00:00The more I ruminate over the gig economy, the more I come to this conclusion that we
00:11are using 21st century technological concepts to generate profit while at the same time
00:17using 10th century labour standards to put people to work.
00:23Now don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of technology and entrepreneurship.
00:29I appreciate how the combination of both can be a very powerful factor to grow the economy
00:35and lift people out of poverty.
00:38What I hope is this, that we are able to update our labour standards, our labour laws to catch
00:43up with the changes in the economy and job market in this 21st century.
00:48And I'm glad that when I attended the ILO conference this year, I was informed that
00:54gig economy will be discussed in next year's conference.
00:58The world is finally catching up to update our labour code in view of technological updates.
01:06Since 2017, Perkeso has already a Self-Employment Social Security Act and this covers work-related
01:15social insurance for gig workers as well.
01:18The government even subsidised 90% of the cost of this social security insurance for
01:22self-employed workers.
01:24In fact, I'm proud to announce that the biggest e-hailing and p-hailing platform operator
01:29here in Malaysia, Grab, has come forward to pay the balance 10% of the cost for the 180,000
01:38drivers nationwide.
01:41This means all Grab drivers get free social security coverage by Perkeso this year.
01:48Congratulations Grab.
01:51Yet, the current government, under the leadership of Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and under
01:56the stewardship of Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Ahmad Zahid Amidi, we realise we are
02:02aware of the inadequacy of the current labour laws to provide sufficient protection for
02:07gig workers.
02:09Hence, in March this year, Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim tasked the Ministry of Human
02:14Resources to create a new gig workers law to have a better protection for Malaysian
02:22gig workers.
02:24The Ministry has just completed a bill drafting workshop this month and an early framework
02:29of the proposed Act has been produced.
02:31The new law will have four main pillars.
02:35Number one, definition of a gig worker or a platform worker.
02:40Number two, minimum compensation in the form of earning for p-hailing and e-hailing workers.
02:48Number three, a grievance mechanism and of course, finally, which is relevant to our
02:56topic of discussion, social security protection, especially in terms of social insurance and
03:02pensions.
03:03In the coming months, the Ministry will conduct further stakeholders' consultation with other
03:08ministries and agencies, representatives from workers' unions, gig workers' associations,
03:15representatives from the employers and platform operators and other interest groups on the
03:19new bill.
03:21The Government aims to table this historic bill in Parliament by the end of this year.
03:28There are still gaps, for sure, but this represents Malaysia's first holistic effort to ensure
03:37decent work and protection for gig workers, which made up about 1.1 million out of the
03:443 million self-employed workers in this country.
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