Raising the retirement age will allow MHA to better meet its manpower needs and tap the experience of more mature officers, said Law and Home Affairs Minister K. Shanmugam.
The extended retirement age means that 14,000 uniformed officers who turn 56 on or after Jan 1, 2025, can continue working in their roles for another year. This applies to officers in the Central Narcotics Bureau, Singapore Civil Defence Force , Singapore Police Force and Singapore Prison Service. He noted that trust in the Home Team remains high. Citing a recent public perception survey, he said 93 per cent of Singaporeans had confidence in the Home Team’s ability to keep Singapore safe and secure.
He spoke about a case in 2019 where a former offender with drug-related offences in his 30s, who was serving the tail-end of his sentence in the community, called him one evening over frustrations at work.