Govt likely to increase working hours

[LRE]

Govt likely to increase working hours



Sunday, August 24, 2008
By Mehtab Haider

ISLAMABAD: The government has decided to increase working hours till 5pm if it goes ahead with the proposal of two weekly holidays in the next federal cabinet meeting, it is learnt.

The idea of five working days came under consideration at the highest level on several occasions but it failed to get through in the recent past. Those who were opposing two weekly holidays, used to cite an example that it would negatively affect Federal Board of Revenue’s efforts to collect due taxes in five working days. “After increasing working hours till 5pm, it will not affect revenue collection,” said a high-ranking official of the government while talking to The News here on Saturday.

Now the government cannot ignore the much-needed energy conservation plan owing to an unprecedented surge in the oil import bill, which is estimated to cross $14.5 billion in fiscal year 2008-09.

The next cabinet meeting will approve five working days in a week but working hours will be increased from 9am to 5pm. The government, sources said, would also approve closure of petrol pumps for one day in a week.

“Petrol pumps will be closed for one day within the five working days,” said the sources and added it would not resolve any problem if the government decided to shut pumps on weekly holidays. Earlier, the government during the cabinet meeting held on May 15 rejected the proposal forwarded by the Ministry of Water and Power for granting two weekly holidays to conserve scarce energy resources.

The WAPDA has estimated that two weekly holidays could help save 850 to 1,000 megawatts of electricity with the closure of all government offices from 9am to 5pm on Saturday.

However, the sources said that the government has so far failed to come up with concrete measures related to conserve the electricity with clear-cut steps when the country is facing severe and torturous load-shedding, making life miserable. Now it seems the realization of severe situation felt at the highest level but the lip service will not help to overcome the situation and concrete steps are required to conserve energy. In the wake of soaring oil prices as well as severe electricity shortages, the government contemplated various options to ensure conservation of energy resources. The sources said the corporate sector was already doing five-day work and other private offices did not contribute a lot in terms of consuming the major chunk of the electricity by doing work on Saturday.

When the sources was asked about the government’s plan to import one million energy bulbs for saving electricity, they said that some people were estimating conservation of the electricity in the range of 500-600MW but according to WAPDA’s estimates, they can save 225MW with the help of energy savers owing to diversity.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/daily_detail.asp?id=131614