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Maternity benefits for SIA stewardesses the right thing to do but discrimination prevails
 It was reported recently that the “Singapore Girl” may finally get maternity benefits. The “Singapore Girl”, of course, is the Singapore Airlines female flight attendant. I will refer to her as the “SQ girl”.
At present, SQ girls have to quit flying after the first trimester of pregnancy. They receive no maternity benefits after they deliver their child, unless they can secure a ground job, which is not easy to do.
Change may be on the way, in response to union and staff feedback. SIA will pay SQ girls who get pregnant a one-time ex-gratia payment when the baby is delivered. This will be in lieu of the 16 weeks of paid maternity leave other working mothers get. But the SQ girls will still have to resign.
Having given birth, they can apply for a position, and after an interview, may be re-employed. I do not know under what conditions they might be re-employed, but I would not be surprised if regaining their slim figures is at the top of the list.
There was a time when I had little sympathy for SQ girls. They enjoyed a glamorous lifestyle and flew to exotic destinations other average Singaporeans of their age could only dream about. Their monthly income was above those of other young women with equivalent qualifications. Young girls looked up to them. And men certainly admired their looks, their ultra-feminine figure so well displayed in their fitting sarong kebaya and their polite (almost subservient) service.
The biggest grouse SQ girls have about their jobs is its relatively short shelf life. The stopwatch begins ticking when they join SIA. The vast majority get only to the level of air stewardess, which limits them to a maximum of three five year contracts. So they have to resign after 15 years.
SIA manages to not retain middle-aged SQ girls yet appear politically correct by not specifying an age at which they must retire. However, as most SQ girls join in their early 20s, most would have to leave the airline before they are 40.
Leading stewardesses are allowed four five-year contracts; chief stewardesses and inflight supervisors are allowed five five-year contracts. But the number of SQ girls who can attain these senior positions is very small indeed. Hence the vast majority of them retire at a relatively young age while their male counterparts can now continue up to the age of 57.
To add insult to injury, SQ girls have to always appear pretty and shapely. If they show signs of putting on weight, they are told to shed it. If they cannot lose the excess weight, their service is terminated.
I personally find it an affront to our SQ girls in particular and to women in general that so much of their public image depends on their presenting an ultra-feminine image – in effect, as subservient eye candy.
This is not just a facade. SQ girls have not only to look that way; they have to behave that way too. An important part of their training consists of learning how to do their hair, apply makeup, and carry and present themselves demurely.
I think SIA’s management must have decided that it is more important for our SQ girls to look attractive than to be efficient. After all, if looking less than slim can result in the sack, looks must precede competence in being employed as an SQ girl.
SIA management obviously must think their judgment is correct. After all, being judged internationally as the world’s top airline, not to mention the profits the airline makes, must mean they are doing most things right.
The young women who become SQ girls know they have to retire relatively young. Most of the SQ girls I have spoken to would like to go on working for a longer period. The current rules force them to retire at a time when they are trying to pay their housing loans and for the various education and enrichment programmes so many Singaporean parents want for their children. Because there are plenty of young women competing to be SQ girls, there is no incentive for SIA to retain those who are no longer young and attractive.
Male flight attendants can work up to the age of 57. It is obvious that female flight attendants are held to different standards compared to their male counterparts. Yet no one seems particularly perturbed.
Perhaps there are deep primal instincts regarding what is expected of women versus men, which I don’t share because I too am a woman. I hope that, at the very least, SIA management will indeed give SQ girls the 16 weeks ex-gratia payment when their babies arrive, whether it be the first, second or third baby.
I am more optimistic that SIA might be persuaded to allow their air stewards to work longer. Their retirement age of 55 has recently been extended to 57, if a review board approves. This may be extended again to 59, but only if the review board approves; a handful are extended to 60. The vast majority are retired at 57.
Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew has said that people should work as long as they can. Being able to work till 62 should be allowed for all SIA air stewards, without any need of approval by a review board.
Finally, although SQ girls are the public face of SIA, they are only a part of “Team SIA”. SIA would never have become the world’s top airline if it did not have an up-to-date fleet of aircraft, and if its employees – from the counter staff to the pilots to the CEO – were not able and efficient.
Just as the term “Team Singapore” should be used to apply not just to our athletes but also their coaches, physiotherapists, sports trainers and sports masseurs, so too the term “Team SIA”.
The same should apply to all Singaporeans, who together constitute a bigger “Team Singapore”. This should encompass everyone, from the President, the Prime Minister and his Cabinet to school teachers, nurses, factory workers and cleaners. We should all do our best in our own niches; and we should all do our best for the least among us. Only then can Singapore be not only a first world country but a first world country with a heart.
The writer is director of the National Neuroscience Institute.
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