KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 27): The government's allocation to the Wage Subsidy Programme (PSU) in 2020 and 2021 has amounted to a total of RM20.7 billion and has benefitted more than three million employees, the Ministry of Finance (MoF) said.

The ministry also announced that the third phase of the PSU (PSU 3.0) will receive an additional allocation of RM500 million given the expansion of scope to include all companies affected by the Movement Control Order (MCO).

This allocation brings the amount given for PSU 3.0 under the PERMAI (Malaysian Economic and Rakyat Protection) assistance package to RM1.5 billion.

Together with the earlier RM1.5 billion allocated in Budget 2021, the government has effectively channelled a total of RM3 billion to the programme for the year 2021 alone, Finance Minister Tengku Datuk Seri Zafrul Abdul Aziz said in the 38th Implementation and Coordination Unit Between National Agencies (LAKSANA) report today.

Apart from the RM3 billion under PSU 2021, the government has allocated RM3.7 billion under the job creation programme under Budget 2021, which has just commenced, the report said.

The PSU was introduced last year under the government's National Economic Recovery Plan (Penjana) to assist employers in retaining staff and not succumb to having to let them go as business conditions deteriorated in the wake of the MCO and negative impact from the Covid-19 pandemic.

As for PSU 1.0, which is still ongoing, Tengku Zafrul said it has utilised RM12.7 billion for 322,177 employers and 2.64 million employees who are registered.

PSU 2.0, which was introduced under the Prihatin Supplementary Initiative Package (Kita Prihatin), a total of RM590.35 million has been channelled to 57,146 employers to continue operating and maintaining the employment for 475,510 employees.