SASCHA WIL­SON

Labour Min­is­ter Jen­nifer Bap­tiste-Primus says com­plaints by peo­ple who ei­ther lost or are re­ceiv­ing a re­duced in­come that their em­ploy­er is re­fus­ing to fill out so­cial re­lief forms will be in­ves­ti­gat­ed and ap­pro­pri­ate ac­tion tak­en.

This comes in the wake of sev­er­al com­plaints by mem­bers of the pub­lic that em­ploy­ers have been re­fus­ing to sign the rel­e­vant sec­tions in the var­i­ous so­cial grant forms.

Many of them, how­ev­er, are re­luc­tant to make an of­fi­cial com­plaint be­cause they are afraid that when the COVID-19 re­stric­tions are lift­ed they will lose their jobs.

When con­tact­ed via What­sapp, Bap­tiste-Primus stat­ed, “I am very con­cerned that such un­scrupu­lous em­ploy­ers are re­fus­ing to sign their em­ploy­ees or for­mer em­ploy­ees Salary Re­lief Grant Forms.”

Not­ing that the gov­ern­ment had called on em­ploy­ers to be rea­son­able, com­pas­sion­ate, and flex­i­ble in treat­ing with their em­ploy­ees, she said, “These em­ploy­ers have a moral re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to treat their em­ploy­ees in a fair man­ner by sign­ing the said forms once they have ter­mi­nat­ed their em­ploy­ment or re­duced their wages or salaries.”

She be­lieved that the em­ploy­ers’ re­fusal has to do with them not pay­ing NIS con­tri­bu­tions and fear­ful of the con­se­quences. She ad­vised em­ploy­ees to at­tach copies of the ter­mi­na­tion let­ters and/or their last payslip and in­di­cate that the em­ploy­ers re­fused to sign the forms.

“They can al­so file a com­plaint with the Min­istry’s Labour In­spec­torate Di­vi­sion at 299-0300, which will be in­ves­ti­gat­ed and ap­pro­pri­ate ac­tion tak­en as pro­vid­ed for in the law,” the min­is­ter ad­vised.

She said ap­pli­cants can al­so get some­one to vouch that they were em­ployed at a par­tic­u­lar com­pa­ny or or­ga­ni­za­tion.

Bar­rack­pore West coun­cil­lor Nicholas Khan­hai who has been help­ing peo­ple ob­tain and fill out the forms said many of them did not have the manda­to­ry doc­u­ments, in­clud­ing payslips, while oth­ers nev­er paid NIS con­tri­bu­tions.

In­di­cat­ing that 20 of the 30 peo­ple with SRG forms could not get their em­ploy­er to fill out the nec­es­sary sec­tion, he said, “I am putting in the ba­sic in­for­ma­tion for the com­pa­ny and I am stat­ing on the forms that the em­ploy­er re­fused to com­plete this ap­pli­ca­tion,” he said.

A sin­gle moth­er in Debe who worked in a restau­rant but her boss doesn’t want to fill out the form said she could not find a suit­able rec­om­mender who ac­cord­ing to the guide­lines must be in cer­tain pro­fes­sions.

“I don’t even have mon­ey to go and trav­el any­where to ask any­body to help me,” she said. An­oth­er woman said she went to the Pe­nal Po­lice Sta­tion to get a form, but they had no more forms.

“I don’t have no com­put­er or noth­ing so I can’t do it on­line. I just don’t know what to do,” she said.

Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert at the press con­fer­ence on Thurs­day stat­ed that over 38,000 per­sons have al­ready ap­plied for the Salary Re­lief Grant.