The Government of Guyana has announced its offer of a 10% salary increase for public service workers earning less than $99,000 per month while those earning between $100,000 and $299,000 could see a 6% increase and those who earn $300,000 to $499,000 per month, stand to gain a 5% increase in their salaries.

Additionally, a 4% salary increase is being offered to the public servants making between $500,000 and $799,000, 2% for those earning $800,000 to $999,000 and for those public servants making more than $1 Million per month, their increase could stand at just 1%.

The offer came at the end of the negotiations between the Government and the Guyana Public Service Union and the Union is yet to make a decision on whether it will accept the offer.  The GPSU is expected to first meet with its General Council before a final decision is made.

When the negotiations started, the GPSU was pushing for a 40% increase in the salaries for public servants. That was readjusted to 25% eventually as the government’s first offer of a 5.5% increase for those earning less than $100,000 a month was rejected.

In a statement on Wednesday night, the Government stated it also agreed during that initial offer to consider a review of allowances for public servants immediately upon the conclusion of the negotiations for Wages and Salaries and as a consequence, a Tripartite Committee comprising representatives from the Department of the Public Service, the Ministry of Finance and the Guyana Public Service Union was established to address this issue.

The government said its final offer for wages and salaries increases for Public Servants had taken into consideration the current socio-economic environment; the difficulty in agreeing to increases that would entail having to raise additional revenue and the unsustainability of any further addition to its offer with regard to the current and future budgets.

The Negotiators

“The GOG reiterated to the Union that its members were also the Government’s employees and that the Government was equally mindful of the need for financial relief for the workers under consideration.”

The statement added that the Union was also reminded of the relief measures that were granted to public servants by the new government since it took office last year and those measures included an increase of the Minimum wage to $50,000; a 5% across-the-board plus $5000 increase, all within the 2015 National Budget, and, a one-off bonus of $50,000 for Public Servants earning below $500,000 per month in December 2015.

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