Will GRIP money be returned?

> Employers seek answers to status of leftover workers’ training funds

PETALING JAYA: With the 1Malaysia Globally Recognised Industry and Professional Certification (1MalaysiaGRIP) no longer being offered, it is still unknown if employers’ contribution will be re-credited into their individual accounts.

“Thus far, there is no information on whether the unutilised funds will be recredited to the individual employers’ accounts,” said Malaysian Employers Federation (MEF) executive director Datuk Shamsuddin Bardan on the closure of the training and upskilling programme offered by the Human Resources Development Fund (HRDF).

“When 1MalaysiaGRIP was first launched, MEF was informed by HRDF that the unutilised funds will be re-credited to employers’ accounts,” he added.

However, he said employers are yet to hear from HRDF on the matter.

According to theSun’s report yesterday, HRDF had received a directive from the government to phase out the programme by Oct 1.

It was also reported that employers saw red over the programme as they were not getting value for their money, as 30% of their contributions, collected through levy payments, were used to cover the training cost of employees of non-HRDF registered companies.

As of December 2015, HRDF announced through a circular that it had collected a total of RM86.3 million through levy collections, of which only RM15.2 million was used for 1MalaysiaGRIP.

The circular dated Dec 22 also stated that the remaining RM 71.1 million would be pooled into a consolidated fund.

Shamsuddin urged HRDF to open its books and be more transparent by detailing what the leftover funds and the matching government grant will be utilised for. He also stated that the report should be audited and made public.