The Tribune

By YOURI KEMP

Tribune Business Reporter

ykemp@tribunemedia.net

A Cabinet minister says the next round of increment payments to civil servants will not happen on schedule because of the finance officer sick-out that cost the Government some $7.5m.

Pia Glover-Rolle, minister of state for the public service, speaking ahead of the weekly Cabinet meeting, said of the next increment payments: “To my understanding, they won’t be getting them in this month. We started the incremental payments in January, and it was being phased. This month would have seen the second tranche and that has been impacted.

“When that will be reintroduced, I cannot say. That would be a Ministry of Finance question that we would have to have a discussion with them about.” Last week’s “sick out” by finance and accounting staff was said to have impacted government revenues as well as payments to its vendors and contractors alike.

The move was blasted by the Ministry of Finance for costing the Government $7.5m in efficiency and revenue losses, which warned that it placed the possible payment of $7m in increments due to civil servants in jeopardy.

However, Fred Mitchell, the senior minister responsible for the public service, was said to have disavowed the Ministry of Finance’s statement on the matter. Asked to clarify this seeming confusion, Mrs Glover-Rolle said: “I don’t know the position on it. That, like you said, is a statement that came from the Ministry of Finance.

“We’re still in meetings, we’re still having the conversations. They will all be based on the reporting that we get back from the various ministries. And until then, I don’t think we can make a definitive statement.”

Mrs Glover-Rolle added: “By Friday, there were about 70 workers that were still out. As of Monday, there are a few still out. But what we have done is asked the permanent secretaries from every ministry to provide a report of what is happening in the ministry in regard to the financial officers. So those reports are coming in slowly.

“From what we can tell, there’s minimal impact. Salaries don’t seem to have been impacted, but special payments would have been impacted. That means deductions, or any special payments that employees would have had facilitated through their salaries.

She continued: “In terms of how it has impacted the nation, of course finance is a critical part of what we need in running a country. So revenue collection would have been impacted and that doesn’t only mean from a perspective of cashiers because these were financial officers that are sitting out, but in terms of invoicing, reduced purchase orders, allowing the government to collect funds that are due.

“Additionally, we understand that outside of the payments to employees that may have been minimally impacted, some of the finance officers that returned to work are able to facilitate some of the tasks that would have been left out last week.

“In a time like this, where there is a crisis, it provides opportunity, which means we’ve now looking at the organisational structure of the Government and ensuring that no group of employees is able to hold the Government, or put us in a precarious position, where there’s only a certain grouping of employees that can facilitate certain tasks.”