Written Reply to Parliamentary Question on Preparing Firefighters for Post-Retirement Career Switches by Mr Teo Chee Hean, Deputy Prime Minister, Coordinating Minister for National Security and Minister for Home Affairs

Question:

Mr K Karthikeyan: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Home Affairs whether firefighters are trained for different jobs before their early retirement to enable them to make career switches.

Answer:

1. Since 2012, SCDF has collaborated with the Singapore Workforce Development Agency (WDA) to accredit the modules of SCDF's fire-fighting training programmes with the national-level Workforce Skills Qualifications (WSQ) framework.  This ensures that the competencies acquired by officers during their continual training in SCDF will be recognised by private sector employers from various industry sectors and improves our officers' employability when they retire from or leave SCDF.

2. In addition, SCDF also runs training courses for retiring officers covering areas such as resume writing and job interview skills, which will prepare them to seek second careers beyond the Force.