Linden nurses protest for gratuity

Apr 11, 2013 News

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By Jacquey Bourne

Nurses and ancillary workers of the Linden Hospital Complex staged a protest in Linden earlier yesterday. Chanting “No money, no work”, the protestors, mainly women began their protest action in front the Linden Hospital Complex, Watooka, around 9.30am.
They walked three miles to Central Mackenzie where they spent some time in front the LEN Building before continuing to Co-op Crescent then hiring a bus around 11.30am to take the protest action

to Georgetown.
The protest action of the Linden Hospital Complex workers stemmed from non-payment of their gratuity. According to one of the protestors, they are contract workers within the Linden Hospital Complex and are not entitled to pension but receive a gratuity every six months.
She said that over 70 workers, most of them nurses, did not receive their gratuity last month.
Additionally, the protestors are disgruntled that some workers – mainly supervisors – received their gratuity on time last month-end while the more than 70 workers did not receive such payment.
As the protest intensified so did the chants.  “Who must go? Management,” the protestors shouted as they carried placards that read: “Injustice to Nurses”, “No money, no work”, “No more delay”, “Wuk yuh like a donkey, pay yuh like a junkie”.
One agitated protestor said that they were protesting the actions of the management of the Linden Hospital Complex. The protestors pointed to other issues, including reduction of the gratuity of employees who become pregnant.
The worker said that the National Insurance Scheme pays 70 percent of a worker’s salary if that worker is on maternity leave but that worker would suffer a substantial reduction in gratuity when that worker goes on maternity leave.
One protestor further stated: “If you’re sick for one day, they take away three months from the gratuity. So, it’s a lot of things with management. We are not going to tolerate it anymore.”
Noting that the government has adopted “playing delaying tactics”, the protestors said that since they did not receive their gratuity at last month’s pay day, every time they threatened industrial action they were promised a speedy resolution.
She said their representatives met with the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Health in Georgetown last Friday and were promised that payment would have been made this Tuesday.
However, the workers were later told that the government only had $1M available for payment and the workers should determine who among them were most in need of money. The disbursement of $1m would then be made to those who were identified as being currently most in need of money.
According to the protestors, the very thought is an insult since they are hard working essential workers and are entitled to the six-monthly gratuity payment without added condition.
Minister of Health Dr. Bheri Ramsaran said the nonpayment is a mild administrative blunder which could be rectified. He claims that the names of the nurses were not submitted by the supervisors on time and measures have been put in place to deal with the errant supervisors if any is to be blamed. He said they are working to have the payments ready by month end.
The Minister added that the Linden Hospital Complex will soon be having a neo-natal ICU installed so that their millennium goal of reducing mortality will be achieved.
He also said that nurses will be trained specifically for this unit.
This unit is the brainchild of Dr. Narsingh who spent most of his life in Linden as his father was the Chief Medical Officer of the Hospital years ago.
Meanwhile, yesterday in the National Assembly, the matter was raised by APNU’s Vanessa Kissoon. Kissoon said that it was unsatisfactory that the Ministry cannot get the matter sorted.  According to the Member of Parliament the matter was raised last Friday and that she had spoken to the Minister of Health.
Minister of Health Bheri Ramsaran in response to Kissoon, described her complaint as a simple administrative matter. He said that many nurses understand the glitch.
After giving that explanation, the Minister described Kissoon’s action as “seeking attention during dog season”.
This caused uproar in the ranks of the joint opposition and the speaker quickly reprimanded the Minister. He described the statement as very discriminatory.

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