The Tribune

By KHRISNA RUSSELL

Deputy Chief Reporter

krussell@tribunemedia.net

DESPITE criticising the former Christie administration last year for adding 9,000 people to the government payroll during its term in office, Public Service Minister Brensil Rolle revealed yesterday a “large number” of those hired from 2012 to 2017 have been re-engaged.

He said many were required to do comprehensive training to attain specific trades and skills related to ministries where they worked. 

“Some of them have remained,” Mr Rolle told The Tribune yesterday. “Some of them were on contracts that expired.

“We re-engaged a large number of them and as in the case of the Ministry of Education they set forth a comprehensive training programme to cause individuals to learn specific trades and skills related to the Ministry of Education and, if they successfully completed the one year probationary period, they’ll be engaged in the service on a full-time basis.”

However, he could not say specifically how many were reengaged.

He made the comments yesterday following a graduation ceremony at Government House for dozens of registered nurses who successfully completed the Psychiatric Nursing Programme and the First Line Leadership & Management Certificate Programme.

Asked what the government is doing to control public sector hiring, he said: “Our hires this year will be targeted. We are replacing persons who resigned and like I said we are focusing on areas where there are strategic needs.”

Additionally, the minister said the government was also focusing on brain drain issues and attracting qualified Bahamians with degrees to apply for government jobs.

“We are trying to strategically place individuals in basically two programmes by the government. One of which is we are targeting Bahamians with bachelor’s degrees who are presently unemployed and what we propose to do is to encourage them to become employed by applying for a government job,” he said.

“We are going to hire them outside the public service on contract and their salary would be a little bit more competitive than in the service.”

He said this was not necessarily a strategy to improve unemployment numbers, but an effort to make the Bahamas more competitive.

“We are losing a tremendous amount of Bahamians to the US and Canada so we have got to respond. One of the ways that we are responding is saying to individuals there are many strategic areas in the government that vacancies exist so come back let’s talk. Let’s get you engaged.

“For example if you are in the Port Department there are so many vacancies there that need to be filled (and in) the Meteorology Department (as well).

“So we are saying to Bahamians let’s be competitive so to get them back into the Bahamas to get them engaged.

“We are offering a programme for degree individuals and this is not only to compete with those persons from away but to really get Bahamians engaged and so where vacancies exist we intend to fill them.”

In March 2018, the minister told the House of Assembly that an estimated 70 percent of the contracts awarded to persons for government employment under the Christie administration did not go through the Ministry of the Public Service.

This allowed Cabinet ministers to act “willy-nilly”, he said at the time.

As an example to parliamentarians, Mr Rolle said direct hiring to the Departments of Customs and Immigration was done without consultation of the public service. In 2016, 114 customs officers were hired along with 217 immigration officers between March and April of 2017 and were told to report for duty without letters of engagement, the MP said.

The majority of them, he said, were just vetted when the Minnis administration took office.

However, according to Mr Rolle, around 50 of these persons had not been able to pass the vetting process.

The government, he said, has been advised by police to not even consider them for engagement.