Malaysian Trades Union Council president Zainal Rampak today lamented the plight of workers in the banking sector and voiced concern over the recent spate of voluntary separation schemes (VSS) offered by large corporations.

Delivering his speech at the Dewan Negara, Zainal, who is also a senator, said 4,371 bank employees have been offered the scheme: 1,913 from Bumiputra Commerce Bhd, 1,223 from Maybank Bhd, 500 from Affin Bank Bhd, 30 from Chase Manhattan Bank Bhd, 15 from Citibank Bhd and 690 from United Overseas Bank.

If we say an average worker has a family of two children, we can say that 17,484 people are suffering due to the loss of job.

This is one aspect that has to be looked into seriously by the authorities, said Zainal.

Zainal said what was more depressing was that those who have been retrenched after accepting the VSS were later recruited by the same company as contract workers.

They will automatically lose all their benefits and career opportunities [enjoyed by them when they were permanent staff], he said.

He added that the latest incident involved 34 employees of Kelab Golf Negara Subang.

Zainal urged that such practices be stopped immediately in order to preserve industrial harmony and stabilise the countrys economic growth.

Since the 1997 Asian financial crisis, several large corporations have implemented the VSS, as a move to minimise losses.

Industrial Court chairpersons' term

Meanwhile, Zainal suggested that the service of Industrial Court chairpersons should be appointed for a period of five years instead of the current two years.

The chairpersons, he said, should also be those who are not currently attached to the Attorney-Generals Chambers.

This is to promote continuity of those in service. This is also suggested in the light of the number of [backlog] cases pending in the Industrial Court, he added.

Presently, the chairperson is loaned from the AG-chambers. Due to a lack of Industrial Court staff, MTUC claims there are more than 1,000 backlog cases still awaiting decision.

As a long-term plan, Zainal proposed that the Industrial Court chairperson should be given a permanent post.

How can we talk about job security at the national level when the Industrial Court chairperson has no job security, when he or she is a contract worker?

Where are the incentives and motivation? This ironical situation has to be handled immediately, he said.