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Only basic salaries for nurses: TU writes to Health Ministry

17 May 2020

By Sarah Hannan The All Ceylon Nurses’ Union (ACNU) has recently written to the Ministry of Health and Indigenous Medical Services about the grievances of nurses in state hospitals. ACNU President S.B. Mediwatte, speaking to The Sunday Morning, said that nurses are facing several issues with not being able to take their leave and insufficient transport facilities to report to work. “Over the past two months, they have made it a point to report to work regularly hoping the Government would provide them an allowance. Initially, it was promised that the nurses would be paid a special Covid-19 allowance for reporting to duty when called on. But they faced quite a lot of issues as they were not provided proper transport and had to pay high prices to get a taxi to go home after their shift ended at 7 p.m.” Mediwatte also noted that the nurses who were to report to work for the night shift too sometimes faced difficulties in getting transport and have personally borne expenses to report to work by hiring taxi services. He further pointed out that prior to the pandemic, the nurses followed a roster system when applying for leave as well. They found that system very sustainable as everyone got a chance to take the leave they were entitled to. However, with their regular routines being disrupted, all they could hope for was the additional allowances that were promised to them. “Now we are told that the Government cannot afford to pay the allowances; to top it all off, they are now requesting employees to donate a portion of their salaries to the Covid-19 Fund. These nurses are already facing financial difficulties as they had to pocket out their taxi fares, and they are now deprived of an allowance the Government promised.” The ACNU has now forwarded a request to the Ministry of Health, urging they pay the due allowances and overtime to the nurses with their May salary that is due on 25 May. The Government has informed the health sector that they will only be paid the basic salary and would not be paid their overtime allowance even if they had worked during the public holidays. Officials at the Ministry of Health refused to comment regarding the matter.

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