The Government and the Guyana Public Service Union (GPSU) continue to “engage” on working conditions and remuneration within the public health sector but the public and the workers remain uninformed about the process.
“An engagement is taking place. I don’t know anything else just that there is an ongoing engagement,” GPSU representative at the Guyana Public Hospital, Owen John told Stabroek News yesterday.
John’s comment is the most the public has heard about the process which was initially scheduled for two weeks. It now enters its fourth week.
Last week General Secretary (ag) of the GPSU Kempton Alexander and Vice President Dawn Gardner declined to provide an update on the process. Attempts to reach them yesterday proved futile.
The union’s silence on a matter of such importance has caused a bit of disillusionment among its members.
Very disappointed
“I’m honestly very disappointed given that it’s the first time I’ve looked up to the union for guidance and help on a matter that is pressing to us nurses,” Jeanel Lewis a nurse attached to GPH told Stabroek News.
Lewis who along with her colleagues took to the streets for days calling for a risk allowance and personal protective equipment explained that she expected some communication from her representatives.
“I’d like for the union to do better and put out some press releases informing us on the progress or non-progress of the negotiations,” she said.
Nurses have since 2016 been demanding improved working conditions and better remuneration. The union however continues to engage in protracted and sporadic negotiations with the government.
In 2019 a resolution by the General Council of GPSU to strike if the government failed to accede to the wishes of workers was nullified after then Minister of Public Health Volda Lawrence set up a committee to investigate the complaints. This committee fell apart after two meetings with government representatives no longer available for discussions.
With the advent of COVID-19 the health workers once again raised their voices against their working conditions and remuneration adding a request that all workers in the sector be paid a risk allowance and be provided adequate Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). They persisted in their protest despite threats of sanction by Attorney General Anil Nandlall, backing down only when assured by their Union that the government would meet their demands.
This assurance came on the same day, October 7, a planned strike was scheduled to begin.
On that day Alexander told this newspaper that the union had a meeting with the government, where the two discussed an agreement to have the demands made by the health workers be negotiated over a two-week period.
“The government has come to an agreement to meet our demands but our strike action has not been abandoned or withdrawn. But it is just put on hold, if they don’t meet our demands in the two weeks we will take an industrial move,” he claimed.
