Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Minimum wage policy: Traders want foreigner excluded | theSundaily

Minimum wage policy: Traders want foreigner excluded | theSundaily

PUTRAJAYA (Jan 29, 2013): About 200 traders and small business owners today marched to the Prime Minister's Office here to submit a memorandum calling for the exclusion of foreign workers in the minimum wage policy.
The group, which claimed they represented 57 business associations, however, stated their support for the minimum wage policy for local workers.
Associated Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry of Malaysia council member Tan Poh Seng said the inclusion of foreign workers in the policy is "a slap and a burden" to business owners, adding that it will cause unhappiness among local workers.
He said previously, the Malacca Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry had passed a memorandum to the government on the matter, but it was not given serious consideration.
"We are submitting the same memorandum again to politicians and the government.
"We want members of the parliament to do more research on this matter, which we feel was implemented in a hurry," he told reporters after handing over the memorandum to the National Wages Consultative Council secretary T. Shanmugam.
On Jan 21, it was reported that the cabinet will decide "in one or two weeks" if foreigners will enjoy the same minimum wage as Malaysian workers.
Human Resources Minister Datuk Seri Dr S. Subramaniam said Malaysia is bound by labour and international laws, which call for no discrimination based on nationality, religion, creed or race.
He said due to the implementation of the minimum wage policy, the cost of employing foreign labour has gone up, and this was being deliberated by the cabinet.
The minimum wage in the peninsula is RM900 while it is RM800 in Sabah and Sarawak.

No comments:

Post a Comment