Rishard Khan
rishard.khan@gaurdian.co.tt
Minister of Finance Colm Imbert has acted on the Prime Minister's promise to provide a financial payment to healthcare workers for their work through the COVID-19 pandemic.
During his Budget presentation in Parliament on Monday, Imbert announced that $210 million will be set aside to make ex gratia payments to some 20,000 healthcare workers.
"It is a fitting tribute to their exemplary and heroic performance that I have acted on the instructions of the Prime Minister...to allocate the sum of $210 million in the estimates of expenditure for fiscal 2023 as a special payment to be distributed to health workers in Trinidad and Tobago. This will involve ex gratia payments to over 20,000 health workers," he said.
If distributed evenly among them, each worker could receive up to $10,500.
One month ago, Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley announced that he would have instructed Minister Imbert to allocate the necessary funds to reward healthcare workers in the Budget for their sterling effort in guiding T&T through the pandemic.