NASSAU, BAHAMAS — Bahamas Public Services Union (BPSU) President Kimsley Ferguson yesterday expressed grave disappointment with Minister of Health Renward Wells, suggesting his handling of matters related to nurses and their long-standing battle with the government for funds owed to them has been less than desirable.
He spoke to Eyewitness News hours before Bahamas Nurses Union (BNU) President Amancha Williams said following a meeting with Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis, he once again assured that nurses will be paid for overtime submitted from March through September 2020, and the honorarium, even if he is not.
Williams and dozens of nurses demonstrated outside the Office of the Prime Minister yesterday, and in Rawson Square as the House of Assembly met on Wednesday, to lament the government’s treatment of nurses, who remain on the frontlines of the pandemic and worked tirelessly amid and following Hurricane Dorian in September 2019.
Ferguson, who expressed full support of the nurses, said he planned to file a number of trade disputes on behalf of 200 support staff, lobotomists, axillary nurses, patient care attendants and administrators, many of whom have not been paid for overtime work associated with the record storm or received the honorarium payment for stepping forward at the onset of the pandemic.
“I would have made countless attempts to reach the minister of health to speak with him concerning the overtime and also concerning the honorarium that persons should have received for the COVID situation and you can never reach the minister of health, and if he answers his phone, he tells you he will call you back.
“And so, what I did is I screenshot everything and sent it to him and I let him know.
“Now, I know you have constituents. I have constituents and when your administrative officers cannot provide me with information, then I have to come straight to the source.”
He continued: “I am very disappointed in him.”
During Wednesday’s protest, Wells did not engage nurses, but spoke briefly with reporters as he entered the House of Assembly.
He said he had already spoken to the union’s leadership on two occasions, and insisted the government’s commitment to pay nurses had not changed.
But Williams cried shame on the minister for failing to speak with them, calling it a disgrace.
During an exchange with Englerston MP Glenys Hanna-Martin in Parliament, Wells insisted that certain nurses had been paid.
Ferguson said he plans to file the trade dispute at the Department of Labour sometime next week.
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