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{
"id": 47400,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/47400/?format=api",
"text_counter": 282,
"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mr. Lesrima",
"speaker_title": "The Assistant Minister, Ministry of State for Provincial Administration and Internal Security",
"speaker": {
"id": 178,
"legal_name": "Simon Saimanga Lesirma",
"slug": "simon-lesirma"
},
"content": "Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, this Bill is as a result of the Constitution that we passed. As you know, we need to take care of the human resources that will drive and implement this Constitution. There have been 15 commissions and committees reviewing salaries in Kenya between 1960 and 2003. A number of them have actually been operating on ad hoc basis. We ended up with the Kipkulei Harmonization Committee, which I think did a good job. It also ended up with the establishment of a Permanent Public Service Remuneration Review Board which has not been anchored in the law because it was merely gazetted. So, the setting up of this Commission has come at the right time. We are aware that there are other Commissions that have been taking care of salaries in the Public Service. They are the Parliamentary Service Commission, the Public Service Commission, the Judicial Service Commission, the Teachers Service Commission and the Armed Forces Pay Review Board. The Constitution has redefined some of these bodies. For example, the Armed Forces now fall under the Defence Council. There will also be a representative from the Senate, as bodies which will nominate members to sit in this Commission. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, there were concerns by some Members that the unions will not be considered, but if you look at the Constitution, under Section 230(1)c, you will find that there will also be one person, each nominated by an umbrella body representing trade unions. Earlier on, a Member had expressed his fears that under the Teachers Service Commission, the teachersâ interest will not be taken care of. The principles that are recognized by this Constitution also revolve around the question of sustainability of the payroll. This is because you can have a wage bill that the economy cannot sustain. Or, you can pay people this year and the following year, the economy cannot sustain that. Sustainability also means the ability to balance between operations and maintenance. In the budget of the Public Service today, maybe, the resources are available. On the Recurrent budget, 70 per cent goes into salaries and remuneration while 30 per cent goes to development. However, there may be departments where the ratios are even worse. This is where you have to spend 90 per cent of the resources to pay people while only 10 per cent of the resources is available for development. So, that principle of sustainability brought by the Constitution is very important. The other principle is the retention of skills. We should retain skills in the Public Service and recognize productivity and performance. We should also be fair and transparent. As a result of all those historical reviews, there has been a lot of disparity over pay and this law will now assist us. That is if we establish the Commission. I do not want to repeat what Mr. Kenneth talked about the Dream Team. We recognize the fact that when the Dream Team came in, in 1999, supported by the World Bank, some Permanent Secretaries, including me, were retrenched. The Dream Team came on board with incredible salaries of Kshs2 million each. The result of that, the judges also came up and said that they perform a very important function in this nation and their salaries were increased. The parliamentarians and Permanent Secretaries also followed suit. Under Section 11, the responsibility to determine the salaries paid to public servants and state officers falls under the Commission. Therefore, we do not need to wait for pressure from trade unions and individuals, like it happened in the past, to increase their remuneration. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, as we also establish counties, I think it is very important that we have a body that will assist the county governments to harmonize and bring equity in salaries. I recall that during the establishment of a number of parastatals, especially the regional authorities, like the Lake Basin Development Authority, Tana and Athi Rivers Development Authority (TARDA) and Ewaso Ngâiro North, one of the problems because of politics was the tendency to over-staff the institutions until there were very little resources for development. If we are not careful, some of these counties can get out of control in terms of the kind of remuneration and the employment level they will undertake. This Commission will also deal with the question of job evaluation across the board, so that we can get equal pay for jobs performed. The question of individual salaries, which has been cited here, where some public servants negotiate their salaries, is covered under Section 11(f), where the Commission will have to make recommendations on matters relating to remuneration of a particular state for public officer. This will ensure that we do not have a situation where one public officer earns Kshs2 million while another one Kshs1 million, and yet they perform the same job. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, finally, this Commission can also take over from the job done by Ministry of State for Public Service which established a pay policy. I am sure one of the tasks that they can also be granted is to look at the question of all pay policy in Kenya, so that personnel can also move from private sector to public sector with ease. If you have universities developing knowledge and that knowledge needs to be translated into development activities or inventions, it should be possible for university staff to move to the private sector and vice-versa. That is what happens in other countries. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, with those few remarks, I beg to support this Bill."
}