New teachers at some primary schools across Barbados are up in arms against the Ministry of Education having not been paid in months.
Some of them complain of not receiving a salary for between three to ten months.
Barbados TODAY has learnt that the lack of an income has placed some of the educators in extreme hardship to the extent that in some cases their mortgage payments are in jeopardy.
A teacher who asked not to be identified for fear of victimization, said the talk in the schools is that the long delay in getting paid is the norm.
“This situation is not fair. We have a right to be paid when we work. Things are already hard in this country and with Christmas around the corner I don’t know what will happen,” an angry teacher declared.
When contacted, Chief Education Officer Dr Ramona Archer-Bradshaw admitted that from the time she took up office in August, she had been receiving these complaints.
However, she sought to assure the teachers that the ministry was working urgently on resolving the pay issue.
“Any payment that hasn’t been made, we are looking into that and we are trying to resolve these issues,” the Chief Education Officer told Barbados TODAY.
Asked if the payments would be made before Christmas, she replied: “Well, we are trying assiduously to have all of those matters rectified.”
Pressed on whether the outstanding payments would be made before the busy Christmas period Dr Archer-Bradshaw said: “Well, I can’t tell you that, I can tell you we are trying assiduously to have all of the matters rectified.”
When the Chief Education Officer was asked to respond to the claims that the late payment of salaries is the norm, she said “I can’t tell you whether it’s the norm, but I do understand. It has been brought to my attention since I came to office that there were some teachers who have not been paid. And I can tell you that we are looking to deal with those matters as a matter of urgency, and we have been dealing with them as a matter of priority.”
President of the Barbados Union of Teachers (BUT) Pedro Shepherd said he is not aware of any teacher who has not been paid for as long as 10 months.
But in any case, he said he would investigate the non-payment matter to try to get to the bottom of it.
“I don’t see how a young teacher would come to work for 10 months without pay and not draw it to the attention of their union and have some representation made on their behalf. Ten months is a very long time to be working without money. It sounds rather strange to me,” the BUT leader told Barbados TODAY.
“But it is something I guess I would have to ask my executive members or my steward body to find out what’s happening. I know we have been making representation on behalf of those coordinators and so on who might not have been getting their allowances, but I don’t know of salary issues. I would have to do a check on it,” he promised.
emmanueljoseph@barbadostoday.bb
