S’gor state agencies to be open on weekends - The Star

SHAH ALAM: May 4, 2008

Selangor wants to implement a seven-day working week for all state government agencies to facilitate people’s dealings with them.

Mentri Besar Tan Sri Khalid Ibrahim said the state government would maintain the five-day working week for all state government staff but the counters would remain open throughout the week.

“The decision is still being studied but I do not foresee any problem in its implementation since other agencies like the police and hospitals are already operating seven days a week.

“We feel it will be accepted by all, especially since it provides better services to the people,” he told a press conference during the Workers Assembly and National Forum Sunday.

Khalid said the state would not be forced to hire more people to introduce the seven-day service but it would mean employees would get staggered off-days during the week.

He said the state government would also propose that the private sector adopt the same policy in order to provide better services.

“Some companies like hypermarkets are already operating seven days a week and even 24-hours a day, so it should not be a problem for others to follow,” he said.

Khalid also said the state government had not made any decisions yet on whether it wanted to buy over Syarikat Bekalan Air Selangor (Syabas) completely or increase its current stake of 30%.

“We have to conduct studies on short and long-term effects to look into the best way to manage our water so that consumers will fully benefit from it.

“We are working on a plan to restructure the entire water management in a way that will also benefit the water producers, distributors and the state government,” he said.

He said the state government’s main focus at the moment was to ensure it provided the first 20cu m of water free to consumers come June 1.

He also said that the state government had yet to complete its calculations on providing the free water and as such could not provide details on whether the state would have to pay Syabas RM17mil a month to do so.