PE­TER CHRISTO­PHER

Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress po­lit­i­cal leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar is propos­ing a wage sub­sidy as a means to re­in­force the work­force that has been af­fect­ed by the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic.

The UNC leader dis­cussed the idea dur­ing the pre­sen­ta­tion of can­di­date by the par­ty on Sat­ur­day night.

“A pro­pos­al that I have been work­ing with our team is for the gov­ern­ment to give a wage sub­sidy. A wage sub­sidy is, the gov­ern­ment will pay part of the wages of a work­er who may have been laid off or al­most been laid off to be able to get them back on the job,” said the Siparia MP.

“We will use the min­i­mum wage as a ceil­ing and I am propos­ing that gov­ern­ment will give a per­cent­age of the wage as a sub­sidy so they can bring their work­ers back again,” she said.

The plan is part of the UNC’s re­peat­ed promise that they would cre­ate 50,000 jobs if they elect­ed in­to gov­ern­ment in the Au­gust 10 gen­er­al elec­tion.

“The fur­ther jobs I raised last night, my team is look­ing at, is to give a wage sub­sidy, for those who lost their jobs, for the small busi­ness­es, medi­um-sized busi­ness­es to give a wage sub­sidy. So yes there will be job po­si­tions, that is my in­ten­tion to cre­ate those po­si­tions,” Per­sad-Bisses­sar said dur­ing a UNC mo­tor­cade in Barataria/San Juan yes­ter­day.