Min­is­ter of Ed­u­ca­tion Dr Nyan Gads­by-Dol­ly says every ef­fort is be­ing made to en­sure that teach­ers re­ceive their back­pay by Christ­mas.

Speak­ing with re­porters af­ter a me­dia con­fer­ence at the Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion on St Vin­cent Street, Port-of-Spain, yes­ter­day, Gads­by-Dol­ly said the new Per­ma­nent Sec­re­tary in her min­istry, Jacque­line Charles, was work­ing with their coun­ter­part in the Min­istry of Fi­nance to en­sure that the teach­ers re­ceive their back­pay by the end of 2023.

The min­is­ter ex­plained that Ear­ly Child­hood Care and Ed­u­ca­tion (EC­CE) fa­cil­i­ties were put in place for par­ents of young chil­dren who are work­ing on the back­pay to en­sure the process went smooth­ly.

“We have an EC­CE di­vi­sion that set up a nurs­ery to ac­com­mo­date per­sons who are work­ing af­ter hours and who have chil­dren.

“They are mak­ing all ef­forts with over­time, all of these are on­go­ing to en­sure we com­plete the process and car­ry out the gov­ern­ment’s man­date,” she said.

Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert, dur­ing the 2024 Bud­get pre­sen­ta­tion, an­nounced the pay­ment of back­pay for pub­lic ser­vants, in­clud­ing teach­ers, by Christ­mas.

How­ev­er, Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley sub­se­quent­ly re­vealed that a per­ma­nent sec­re­tary in a min­istry said the back­pay could not be done by Christ­mas and sug­gest­ed it could be achived by May next year. It was lat­er re­vealed the PS in ques­tion, Kurt Mey­ers, was in the Ed­u­ca­tion Min­istry.
Mey­ers, who had gone on leave, was lat­er trans­ferred and re­placed by PS Charles.

Yes­ter­day, Gads­by-Dol­ly said she had a good work­ing re­la­tion­ship with the new PS, who start­ed this week.
She said Charles had hit the ground run­ning and was ac­tive­ly in­volved in the back­pay process and work­ing to en­sure teach­ers re­ceive their monies as promised.

Charles was al­so at the me­dia con­fer­ence yes­ter­day.
The Min­is­ter added that the new PS was “do­ing what is re­quired of a Per­ma­nent Sec­re­tary”.