Employers warned not to plunder worker wage subsidy

A senior official told Hong Kong's employers today that they must ensure the proposed wage subsidy of up to HK$9,000 is given directly to workers and that no one is laid off.

Details of the subsidy amount given to employers will be disclosed to the public and also to the workers, the Chief Secretary, Matthew Cheung Kin-chung told a radio program

Two criteria are important, he said.

“One is, as I said, no redundancy at all. The second thing is, all the subsidy from the government for that particular purpose must go to paying staff salaries and not other purposes,'' he insisted.

He said the purpose of the scheme is to ensure the continued operation of the enterprises concerned.

“It is incumbent on the employers concerned to ensure that there is no redundancy once they join the scheme,'' he said.

"Also, it's more important to bear in mind that we should give them some flexibility in how to handle the exact so-called human resources policy of the respective enterprises. So that freedom, or that flexibility, is very important.''

If employers use the subsidy for other purposes, it will be totally unacceptable, he said.

“We will claw back the money. Also, a very important safeguard is we'll ensure transparency of the scheme,'' Cheung said.

“For any successful applicant, their amount of subsidy disbursed and so on, will be released to the public, and also particularly to the employees concerned, so they know whether the employers have applied for the scheme and whether they are successful indeed. ''

He said Hong Kong has a very active media and also a very active trade union movement.

“I'm sure that all these are very important watchdogs. But of course if there is any criminal element involved – conspiracy, dishonesty and so on – we will act in accordance with the law. Any outstanding sum not used will be clawed back. We are also considering imposing a penalty for any deviation from the so-called regulation or rules imposed by the scheme. Now, all these need to be thrashed out in the next few days. We will be going to Finance Committee coming Friday. There are still some minor details yet to be thrashed out.''