Just read the article below through Thestar online.
What say you?
I love they way the author said:
“If I can’t afford the levy, I would rather close my business than to be held ransom by local workers.”
Seems this explains why Crime Rate in Malaysia is so damn high…
I wonder why Malaysian always want high pay salary without working hard. Who taught us to think this way?
Or the owner is too stingy to pay salary?
Look in Malaysia’s history. Face it, face the fact. The whole piece of land is developed by foreigners. We got Indonesian Prince who came toMelaka to develop the Monarchy, then the Chinese arrive for tin mines and develop towns. Later Westerner came in to develop the education system, railways, transportation, postal and all sorts of technology development. This leads to bring in of Indian as worker in agricultural etc.
Presently, Indonesian worker were here to build our houses, Bangladesh workers in manufacturing, as well as Nepalese and Burmese.
Malaysia, we need foreigner, don’t we? We depend on them, whether you like it or not, the fact is true. You can’t hide from history.
If you want to work in your own “land”, you better be more hardworking right now. The world is flat.
Foreign labour a lot better than lazy locals
THE statement by Human Resources Minister Datuk Dr S. Subramaniam that doubling the levy on foreign workers will discourage their employment and will result in increased salaries for the locals is immature.
I have owned a restaurant for more than 20 years and during this period I have hired both Malaysian and Indonesian staff. The working conditions are the same for both nationalities and it does not matter what position they are in – manager, kitchen staff or waiters.
When we first opened for business, we hired locals. In the beginning, there were not much of a problem but when business began to pick up, my cook began to talk about leaving. It is her way of wanting to renegotiate her pay.
I put up with the “blackmailing” by ignoring it, but by the third time, I paid her her salary and showed her the door. That brought a temporary end to such threats from the others when they realised that I was not going to be held to ransom.
Then, with the influx of Indonesians, we hired them to work alongside with the locals. However, the Indonesians were hard working and had better attitude towards work.
But, when the Government began to make it harder to hire Indonesians, we had no choice but to look to local labour again. It was the mid-1990s boom and we needed the staff.
We found the locals arriving late for work and leaving early – sometimes before even the close of business, leaving the clean-up to be done by the foreign workers.
The locals would come to work unkempt and they sat around smoking cigarettes despite the “no smoking” sign in the restaurant.
Meanwhile, the Indonesian workers would ensure business goes on in the restaurant.
The locals refused to learn anything new because they thought they knew better. They were not happy at being told what to do by a woman – even if she was the manager.
They showed their displeasure by making the food inedible – adding too much salt or chilli.
Local staff are simply unreliable. Perhaps what is most disturbing is their health. The Indonesian workers have to pass a medical examination before they get a work visa. Locals do not.
Just to make sure, we would ask all new foreign workers to go for another medical test before they commenced work at the restaurant. However, this backfired. If he or she failed the test and cannot be hired, we still had to pay the bill which came to a few hundred ringgit.
To be fair, not every local we have hired was a nightmare. However, the dreadful ones we have hired far outnumbered the good ones.
If Dr Subramaniam thinks that raising the levy on foreign workers will lead to more locals being hired in the restauraunt business, he is sorely mistaken. They have poor work ethics and are not worth the trouble. If I can’t afford the levy, I would rather close my business than to be held ransom by local workers.
RESTAURANT OWNER,
Petaling Jaya.http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2009/3/17/focus/3490174&sec=focus
