NUBE is extremely disheartened with Bank Negara Malaysia’s (BNM) lackadaisical attitude in relation to the HSBC Bank’s action to export hundreds of jobs to Hyderabad in India, Sri Lanka and other vendors in Malaysia who are not unionised especially in era of New Malaysia.

Before this, HSBC Bank told its workers that BNM approved the exporting or outsourcing of jobs done by Malaysian workers.

NUBE wrote to BNM with regards to this on 23 November 2019, there was no response.

On 28 November 2019, NUBE submitted follow-up letters to the central bank head office in Kuala Lumpur and at its branches in Penang and Johor Bahru.

Late evening on 9 December 2019, BNM replied to NUBE; the response was evasive and disappointing. It was merely requesting NUBE to resolve the dispute over the exporting of jobs with HSBC Bank.

BNM’s correspondent said that it does not comment on individual financial institutions. It also stated that financial institution carrying out any outsourcing must comply with policy department expectation which is assess the overall impact of the outsourcing on the employment and talent capacity with the bank and control the customer data shared with service providers with proper security, confidentiality and integrity.

This evasive respon only mirrors BNM’s lackadaisical attitude toward the plight of HSBC Bank workers. As the central bank, BNM is responsible to also protect the welfare of the workers.

BNM is clearly washing it hands off this matter when it proposed that NUBE engage with HSBC Bank bilaterally to resolve the issue.

It is ABUNDANTLY OBVIOUS that the outsourcing and exporting of jobs by HSBC Bank will have a direct impact on the welfare of Malaysian workers and it is also clear that this is contrary to BNM’s own policies stated in the response to NUBE.

Therefore, why is BNM reluctant to take any action against HSBC Bank?

In its reply, BNM kept mum over the intrusion into the HSBC Bank workers computer system by unknown persons done with the blessing of HSBC Bank.

The Central Bank MUST EXPLAIN TO MALAYSIANS about its action in granting the approval to HSBC Bank to export about 200 Malaysian workers jobs which will inevitably impact the employment of Malaysian workers.

NUBE will continue to engage with Bank Negara till the central bank takes the responsibility to protect the interest of Malaysian workers.