****************************************
Director of Hobby Limited trading as Sun Ho Seafood Restaurant, Mr Sit Siu-nam, was fined $27,000 at Tsuen Wan Magistrates' Court today (August 9) for wage offences under the Employment Ordinance. The prosecution was launched by the Labour Department.
The company failed to pay wages to five employees within seven days of the expiry of the wage period and the termination of employment as required by the ordinance. The amount of wages involved was $54,718. The wage offences were committed with the director's consent or connivance or attributable to his neglect. The director was also ordered to clear the outstanding wages via the court.
Section 64B of the Employment Ordinance says that where any wage payment offence committed by a body corporate is proved to have been committed with the consent or connivance of, or to be attributable to any neglect on the part of, any director, manager, secretary or other similar officer of the body corporate, the director, manager, secretary or other similar officer shall be guilty of a like offence. The maximum penalty has been raised to a fine of $350,000 and imprisonment for three years upon conviction.
The Labour Department will not tolerate wage offences and will spare no effort in bringing to justice directors and employers who defy the law.
Ends/Thursday, August 9, 2007
Issued at HKT 18:31
NNNN
