Today, Wednesday, the Parliamentary Committee on Labor, Development, Social and Population discussed the tendency to abolish the Ministry of Labor and transfer its powers to other ministries, as part of the public sector modernization plan.

This came during a meeting held by the committee today, headed by Representative Hussein Al-Harasis, and in the presence of the Ministers of State for Prime Minister Affairs Dr. Ibrahim Al-Jazi, the Digital Economy and Entrepreneurship Ahmed Al-Hanandeh, the Vice President of the Jordan Labor Union Khaled Al-Fanatah, and representatives of trade union federations and the Labor House for Studies.

Al Harasis said that the Ministry of Labor is one of the sovereign ministries, and it has a work system, powers and tasks concerned with supervising labor and labor affairs, organizing the Jordanian labor market, taking care of Jordanian workers outside the Kingdom, and registering trade unions and employers’ unions.

He added that if the main objective of the merger was to facilitate procedures for the citizen, it would be more appropriate to correct the conditions of the Ministry of Labor, and not to abolish or merge it and transfer its powers to other ministries, especially “we do not know the extent of the readiness of the ministries and institutions that will carry out the tasks of the Ministry of Labor and their ability to deal with them.” With labor problems and disputes,” he called for the need to elicit the opinions and recommendations of the relevant authorities.

A number of deputies attending, in turn, stressed the importance of having a real tendency to simplify procedures, standardize oversight and inspection through a clear mechanism, and not distribute tasks and transfer them to institutions and bodies other than the Ministry of Labor.

They added that “Labour” is one of the sovereign ministries, which contains many important departments, which follow up on all labor issues as the third party to the equation, which means that any decision to merge or cancel them will have significant negative effects.

The deputies called for the importance of automating information and services related to employment, and for there to be a unified system that regulates the relationship between the worker and the employer, in addition to unifying the supervisory and inspection bodies in line with the investment environment law.

They wondered about the reasons and results of the government’s plan to merge the Ministry of Labor, the financial impact of that, and the fate of its employees.

For his part, Al-Jazi said that the main objective of the merger is to ease procedures for the citizen, based on the reform plan followed by the state in relation to the development of the public sector apparatus, explaining that the intention of this plan is not to save money, but rather to simplify and ease procedures to serve the public interest.

He added that the ministerial committee concerned with this issue examined all available options regarding the public sector development plan, which came in line with the political and economic reform tracks, stressing that the administrative reform pursued by the state aims to reach a flexible public sector that meets the needs of citizens in a better and more successful way.
Al-Jazi indicated that the roadmap to modernize the public sector will not affect the rights of any employee in the public sector, and that no employee will be dispensed with the services of any employee in various government institutions and departments.

For his part, Al-Hanandeh said that the Ministry of Labor has many tasks, and it is intertwined with more than one ministry, which leads to a multiplicity in the competent authorities and a dispersion of reference, which called for the need to reconsider them, a research that is unifying the system and simplifying procedures and tasks for citizens, including Serves the interests of investors.
He added that the main objective of this plan is due to the need to improve and develop procedures and re-engineer them in line with the political, administrative and economic reforms pursued by the state.

For its part, Al-Fanatah stressed that the General Union rejects the decision to abolish the Ministry of Labor, as it is one of the sovereign ministries, and contains many service directorates that cannot be distributed or dispersed their tasks, in addition to being the third party in the equation and responsible for settling labor disputes.

The head of the Workers’ House Center, Hamada Abu Najma, said that the trend to abolish the Ministry of Labor and distribute its tasks, the bureaucratic side predominates over the economic and social aspects in looking at work affairs and issues, which leads to the marginalization of major tasks carried out by the ministry and its responsibilities in what is known as the national labor policy.