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"content": "House made a promise to the CoGs that the Bill shall be withdrawn and any subsequent debate on it would capture negotiations between the CoG and the Senate. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, even though this Bill is in the Second Reading, we will have to look at it keenly to ensure that the control that the National Treasury had in the original Bill has not been reintroduced. It was a matter of contention and if it comes back in a similar way, it will remain contentious and we will not proceed. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, again, just to capture some of the background to this Bill, in 2014, the CoG set up a Committee to advise on how to manage pensions and retirement benefits for county employees. The Committee that was established by the CoG came up with a number of recommendations. One, they resolved to establish an umbrella pensions fund for county employees. Two, they proposed that the two main players in that space, that is, the Local Authorities Provident Fund (LAPFUND) and the Local Authorities Provident Trust (LAPTRUST) would be wound up and their assets transferred to the new umbrella body. Three, the Committee recommended that the umbrella pensions fund be established under an Act of Parliament to avoid arbitrary changes, give it a national outlook and prevent a situation where people would be coming up with specific regulations for the 47 county governments. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, I am glad that, today, in discussing this Bill, we are giving effect to the recommendations that the governors came up with. Today, in the County Public Accounts and Investment Committee (CPAIC), we were with the Governor for Meru County. He made an appeal to the Senate that it is not enough to oversight; we must always remember to play the role of representing the interests of counties and their governments. In looking at this particular Bill, we will be looking out for the interests of counties, their governments and, more importantly, their employees who render a lot of sacrifice and dedicate themselves to ensure that county governments operate the way they should. The question would be: Before this Bill becomes a law, what happens to those people who work in counties? We know, and it has been said before, that there are two funds; LAPFUND and LAPPTRUST. LAPFUND was established for the lower cadre employees in the local authorities, whereas LAPTRUST was established for the senior employees. Over the years, these two organisations have choked up or accumulated huge amounts of Kenya shillings in terms of assets and liabilities. Mr. Deputy Speaker, Sir, last week, we were looking into the accounts of Isiolo County and in the list of pending bills were pensions deductions from employees that had not been remitted to either LAPFUND or LAPTRUST. This raises a serious issue because with pensions, it is all about a person’s accumulated contributions or savings. When we have a situation where since 2013 certain counties are not remitting pensions deductions to the relevant funds, it means that the employees are missing out on an opportunity to accumulate their savings and earn interest. This is not only in Isiolo County. LAPFUND is owed close to Kshs13 billion by Nairobi City County. This is because since 2013 Nairobi City County has been deducting, but not remitting the contributions to the relevant funds. Even before we enact this legislation, we need to remind governors and counties that they must find a mechanism for securing the interests, welfare and future of the 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."
}