Employers were today accused of not paying employees’ NIS or PAYE deductions, prompting Minister in the Ministry of Finance Ryan Straughn to urge workers to check with the National Insurance Scheme (NIS) and the Barbados Revenue Authority (BRA) from time to time to ensure the contributions are being paid up.
Straughn did not say how much money was owed in NIS contributions or income tax. He also stopped short of saying whether any of the now 42,797 unemployed people are unable to receive unemployment benefits owing to delinquent employers.
Straughn, who was leading off debate on the Catastrophe Fund Act during the morning session of Parliament, said he would encourage all workers to do period checks with the NIS and the BRA to ensure their NIS and Income Tax contributions were being paid as reflected on their payslips.
He said: “It is the responsibility of every citizen to check and verify that any statutory obligations that are being taken from your salaries are being deposited at the appropriate institutions.
“Over the course of the last few weeks as I have been doing tax clinics online, I have been asking people ‘can you confirm if this money that is shown here at the Revenue Authority on your account that you actually earned?
“And the reality is that we have all taken things for granted that once the payroll slip is done and they send you the payroll and it go to the bank, we all take it for granted.”
Straughn hinted that some employers could be using the current pandemic as an excuse not to pay those contributions.
He told the House: “It is at these very times when people may be expecting to receive benefits only then to realize that no monies were deposited into their account for some time. I think it is important that employers and employees be responsible in managing this going forward.
“Therefore, employees cannot simply absolve themselves of the responsibility of checking periodically to ensure their accounts are up to date.”
The Finance Minister advised companies that were having trouble paying their employees’ contributions to contact the NIS and BRA to arrange a payment plan.
Straughn said: “I want to urge those self-employed persons as well as those employers who have submitted the schedules but not necessarily the monies, that while we understand in this environment where we want to maintain as many jobs as possible that we have to find a workable solution that allows for people’s contributions to be made, for businesses to be compliant and that we can get as many self-employed people compliant with their National Insurance contribution such that if any of this is to ever happen again, that people would be clear as to what it is they will be eligible for “
The House Chairman of Committees Dr Sonia Browne recommended that changes be made to the NIS to ensure self-employed people could access greater benefits.
The backbench MP said: “I think the benefits need to be extended to sick leave. Self-employed people do get sick and I don’t know if it is a glitch at the NIS but self-employed people do get ill and need a little support.
“Nothing is coming in to support them during that sickness that could be as short as two days to a lot of months depending on what is happening, and they do pay.”
Self-employed individuals are entitled to sickness benefit, maternity benefit/grant, funeral grant, invalidity pension, old age contributory grant/pension and survivors’ benefit.
While the features of those benefits are largely the same as those offered to employees, there are differences in the sickness benefit and the maternity benefit.
Self-employed individuals are not entitled to unemployment and employment injury because they do not contribute to those funds, according to the NIS. marlonmadden@barbadostoday.bb
