Entry Instance

HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept

{
    "id": 392046,
    "url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/392046/?format=api",
    "text_counter": 59,
    "type": "other",
    "speaker_name": "",
    "speaker_title": "",
    "speaker": null,
    "content": "We have gone around counties. The issue of employment is one of the critical issues that the county government is facing. We have seen demonstrations in Nairobi by workers. We have seen workers in Mombasa also demonstrating and going round to claim their rights. Everywhere you go, the problem is the same. The other issue is that the amounts, so far, allocated to the county governments, in most counties, are not sufficient to pay the wage bill. In other words, the wage bill is higher than the total amount allocated to a number of these counties. If we are not careful, therefore, we will reduce county governments to mere employment agencies and not the developmental agencies they are supposed to be. They will not be institutions that promote democracy, but institutions that only provide employment. If we are not careful, the employment will, in most cases be of people who have been failures, either at the national Government or at the former local authorities. All of them were bundled to the local authorities. Right now, the county governments have three categories of employees. There are those who have been employed directly through the county public service boards, there are former employees of the local authorities and employees of the national Government seconded to the county governments. In all of these, the law says they are currently deemed to be employees of the national Government until such a time when the county public service boards are established and county governments can employ their own staff. For that to happen, as the Motion points out, we must have an audit of functions. I want to add that we do not want to have an audit of functions. We need a rationalization of those functions. An audit may imply the staff that was employed by local authorities and their numbers. We should remove the ghost employees who are getting double salaries. That is an audit. What we need is a rationalization of employment. In other words, this is an exercise which must be done through the unbundling of functions under Schedule Four. It has been found that when they are unbundled, it is more complicated than it appears under Schedule Four. A costing of those functions will realign employees to those jobs which have been rationalized both at the national and at the county level. That is something that will be done after the audit. This is what I would want the TA to do. Mr. Speaker, Sir, when you talk about the TA, I am in support of those who have said we should put in place a law to govern this process because of many reasons. First, from what we hear - and I am speaking because I met the TA members yesterday as Chairman of the Committee on Legal Affairs - the TA itself is under threat. In fact, we were told that the Miscellaneous (Amendment) Bill has already been approved by Parliament, more or less, dissolving it. What will be the end of this Motion if we leave it the way it is because here, we are urging the TA and yet it is under threat? Secondly, the point that came out is that to the extent that all employees are employed by the national Government and, to the extent that the Government takes responsibility for them, that should continue to be the way it is until we have put in place a law on the issue of pensions and how the employees of county governments are going to get their pensions. So, if someone is transferred from the national Government his or her pension rights continue. Right now, although it is contemplated that we must have that law, we still have to have that particular law in place. The electronic version of the Senate Hansard Report is for information purposes only. A certified version of this Report can be obtained from the Hansard Editor, Senate."
}