Latest update November 5th, 2024 1:00 AM
Recruitment soon on for more Labour and OHS officers – Labour Minister
The Minister of Labour, Joseph Hamilton
Kaieteur News – Guyana’s labour force is set to be strengthened with the Ministry of Labour’s plan to recruit more Labour Officers and Occupational Health and Safety Officers (OHS) soon. This is according to the Minister of Labour, Joseph Hamilton, who made the disclosure while speaking to Kaieteur News yesterday.
The Minister said that permission was recently given by the Ministry of Public Service to improve components within the labour force, which includes the hiring of more officers. In light of that, he stated that the Labour Ministry will be hiring ten labour officers and 18 OHS officers, who will be distributed among the regions based on their needs.
Hamilton had appeared on Kaieteur Radio’s “Wake Up Guyana” radio programme last year where he expressed that Guyana only has about 20% of the required quantity of labour officers and OHS officers needed for the efficient monitoring of the labour industry. He said that an adequate number of officers is lacking in every region of the country, which has made it extremely difficult for the Labour Ministry to tackle labour-related matters in all regions.
According to Hamilton, the central region, Region Four (Demerara-Mahaica), only has eight labour officers, standing below the required number and other regions have about one officer each, which he referred to as “sprinklings.”
Now, in the regions that have only one labour officer, another will be added so every region can have at least two officers. This he stated, is ideally what the Ministry is aiming for. Hamilton gave a distribution of the new officers regionally, where he said that Regions One, Two, Five, Seven, Eight and Nine will each have one labour officer added and Regions Four and Ten will each have two officers added.
In Region Ten, one will serve in Kwakwani, while the other one serves in Linden. Since Region Four will have ten labour officers when the two are added, he said that two will serve on the East Coast of Demerara, two will serve on the East Bank of Demerara and the other six will remain at the central office in Georgetown.
Currently, there are 16 labour officers and nine OHS officers countrywide.
Additionally, Minister Hamilton noted that a move has been made to write to the Public Service Ministry to seek permission to place advertisements for the positions, where they will recruit those who meet the requirements.
It was also stated that a skills assessments survey will be conducted next month. The Ministry will also do a first phase skills assessment on the formal economy by the second quarter of this year/ the end of June and another one on the informal economy by the end of September.
Going forward he said, these things will help them to plan and advise the government about skill needs on a national and regional level.
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