BANGKOK, July 10 – Chalermchai Sri-on, Labour Minister said he believed the Pheu Thai party policy to raise the daily minimum wage to 300 baht per day will attract Cambodian labourers to migrate to Thailand for work, particularly legal workers under the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the two countries.
The Labour Minister said he supported the new government’s efforts to implement this policy to benefit all workers in the country. However, he asked the new government to consider the overall economy in the country along with other issues including inflation and higher cost of living, which have had an impact on Thai people.
The increase in the minimum wage must be also applied to legal foreign workers. If this cannot be done, the new government must explain why to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), as the Thai Labour Protection Law requires legal foreign workers receive the same wages as Thai workers do.
Thailand’s election-winning Pheu Thai Party announced after the July 3 election that it expects to raise the daily minimum wage for workers nationwide to Bt300 (US$10) as early as January next year, as promised in its election campaign.
The Pheu Thai Party earlier promoted raising the minimum wage of workers across the country to Bt300 per day and a minimum starting salary for university graduates of Bt15,000 (US$500) per month.
