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Following is a question by the Hon Ip Wai-ming and a written reply by the Secretary for the Civil Service, Miss Denise Yue, in the Legislative Council today (December 16):
Question:
Regarding the Government's employment of non-civil service contract (NCSC) staff, will the Government inform this Council:
(a) of the maximum numbers of days of annual leave that NCSC staff are entitled to, broken down by rank; in respect of those NCSC staff who are entitled to the maximum annual leave, the bureaux/departments/offices in which they are engaged and their grades;
(b) of a breakdown, by rank of such staff, of the percentages (5%, 10% and 15% or above) by which their end-of-contract gratuities are calculated, as well as the number of the relevant contracts involved; of the criteria used by heads of department (HoDs) to determine the percentages for end-of-contract gratuities; and
(c) as the Government stated in a paper submitted to the Panel on Public Service of this Council in May 2004 that "HoDs employ staff outside the Civil Service on fixed-term contracts of various duration (e.g. one month up to three years) to meet service needs which are short-term, part-time or under review", yet at present, some NCSC staff have been in continuous employment for 10 to 20 years, what the definition of "service needs which are short-term, part-time or under review" is?
Reply:
President,
The NCSC Staff Scheme was introduced in 1999. It aims to provide Permanent Secretaries and Heads of Departments(hereafter shortened as 'HoDs') with a flexible means of employment to respond more promptly to changing operational and service needs of Bureaux/Departments(B/Ds) which may be time-limited, seasonal, or subject to market fluctuations; or which require staff to work less than conditioned hours; or which require tapping the latest expertise in a given area in the market; or where the mode of delivery of the service is under review or likely to be changed.
As a general guideline, HoDs are advised by the Civil Service Bureau(CSB) that the terms and conditions of employment of their NCSC staff should be no less favourable than those provided for under the Employment Ordinance (EO) (Cap.57) and no more favourable than those applicable to civil servants in comparable civil service ranks or with comparable levels of responsibilities where they exist. Within this general guideline, HoDs may determine the employment package (including leave and contract gratuity if any) of their NCSC staff, having regard to the job nature, condition of the employment market, as well as their management and operational considerations.
Given the nature of the NCSC Scheme, CSB only collects general information (such as the number of NCSC staff employed, the monthly salary range and the duration of contracts) twice a year from B/Ds. It does not require B/Ds to provide detailed information on the terms of employment of their NCSC staff.
With the above brief explanation on the NCSC Staff Scheme, my reply to the specific questions is set out below:
(a) HoDs have been given the authority to determine the annual leave entitlement of their NCSC staff, provided that it is not below the minimum provision under the EO (i.e. progressive increase of annual leave from 7 days for the first and second year up to 14 days for the ninth year and beyond) and not more than 14 days per year (which is the leave entitlement for the majority of civil servants appointed to basic ranks on new permanent terms and with less than 10 years of service). CSB does not have information on the leave entitlement of individual NCSC staff employed by the different B/Ds.
(b) In order to attract recruitment and retention of suitable individuals to serve in specific NCSC positions, HoDs may, as necessary, offer end-of-contract gratuity to individual NCSC staff, payable upon satisfactory completion of the contract. As a general guideline, the gratuity payable, when added to the Government's Mandatory Provident Fund contributions, should not be more than 15% of the total basic salary for the concerned individual NCSC staff engaged in work that requires managerial, professional, technical, or other specialised skills; and should not be more than 10% for the concerned individual NCSC staff in non-skilled jobs.
Based on the information collected from CSB's latest half-yearly survey of the NCSC staff position as at end June 2009, the majority (about 10,340 or some 64%) of the some 16,190 full-time(Note 1) NCSC staff were offered gratuity in their contracts. The breakdown of these 10,340 NCSC staff is as follows:
Percentage of Number of NCSC staff
end-of-contract (and percentage
gratuity to total)
--------------- ---------------------
At 15% 5,330 (51.6%)
At 10% to less
than 15% 4,920 (47.6%)
Less than 10% 90 (0.8%)
-------------- -------------
Total 10,340(100%)
CSB does not keep information on the breakdown of end-of-contract gratuity offered to NCSC staff by rank.
(c) As explained at the beginning of this reply, HoDs may employ NCSC staff for different reasons. They may be employed to meet service needs which are time-limited. An example is the 10-year programme to remove unauthorised building works, where the concerned NCSC staff may, subject to their performance, remain in continuous employment for a number of years. HoDs may also employ NCSC staff for services which are intended to be contracted out in the longer term or services whose mode of delivery is under review. The concerned NCSC staff may, subject to their performance, remain in continuous employment until the contracting out is implemented or until the new mode of delivery of service comes into being. Separately, some NCSC staff may serve in one NCSC position after another without a break in service.
Note 1: "Full-time" means the employment is on a "continuous contract" under the definition of the EO. According to the EO, an employee who works continuously for the same employer for four weeks or more, with at least 18 hours in each week, is regarded as working under a continuous contract.
Ends/Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Issued at HKT 16:22
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