LETTER | The recent statement by the Human Resouce Minister M Kulasegaran about re-activating the productivity-linked wage system (PLWS) to bring back Malaysians workers abroad is something that misses the point of labour skills.

Kulasegaran, having failed in the implementation of the minimum wage and having made a series of U-turns on other labour matters, seems to give the impression that he does not know what he is talking about.

The productivity question in Malaysia was the magic wand used by employers for years to deny decent and acceptable wages for workers in the private sector.

Even today, employers are not willing to advance this argument simply because productivity has increased among workers, and what is more, the raking of huge profits by employers is a tell-tale sign that productivity is no longer an issue among employers and workers.

Minimum wage in the country is used merely to address the grievances of labour in an environment where trade union rights and collective bargaining have been severely restricted by the state through laws and other measures.

Thousands of Malaysian workers have left the shores of the country not because they are not productive or have low skills but because of discrimination and low wages.

So I don’t understand how the PLWS is going to provide incentives to workers to come back to the country. What is needed in the so-called New Malaysia is the presence of a non-discriminatory environment where skills are duly recognised and monetarily rewarded.

I don’t see how the PLWS is going to bring back workers on the basis of productivity. Perhaps Kulasegaran could take some time to study the labour system in the country before shooting off his mouth on archaic and outmoded ideas and concepts that do not have a real meaning.

For him to justify the deplorable increase of the minimum wage tells us much about him and his ministry in not providing the necessary material and confidence to workers in the private sector.

He can’t just turn around and say that the government has no money to pay when the minimum wage does not entail the payment to employees in the public sector.

Kulasegaran should be an effective minister of human resources with an independent and open mind. He should not blindly read the speeches prepared by those civil servants who are still sticking to the old and archaic ways of doing things.

He has been in office more than one hundred days, I have yet to come across his articulation on policy matters, the removal of anti-labour legislation, the provision of balanced employment and ethnically balanced intake into government-owned skill centres and so on.

The writer is Penang deputy chief minister (II).

The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of Malaysiakini.