Amendments to Employment Act proposed |02 May 2020

PS Baker and AG Ally during the press conference (Photo: Jude Morel)

With the coronavirus pandemic taking an increasing toll on the economy and bringing the tourism industry to its knees, the country’s unemployment rate is predicted to rise into double digits.

Principal secretary for employment, Jules Baker, made this projection for the second half of this year during a press conference on Thursday.

According to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), the country’s unemployment rate stood at 2.3% in the last quarter of 2019.

In a bid to curtail the inevitable redundancies and cushion the impacts of COVID-19 on workers, the government will bring amendments made to the Employment Act of 1995 to the National Assembly as soon as the latter resumes next week.

Mr Baker, assisted by Attorney General Frank Ally, explained that some employers had been looking to either delay salary payments or proposing reduction in salaries. However, Mr Baker continued, this would not be fair on employees who also have commitments to honour.

For this reason, the government will bring a proposed amendment under section 39 of the Act, stating that an employer will not have the right to defer their employee’s salary to another month, with or without the consent of said employee. Employers will also not be able to ask their workers to accept a salary lower than what was agreed to in their contracts.

The latest period in which salaries can be paid is during the first five days after the end of the month.

If approved by the National Assembly, this regulation would come into effect as of March 20, 2020.

Attorney General Ally further highlighted that an employer who wants to defer or reduce their workers’ salaries will have to undergo negotiations with the employment department in order to gain the necessary approval. These negotiations however will not be considered by the department in relation to Seychellois workers until after June 30.

“The second objective of the law is that all negotiation procedures to defer or reduce salaries for Seychellois workers will not take place. No employer will be able to go before a competent officer and say that I would like to defer or reduce the salary of Seychellois workers from March 20 to June 30,” he said.

However, this will not be applicable for expatriate workers who, unlike Seychellois workers, can be made redundant, even between March 20 and June 30.

“Also related to redundancies, as announced by President Danny Faure in March, the department of employment will not entertain redundancy applications and the government will be providing financial assistance until June. However, all redundancies that were filed with the ministry before March 20 will still be processed during this period because they were not related to the pandemic.”

Meanwhile, salaries should not be affected for those deemed to be under special leave – these include, working parents, employees whose place of work is temporarily closed or non-essential workers during a restriction of movement order.

PS Baker also touched on the concerns of working parents who have to go back to work on Monday but whose children would only go back to daycares as from May 11 and primary and secondary schools on May 18.

He noted that these parents will be able to extend their special leave up to May 18 and has encouraged parents who have not requested for special leave and who need to stay with their children to contact their employers to undertake the process.

Elsie Pointe