PSM’s Sungai Siput MP Dr Michael Jeyakumar Devaraj said the government did not relay the development of the bill properly to the stakeholders resulting in some of them questioning various points in the bill.
“One of the major points was the amount of contribution to be made under the scheme. Back in 2015 when the Malaysian Trades Union Congress (MTUC) held a tripartite-meeting together with Malaysian Employers Federation (MEF) and the human resource ministry, the amount agreed was 0.25% of the total employees’ wage.
“And now we only got to know in the first reading that the amount has increased to 0.5%. None of the stakeholders were updated by the government. Of course, they will be shocked, as were we,” he said at the PSM headquarters here today.
Jeyakumar said the proposed EIS Bill will have deficiencies but most importantly it should be passed first to then allow the stakeholders to improve on the Bill.
He questioned the government over the delay in the second reading of the proposed EIS Bill saying it is only going to burden some 80,000 working people who are expected to be retrenched over the next four years.
“There were 38,000 workers who lost their jobs back in 2015 and the number increased to more than 40,000 last year. MEF even predicted there will be some 50,000 job losses this year.
“We urge the government to allow the second reading of the EIS Bill in the next Parliament sitting this October so it can be implemented in 2018 and for us to improve the Bill for the benefit of Malaysian workers,” Jeyakumar said.
The EIS Bill, which was first tabled in parliament last week by Human Resource Minister Richard Riot, will see the creation of an insurance scheme for laid-off workers while increasing their re-employability following their job loss.
However, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department Wee Ka Siong said the EIS Bill has been put on hold to allow for more engagement with the stakeholders.
He said the cabinet had decided that there should be an “in-depth analysis” of the content of the bill with employers and employees.
“If you want to have more of these analyses that would take years. By then thousands of Malaysians would be unfortunate not getting anything when their companies closed down or they have been retrenched,” Jeyakumar said.
He also did not dismiss the possibility of the cabinet being influenced by external factors leading to the delay of the second reading of the EIS Bill.
PSM has been pushing for the workers’ retrenchment insurance bill for years, saying it would help employees get compensation if their companies go bankrupt.
However, employers have since expressed misgivings over the proposed law saying it will increase their operational cost.
The system, which is to be managed by the national social security organisation (Socso), covers monthly wages of up to RM4,000, with both the employers’ and employees’ contributions ranging from 10 sen to RM29.65 a month.
According to the bill, any employee meeting the conditions of termination which allows for the insurance to be activated, must submit an application within 60 days from the day the employee lost his/her job.
A job search allowance can be paid to the insured person but on the condition that the person shall not be under any employment during the job search period.