Employment reforms happening but some problems are entrenched

What may be the most clear-eyed assessment to date of Cayman’s job market and the performance of the amended employment and immigration laws has come from Hon. Minister for Caymanian Employment, Michael Myles.

While reporting an uptick in job applications by Caymanians and more clarity in the process, Min. Myles has also said that the new system has revealed how the previous structure was systematically abused. According to him, that was to the extent where many Caymanian applicants were denied opportunities, and even Caymanian employees were being frustrated to the point of quitting.

In an interview on Radio Cayman with Orrett ‘OC’ Connor, the Caymanian Employment Minister pledged to double down on his drive to make the system even more transparent and beneficial to Caymanians by prioritising them in the jobs market.

According to Min. Myles, some recruiters, HR (human resources) departments, and even some industry sectors are being blatantly discriminatory, mainly against Caymanians but also against foreign workers.

“My team has pushed extremely hard to ensure that we live our mantra of ‘Caymanians first’ he stated while announcing a third Hello to Hire initiative as a pathway to get more Caymanians into jobs and careers.

GAMING THE SYSTEM

Outlining what his Ministry for Caymanian Employment and the Workforce Opportunities & Residency Cayman(WORK) department have encountered while streamlining the employment and immigration system, Mr Myles described situations of ‘shady employers gaming the system’. He urged Caymanian applicants to submit their applications via the WORC portal in addition to applying to the employers. This, he explained, is to ensure that the government has a record of their application.

“Please apply for the job on the WORC portal,” he urged. “Those resumes stay with that particular job. Another thing is that it’s the only way for us to track. “So if you get very overly ambitious and apply for the job just on the employer’s website, we have no clue that you applied, and the employer can say, ‘Well, I didn’t receive that resume’.”

He also said that employers have a legal obligation to advise WORC of applications they have received outside the WORC portal. “They are obligated under law to advise of any applications that they received from a Caymanian outside the portal. However, Mr Myles said some of whom he described as “shady employees” have not been making that disclosure.

“A lot of shady hiring professionals will not be honest about things like that. In my nine or 10 years of doing employment services and certainly professional development, I have dealt with a lot of this. So the safest thing is to apply for the job on the WORC portal because it’s important that we see that you have an interest in that job.”

DISCRIMINATION

The Minister for Caymanian Employment also lamented examples of a recurring pattern of Caymanians being discriminated against, both in applying for jobs and within the workplace.

“There are Caymanians who submit job applications on the WORC portal, but no Caymanians are hired or interviewed. In some cases, these Caymanians may not make the shortlists designed by the employers. So we’ve seen it. And let me say here, and I’ve said it to our team at WORC. There’s no such thing as work permit renewal. The law states that if a Caymanian is qualified for that job, that employer must hire that Caymanian.”

Elaborating on the issue, Min. Myles spoke of Caymanian job applicants being overlooked for positions in favour of work permit holders, and said that is a form of discrimination.

“What I…our boards…and the department battle with it is discrimination against Caymanians. It’s folks coming into the country as an expat. They simply see opportunity, and they say, “Well, I don’t want this person to work with me. I prefer my friend in Europe to work with me’. So therefore, what they do is frustrate us. And most Caymanians aren’t going to sit down there and be talked down to. So we leave our jobs.”

On that point, Mr Myles appealed to Caymanians already in work not to get frustrated and quit, saying there are other avenues available.

“We cannot walk off of jobs. We cannot be frustrated,” he urged. “We have too many people that are our people walking off jobs and giving these people the right to then hire who they want, and then they can go back to immigration and say, ‘Well, you know, we had a Caymanian that abandoned the job’.”

He cited mainly the financial services and hotel sectors, saying that’s where such practices prevail among some employers and recruiters.

“There are two industries that primarily I have seen lots of discrimination, from the lack of advancement for Caymanians to not allowing Caymanians to get through the door: financial services and the hotel sector.” According to Min. Myles, this has been observed across a range of job roles and even affects non-Caymanians.

“It’s not just about Caymanians. I’ve had expats call me. I’ve had people from all over the world that are here working and are being abused right, left, and center. I cannot get them to make a formal complaint to the HR department because of fear of retaliation…Whether it’s in Nepal or the Philippines or Jamaica or wherever, they are petrified of making that call. But they needed to air it with someone, and someone gave them my number, and I will listen. But I cannot be the complainant.”

REFORMS

According to Minister for Caymanian Employment Myles, there has been a longstanding practice of people trying to game the system, which he said had become a political pinball over the years. However, he affirmed that he is committed to reforming the system with the policies he has put in place.

“They are trying to game the system…Unfortunately, we’ve allowed it across governments for decades. And the chickens have come home to roost with us that our people are being brutalised.” He also said there is a wider cost to society and the government if such practices are allowed to continue.

“When you deny the Caymanian an opportunity, that Caymanian needs to eat; they need to be housed. We are all arguing about the cost of living. Where do you think that money is going to come from to protect those people? It’s going to come from those same employers because the cost of living is going to go up. Why? We have to now send them to the Department of Financial Assistance(DFA) to qualify for that…Well, taxes go up because we need to pay for that. Somebody has to pay for it, right?”