost, and make better use of manpower.

• For example, we are supporting firms to adopt robotics and automation through the Robot Leasing Support Scheme. I am also glad that SCAL is working with vendors to help contractors identify robotic solutions that can be deployed across different types of projects. I am sure when you go for your study trip in Shenzhen, Hong Kong later this year, you will be able to learn more about what are some of these practices. The Chinese are very advanced when it comes to robotics and automation.

• We have also simplified the approval processes for standardised designs and precast components. Instead of making a fresh submission for every project, firms can draw from a pre-approved catalogue. This can save consultants around 320 man-hours per project, reduce precast component manufacturing costs by at least 10%, and lower manpower needs by at least 20%.

• We have also introduced virtual TOP inspections, allowing agencies to conduct inspections remotely and concurrently. This can potentially reduce inspection manpower by up to 30% and enable projects to obtain TOP up to two months earlier.

These improvements did not come from the Government alone. They were shaped by ideas and inputs from all of you, from the industry, including SCAL and many of your members, based on your actual experiences on the ground.

• I would like to thank Mr Lee Kay Chai, SCAL, and our industry partners for working very closely with the Government through the Action Team. Your candid feedback has helped us to identify pain points, and more importantly, to develop practical ways to address these pain points and make things better for everyone. As I said, this is still work-in-progress, it is still ongoing. We still have a lot more that we want to do together.

Scaling up the adoption of Lean Construction

Next, there is more that we can do to organise and deliver our projects better. This is where Lean construction can make a real difference.

Lean construction is not about asking people to work faster. It is about planning and coordinating our work better, reducing unnecessary waiting and rework, and improving sequencing to improve efficiency. Done effectively, it enables project teams to make better use of their time and resources.

Gammon Singapore has shown what this can look like in practice.

• For one of its infrastructure projects, using Lean principles, Gammon brought its project teams, supply chain and subcontractors together to plan backwards from key milestones, coordinate work more closely, and identify potential roadblocks early.

• The teams also conducted regular “waste walks” to identify instances of unnecessary waiting, idle manpower and inefficient processes, and then worked together to address these gaps.

• Through these efforts, Gammon reduced weeks of delay across various project milestones and avoided costly rework. Gammon is convinced about the benefits of Lean and they have started implementing Lean practices across other project sites.

We want to help more contractors and subcontractors to achieve similar improvements. I am therefore pleased to announce the Lean Implementation and Field Transformation initiative, or LIFT [PDF, 225.74 KB (opens in new tab).

Conceptualised by BCA and the Skills and Workforce Development Agency, or SWDA, with support from SCAL, LIFT will provide firms with six months of dedicated workforce consultancy support from the Boston Consulting Group. Participating firms will be supported in applying Lean practices to solve real challenges on their projects.

• So this is not just classroom learning. Firms will receive dedicated coaching on live projects and work on actual processes – from how equipment is deployed and teams are coordinated, to how submissions and workflows can be streamlined.

• LIFT aims to help participating firms fundamentally improve how they plan, coordinate and deliver work, including strengthening collaboration between main contractors and subcontractors. Outcomes observed from past Lean Construction implementation runs conducted with local BE firms suggest that well-implemented Lean practices can improve productivity by as much as 30%.

• More importantly, this is not about solving one problem on one project. We want firms to develop better ways of working so that you can sustain and scale up across future projects.

• Firms can receive up to 70% funding support for job redesign-related costs through SWDA’s Workforce Development Grant, as well as up to 90% salary support for a three-month period through the Career Conversion Programme to support employee reskilling.

• I encourage everyone to find out more and register your interest for this initiative through Boston Consulting Group’s LIFT website.

Let us scale up solutions that work, so that we can build faster, better and more productively.

Upskilling Our People to Drive BE Sector Transformation

Finally, I want to talk about our people. We must continue to invest in our people.

While new technologies and construction methods can open up new possibilities, it is our people who ultimately turn them into results. We must therefore equip our workers with relevant skills and create opportunities for them to take on higher-value roles.

I am glad that firms such as DLE M&E Private Limited are already taking practical steps through job redesign, skills development and internal career progression.

• Two DLE employees, Mr Ng Jiun Yen and Mr Sng Yew Peng, started out as cost engineers. Through on-the-job learning and mentoring, they progressively built capabilities in project planning, site coordination and stakeholder management. Both of them have since progressed to become Project Managers. Congratulations and well done!

• Their experience shows what is possible when firms invest in our people. Employees can take on broader and higher-value responsibilities, while firms build a stronger pipeline of people who can be ready to assume larger roles in future.

• DLE has also automated some of its repetitive administrative work, so that its employees can spend more time on higher-value tasks. There is scope for this approach to be applied across more processes and job roles across the BE sector, when we apply new tools like automation and AI to improve the way we work.

This is an important part of productivity transformation. It is not simply about doing the same work with fewer people, but empowering existing workers to do more and achieve better outcomes. It is about redesigning jobs so that our workers can contribute more, take on better roles and build stronger careers. I hope more firms will similarly invest in your people and prepare them for the future.

And I want to assure all our industry friends and partners that you will not walk this journey alone. The Government will support you along the way. BCA Academy and SCAL Academy offer courses in areas such as advanced construction techniques, green building technologies and digital construction. Firms can also tap on SWDA’s support for job redesign, reskilling and career conversion.

Conclusion

When I announced the Action Team earlier this year, I said that our emphasis must be on the word “action”. We have made a good start, but there is more for us to do.

We will continue to work closely with the industry to identify practical problems that we need to tackle, develop workable solutions, and see how we can translate good ideas into action, so that we are able to help more companies to save time, to save costs and to save manpower.

SCAL has been a very important and valuable partner in this effort. I want to thank all of you for sharing your ideas and feedback with us, and more importantly, your willingness to work together with the Government and our agencies to see how we can move the industry forward as a team.

Thank you very much, and I wish everyone an enjoyable evening.