In Singapore, the birth rate has been declining over the past decade, with the total fertility rate of the resident population falling from 1.19 children per woman in 2013 to a historic low of 0.97 in 2023.

The improvements to parental leave, announced at the 2024 National Day rally on August 18, are the latest in a series of measures the government has taken in recent years to stem the declining birth rate.

They build on the measures to support marriage and parenthood included in the 2023 and 2024 budgets.

This has been done so far:

Financial support

• Married couples with Singaporean babies born on or after February 14, 2023 will receive $3,000 more in the form of the Baby Bonus Cash Gift. This means that eligible first and second borns will now receive $11,000, up from $8,000. For the third child and above, this amount will increase from $10,000 to $13,000.
• The Child Development Account (CDA) First Step Grant, which allows parents to directly offset preschool and health care costs, has been increased from $3,000 to $5,000 for all children born on or after February 14, 2023.
• The CDA cap will be raised by $1,000 for a couple’s first and second children. With the change, the savings parents put into the account will now be matched dollar for dollar by the government, up to a cap of $4,000 for the first child and $7,000 for the second child.

Harmony between work and private life

• From 1 January 2024, state-paid paternity leave on a voluntary basis will be doubled from two to four weeks and unpaid infant care leave in the first two years of the child’s life will be increased from six to twelve days per parent per year.
• (NEW) Two of the four weeks of paternity leave that fathers are entitled to will no longer be voluntary. From April 1, 2025, these additional two weeks of state-paid paternity leave will become mandatory. This means that employers cannot refuse such leave requests without good reason, as long as fathers meet certain conditions, such as having been employed for at least three months continuously before the birth of their child.
• (NEW) From 1 April 2025, parental leave will be increased in two phases from 20 weeks of paid leave to 30 weeks for couples. The 10 additional weeks are the result of a revision of the shared parental leave system, which will no longer count towards the 16 weeks of maternity leave granted to mothers.
• In April 2024, tripartite guidelines for requests for flexible working arrangements were introduced, which will come into force from December 2024.