The Ceylon Federation of Labour (CFL), slamming the government for using EPF money (in the stockmarket) to bail out business cronies, said this week that the 2011 budget hasn’t provided any relief to the people.
“As in previous years the wage earners particularly in the private sector have been left high and dry. The pittance that has been doled out as a special non-pensionable allowance to the public sector employees and the COLA payment is nowhere near to easing the burden of the cost of living,” it said in a statement.
Employees in the private sector languish due to the continued perpetuation of the minimum wage disparity between the private sector and the public sector. In order to pamper to the interests of employers the Government pursues a hands-off policy where private sector wages is concerned. The Government has also failed to bring relief to over 60,000 employees who lost their employment due to the global economic recession that set in 2008 and this, despite the urgings of the National Labour Advisory Council (NLAC) through a report to the Cabinet of Ministers submitted by the previous Minister of Labour Relations, it said.
“In a bid to cover up the grave injustice that is being perpetrated to private sector employees, the Government is dangling the carrot of a pension-scheme for private sector employees. The proposed pension scheme is going to be based entirely on the EPF monies with no contribution whatever from the state. This is going to serve as another captive fund in the possession of the government. Already EPF monies are increasingly being utilised to bail out government’s business cronies who have invested their money in failing stocks,” it said.
The Federation called on trade unions to be vigilant regarding security and safety of hard earned savings of workers and beat back any moves to gamble with the savings of workers in the stock-market. |
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