Migrant worker groups renew calls to ban lorry transport after Orchard Road crash injures 13
Migrant worker groups renewed calls to ban transporting workers on lorries after an Orchard Road crash injured 13 people, including 12 foreign workers. The early-morning accident has revived long-standing concerns over the safety and dignity of lorry transport.
- Thirteen people, mostly migrant workers, were injured in an Orchard Road lorry crash on 28 January.
- Advocacy groups renewed calls to ban transporting workers on lorries, citing safety risks.
- The Transport Ministry said the impact of a ban is hard to quantify but safety reviews are ongoing.
SINGAPORE: Migrant worker advocacy groups have renewed calls for a ban on transporting workers on the back of lorries following a traffic accident in Orchard Road that left 13 people injured.
The incident occurred in the early hours of 28 January 2026 and involved a lorry carrying migrant workers and a car.
The accident has once again drawn attention to long-standing safety concerns over the continued use of open-deck lorries to ferry workers in Singapore.
The Singapore Civil Defence Force (SCDF) said it was alerted to the accident at about 6.20am at the junction of Orchard Road and Orchard Link.
Paramedics conveyed six people to Tan Tock Seng Hospital and seven others to Singapore General Hospital. Another five people were assessed at the scene for minor injuries but declined hospital treatment.
Police said they were alerted to the collision at about 6.15am. All 13 casualties taken to hospital were conscious.
They included a 64-year-old male car driver and 12 male passengers on the lorry, aged between 30 and 51. The lorry passengers were foreign workers.
Investigations into the accident are ongoing.
Advocacy groups urge immediate action
Following the incident, the Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics (HOME) reiterated its long-standing position that transporting migrant workers on the back of lorries is inherently unsafe and undermines their dignity.
In a social media post on 28 January, HOME said the Orchard Road accident highlighted the dangers of the practice and renewed its call for an outright ban.
The group urged the Government to act without further delay and pursue safer and more humane alternatives that prioritise workers’ lives and wellbeing.
Workers Make Possible also weighed in, arguing that existing measures such as speed limiters and safety modifications to lorries were insufficient.
The group said the issue should have been treated as an emergency many accidents ago and called for an end to what it described as incremental or partial solutions.
The group further argued that the state collects around S$6 billion annually in foreign worker levy, and that a portion of this could be used to subsidise smaller companies in arranging safer transport options.
Long-standing safety concerns
The Orchard Road crash has once again revived debate over the transportation of migrant workers on lorries, a practice that remains legal in Singapore despite years of public questioning.
Civil society groups have cited figures showing that between 2020 and 2024, an average of 161 workers were injured each year while being transported on lorries.
In 2023, more than 50 community organisations signed a joint statement opposing the continued use of lorries to ferry workers.
The groups argued that lorries are not designed to carry human passengers and expose workers to multiple risks, including severe injuries in traffic accidents, heat stress and heavy rain.
They highlighted that between 2011 and 2020, a total of 58 workers died and 4,765 were injured in lorry-related accidents.
The signatories called for safer alternatives such as shared buses, minibuses and goods-cum-passenger vehicles to replace open-deck lorries.
Transport Ministry cites economic and manpower challenges
The issue was raised in Parliament on 23 September 2025, when Sengkang Member of Parliament He Ting Ru asked whether the Ministry of Transport (MOT) had studied the impact of banning the transport of workers on the backs of lorries.
In a written reply, Acting Minister for Transport Jeffrey Siow said the ministry had conducted some studies but found it difficult to quantify the full economic impact of such a ban.
He explained that the effects would be both direct and indirect, with several factors proving hard to measure accurately.
One challenge cited was manpower. Shifting all workers to buses would require a significantly larger pool of drivers, a sector already facing shortages.
Siow noted that hiring and retaining drivers remained difficult even within the public bus industry, despite multiple wage adjustments.
He said the priority was to improve transport safety for workers, adding that the ministry would continue working with industry associations and tripartite partners to review and enhance safety standards.
According to Siow, government agencies have introduced measures such as mandatory canopies, higher side railings, lower speed limits and minimum space requirements for passengers on lorries.
However, advocacy groups have argued that these measures do not address the fundamental risks of transporting workers in open-deck vehicles.
