Salary setback for UWI’s academic staff

A 15 PER CENT salary increase accepted by academic staff of The University of the West Indies (UWI) will not be paid this week as initially agreed on after the tertiary institution indicated to union representatives that it will not be able to meet the deadline.

In an April 16 letter to Professor Paul Brown, president of West Indies Group of University Teachers (WIGUT), Campus Registrar Dr Donovan Stanberry said the decision came after a meeting with the relevant teams needed to implement an across-the-board increase.

“The executive management was advised that it would be impossible, especially in light of the fact that all three payrolls are due on April 25, 2024,” the letter from Stanberry said.

However, he said the teams have commenced the work, and sought to assure that the new salaries will be disbursed in May. April’s additional payment is also expected to be made at that time.

Brown declined to comment on the development when contacted by The Gleaner on Monday, indicating that he did not have any other information to add.

WIGUT informed members via a newsletter on Friday about the delayed payment.

Members were told early April that negotiations had reached a point where the Government had placed an offer on the table of a 15 per cent salary increase, effective April 2024.

OFFER ON TABLE

A proposal for a retroactive payment of five per cent that would cover the period August 2023 to March 2024, to be paid in October 2024, was put on the table.

Additionally, a salary increase of 9.5 per cent is to take effect April 2024. Through compound interest the net overall increase to salaries amounted to 15 per cent.

“After much discussion, members voted to either accept or reject the offer. Voting concluded with a majority, 70 per cent, of the attendees opting to accept the offer,” WIGUT’s lead negotiator Hubert Devonish told members.

The union said still in the pipeline is the completion of the full collective bargaining agreement, inclusive of non-salary items, for the 2023-2026 triennium, and the campaign for compensation review and for regional and international salaries as part of this review.

“There are many rivers still to cross. The cost-of-living allowance is just the first of these. The journey continues to the end of the year and most likely beyond. We shall have to remain organised and militant,” Devonish said.

In January, academic and senior administrative and professional staff at The UWI backed away from taking industrial action as efforts were made to undertake an interim salary adjustment while a compensation review took place.

The workers and their unions had indicated a week prior that they would take protest action to press the Government on the matter.

They had argued that UWI employees were the only major group of public sector workers not to benefit from the increases paid to public sector workers as part of the Government’s compensation reform.

kimone.francis@gleanerjm.com