KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 4 — The government has withdrawn the Employment Insurance System (EIS) Bill for further consultation.
Second Finance Minister Datuk Seri Johari Abdul Ghani confirmed to Malaysiakini that the Bill will now be advanced only in the next parliamentary sitting.
“The government still wants to implement it, but we want to make sure all the stakeholders understand the scheme,” he was quoted as saying by the news portal.
Employers have expressed misgivings over the proposed law that would provide a safety net for retrenched and unemployed workers, citing the added cost as well as apparent redundancies.
The EIS Bill, which allows retrenched workers to claim a portion of their insured salary for between three and six months of unemployment as well as allowances, was tabled for the first reading in the Dewan Rakyat this week
Contributions to the Employment Insurance Fund, which will be based on the worker’s salary, are split equally between the employee and the employer. The contributions based on fixed rates range from 20 sen for workers earning RM30 monthly to RM59.30 for employees earning RM4,000 and above a month.
