More laws to lure foreign investments into country

The government will soon enact important economic laws to attract foreign investment into the country, the minister of justice told the Federal National Council (FNC) yesterday during a review of his ministry's policies.

Dr Hadif Al Dhaheri, Minister of Justice, said: "The Ministry of Justice has almost finished drawing up many economic laws requested by the Emirates Competitiveness Council, which relate to competitiveness, bankruptcy and company laws. The draft laws are in their final phases and will be referred to the FNC for discussion before they are approved.

"The UAE still needs to modify many laws, especially economic ones, to bring them in line with the progress achieved over the past several years and attract more foreign investments.

"The ministry will expand the network of specialised courts, including economic and commercial courts. It has approved a project for sending 40 personnel to famous western judicial institutions to study how cases are handled at specialised courts. They will be appointed to important judicial posts at the expanded specialised courts after they finish their study. The ministry has created special judicial departments for cases of consumer protection and information crimes," Al Dhaheri said.

"We are very interested in economic and commercial cases. The ministry is training judges with more than 20 years of experience in UAE courts to deal with economic and commercial cases. The judges have become conversant with such cases, whether they are financial, real estate or investment cases."

The FNC decided yesterday to discuss the ministry's policies after the FNC's Legislative and Legal Affairs Committee compiled a report on the policies of the ministry.

Ahmed Al Khateri, head of the committee, said the committee noticed a shortage in the number of judges and an increase in a judge's monthly quorum of cases.

Some 32,506 cases were registered in 2008, which were distributed to 153 judges. In addition, the number of judicial authority members fell from 418 in 2006 to 374 in 2008.


New pay scale for moh doctors, technicians

A new scale of pay for doctors, technicians and administrators at the Ministry of Health (MoH) will be implemented before the end of this year, said Dr Hanif Hassan, Minister of Health.

"The amendment of salary scales of MoH'doctors and technicians is of the utmost importance for me personally and I regard it as the most vital issue at present," Hassan said yesterday said at the Federal National Council.

"The weakness in pay scales of doctors and technicians was the reason behind the exodus of efficient medical and technical cadres from MoH's hospitals.

"Over three years, 396 consultant doctors and specialists resigned from MoH, including 100 national doctors and 296 expatriates. Also, 736 technicians resigned, including 100 nationals. This was obviously a big loss for MoH," he said.

Hassan attributed the resignation of this large number of doctors and technicians to the fact their salaries are low compared to high salaries offered by the private sector and other healthcare authorities.

"The exodus of distinguished medical cadres from MoH's hospitals led to reduce the level of health services. These resignations form a big challenge for us. We attempt currently to contain it. We will attempt during next period to draw up the new organisational structure of Federal Health Authority (FHA) to which the ownership of MoH's hospitals and centres will be transferred. Then, we will draw up the new salary system of FHA staff. Undoubtedly, the new salaries will be competitive and attractive and I think they will largely limit the resignations."

Keep up with the latest business news from the region with the Emirates Business 24|7 daily newsletter. To subscribe to the newsletter, please click here.

Follow Emirates 24|7 on Google News.