THE MALAYSIAN Trades Union Congress (MTUC) has chided Home Minister Hamzah Zainuddin for proposing that employers hire illegal immigrants in detention centres to help Putrajaya reduce cost on their upkeep. 

MTUC secretary-general J. Solomon said that such a move is reckless and counter-productive to the efforts of the Human Resources Ministry (MOHR) to reduce foreign workers and provide jobs for unemployed Malaysians. 

In proposing to allow employers to hire illegal workers, the Home Ministry appears to be at odds with policies to reduce the growing number of migrant workers in Malaysia. 

“The government must not be seen as penny wise and pound foolish. The government policies must focus on discouraging millions of foreigners from entering the country illegally to work, therefore reducing the massive outflow of funds from our shores annually and prod employers into offering better terms to hire Malaysians,” Solomon said in a statement today.

He was responding to Hamzah’s statement yesterday saying that employers could be allowed to recruit illegal immigrants held at the Immigration detention centres.

Hamzah said the move would reduce the number of illegal migrants in detention and therefore help the government save money on their upkeep. 

Yesterday, Human Resources Minister M. Saravanan announced a freeze on the recruitment of foreign workers until the end of the year in a attempt to free up jobs for Malaysians and reduce unemployment in the country. 

Solomon said this is a positive move that will check Malaysia’s over-reliance on unskilled migrant labour.

“This calls for a comprehensive review on the need to improve salaries and benefits to encourage Malaysians to take over jobs traditionally filled by foreigners.”

He said the Home Ministry should not be in the business of offering employers illegal foreign labour merely to reduce costs. 

“In any case, the Home Ministry’s proposal is not practical or fair as any offer to legalise (illegal foreign labourers)  must cover all undocumented workers, not just a select few. 

“Every undocumented worker should have the right to be legalised. Otherwise we will be considered as discriminating between foreign workers and once again make international headlines for the wrong reasons.”

Solomon added that it is better for Putrajaya to focus on implementing the MOHR proposal to freeze the intake of foreign workers to address local unemployment and reduce the country’s dependence on migrant labour.  

“This policy by itself will not be effective if employers are allowed to hire foreigners who have been detained.

“Instead, attention should be centred on tighter enforcement to stop human trafficking rings to smuggle foreign workers into the country.”

He said that in freezing the recruitment of foreign workers until year-end, the MOHR must do more to compel employers to woo Malaysian workers by offering decent wages and benefits.  

“The government obviously has high hope that there will be a rush by locals to take over blue collar jobs from foreigners which would include unskilled positions in the construction, plantation and manufacturing sectors.  

“The government must not ignore the elephant in the room in wooing Malaysian workers to take up such jobs, until and unless MOHR is able to convince employers to improve wages and benefits for these positions.

“Any government campaign to encourage Malaysians to fill jobs traditionally held by migrants will not make much headway.”

He said that Malaysia has about six million migrant workers in Malaysia, more than half of which are undocumented. 

“They remain the employers’ first choice for hire unless there is government intervention to compel them to recruit local workers.”

Solomon also urged the government to look into the proposals of former finance minister Daim Zainuddin. 

“We strongly urge Perikatan Nasional to immediately conduct an unbiased and transparent study on Daim proposals to revamp the management of foreign workers that was submitted to the previous administration. 

“The proposals which detailed measures to improve policies involving foreign workers were never made public by the Pakatan Harapan government, nor did then Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad explain why they were not implemented.”

He said it is MTUC’s view that those proposals would have addressed several longstanding problems of foreign workers. 

This, he said, would also address the issues of undocumented migrants, the role of the middlemen and human traffickers, as well as the treatment of foreign workers by employers and the authorities.  – June 23, 2020.