Govt working on improved MoU on hiring foreign workers

KUALA LUMPUR: The government is working out an improved and standardised memorandum of understanding (MoU) on employing foreign workers by making the recent MoU signed with Nepal as among the guidelines.

Human Resource Minister, M. Kula Segaran said the MoU with Nepal signed on Oct 29, conformed with the International Labour Organisation, which among others, was aimed at curbing human trafficking and exploitation of workers.

He said this was paramount to the government to prevent Malaysian from sliding further down in the US State Department’s Trafficking in Persons (TIP) report after the country was once again downgraded to the Tier 2 watch list this year, the same position it held in 2015 and 2016.

“This means, if we just go one more (tier) down, we will face sanctions by all major countries in the world, including these countries not allowed to invest here. That is a bigger looming danger than anything else,” he told a press conference after opening the 25th Asean Labour Ministers’ Meeting, here, yesterday.

According to media reports, under the new MoU signed with the Nepalese government, employers would now bear the recruitment service charge, two-way airfare, visa fee, health check-up, security screening and levy charges, among others, compared to previously which was by the employees.

It was also reported that based on the MoU, Malaysian firms would pay the salary of workers through the banking channel and would have to deposit the salary on the seventh day of the month, while the employing firms would also have to bear all expenses related to accommodation, health check-up and security, among others, during the contract period.

Kula Segaran noted that for now, several MoUs, among these, with Bangladesh, Indonesia and Vietnam were expiring.

“Thus, we are entering a new phase (with the agreements) to be signed with the laboursource countries. Hopefully, we can sign the agreements with Bangladesh, Vietnam and Indonesia with which we have held discussions.

“Our country is now in the negotiation phase with the Philippines and we have also outlined our targets,” he said.

Earlier, Kula Segaran had a short bilateral meeting with Japan’s Deputy Labour Minister, Akira Miyakawa after which the former said both had discussed collaboration between the two countries, particularly in technical and vocational training.

He said he planned to visit Japan soon on the invitation of the Japanese government to further discuss, among others, about bringing Japanese trainers here. - Bernama