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{
    "id": 1558937,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/1558937/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 177,
    "type": "speech",
    "speaker_name": "Nyatike, ODM",
    "speaker_title": "Hon. Tom Odege",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": " Thank you, Hon. Speaker. Allow me to join my colleagues in supporting this timely Bill. In the last Parliament, I served on the Departmental Committee on Labour and Social Protection and I detected a lot of loopholes in the structures for supporting vulnerable people in the society. The Bill before us is an attempt to solve most of the issues. I urge the House to take this opportunity and panel beat the Bill to sort out all the issues. We face a lot of issues from vulnerable people. You may find yourself being changed from a Member of Parliament to a welfare officer. The majority of the people who cannot make ends meet will always knock at your door. They have no other way out apart from looking for us as leaders to help them solve their personal issues. This Bill can help to cure this, so that we dignify Kenyans. If you want to measure the success of a country, look at how it treats the less fortunate people. If you are in a country where less fortunate people are not considered and helped, that is a failed state. If hawking by the roadsides is a major activity in a country, that country is poor. A majority of the people in that country live below the minimum wage. A majority of the hawkers are vulnerable. Some of them walk using support and others beg by the roadside. Those are things we can cure if we thoroughly work on this Bill. Another area of concern is enrolment criterion. If you go down there to your home in the constituency today, almost every time you will find people who are over 70 and are not benefiting visiting you. Why are they coming? They are questioning why their neighbours are benefiting and they are not listed. We should come up with a very clear criterion where people are automatically listed when they attain a certain age and are vulnerable. It will bring equity, fairness, and make people have a very clear mind of those who are benefiting, so that we are not made to be welfare officers. We want a Government that is responsive and ensures those who deserve are given. If you go to the ministry and look at the criteria of recruitment, it depends on the available budget. If they have less money and have qualified people to be recruited but cannot fit in their budget, they will only go with what their budget can accommodate. The ministry will not have any criterion that clearly indicates who is supposed to be picked. We will be in a very fair country coming up with a Bill or a law that obligates and mandates the Government to ensure the qualified get money; that treats everybody fairly and people will be happy in Kenya. On how to run the Fund, I think creating a board is very good. The Fund is currently managed at the ministry level. There are no specific mandates coming out clearly or specific people who can be charged with the responsibility. The person available currently is the Principal Secretary and we know he has a number of issues around him. Creating a board that will look into the issues related to social protection will be very good. It will also help us define the kind of human resources we need to serve the board and help implement this good idea up to the lowest level possible. An identification criterion will be the fairest experience in our country if we get the right people charged with the responsibility to ensure that every qualified person in our society is rightly identified at the right time and given the opportunity to be served by the board. Hon. Temporary Speaker, allow me to join my colleagues in supporting this Bill. I thank you."
}