DP proposes supplement for school bus workers’ pay
(CNS): Deputy Premier and Social Development Minister André Ebanks has proposed that the government pay a stipend during the summer months to people employed by private companies contracted to provide school bus transportation services for Cayman Islands Government (CIG) primary and high schools.
In a statement to parliament last week, Ebanks said that private bus companies used in the education system are only paid for the ten months of each academic year that they are engaged to provide services. In turn, the bus companies only pay their employees for this time.
In his calculations for MPs, the deputy premier also reduced the time for which bus wardens and bus drivers are compensated by the number of days in weekends, public holidays, and vacation breaks during those ten months, concluding that they are only paid for approximately 8.75 months out of every twelve.
According to the Labour Law, employers are required to pay staff their regular wages on public holidays or pay them double if they are required to work. It would also be very unusual for any employer to pay wages for weekends off, and it is generally accepted that people paid by the week or the hour must find a way for that to last the whole week.
Making a case for paying private sector workers a stipend, Ebanks said that while bus wardens and drivers are only paid for the days they work, civil servants in similar roles receive a fixed salary throughout the entire year.
Although the UPM government has rejected recommendations by the Minimum Wage Advisory Committee to raise the minimum wage from an unlivable $6 per hour, the deputy premier also noted the rise in the cost of living as a factor in the need to pay the stipend for this particular group of workers.
However, the deputy premier has not suggested that the bus companies pay their employees more so that they have enough to live on in the summer months, even if that means increasing the value of their contract with the government. Nor is he suggesting that the drivers and wardens become full-time civil servants employed by the government to drive the buses or short-term government employees doing some kind of work over the summer months.
Instead, he said that his ministry is finalising a policy to give a stipend during the summer directly to the bus company employees, which would somehow bridge the gap between the pay structures of civil servants and employees of private companies.
However, if they receive a government stipend instead of a pay rise, their employers would not have to pay more into their pension plans.
“Through this summer stipend, we seek to address the deficiency in pay structures and ensure fairness for individuals providing transportation services to our children so they can access education,” Ebanks told MPs.
The ministry is also developing a supporting policy to set parameters for the proposed summer stipend and potentially continue the programme in future years, budget permitting, he said.
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Category: Education, Government Administration, Politics
if una only kn the trouble una kids gives on tho6 buses una wouldn’t have time to write up stupidness on this wall take time to consider u in our situation
if una only kn the trouble una kids gives on tho6 buses una wouldn’t have time to write up stupidness on this wall take time to consider u in our situation
I usually agree with Andre. But not this time! No. Absolutely not.
Teachers only work 10 months of the year and are only paid for 10 months (most schools do give them their pay OVER 12 months though so that they get a cheque in the summer). If budgeting is the issue for the school bus drivers, their employer could do the same for them.
You forgot to mention that bus drivers earn a fraction of what a teacher makes. Teachers are underpaid as it is… If you think that comparison is equitable, you’re not thinking.
It would make more sense to expand the contract to provide actual services for the remainder of the year…
Government ministers only work 4 months a year. My vote is to only pay them for the months they work!
auditor general should take a look at this nonsense….
I think they call this socialism. Income redistribution at its finest. Assuming the bus company has a contract with CIG that’s the amount of money they get period as that’s what they bid. Make it work, if not simply don’t bid the contract. If enough companies dropout prices will rise for the remains contractors. Same holds true for drivers. If you can’t make it on this salary quit and find another job. This is simply election year vote buying 😡😡😡
not even trying to hide the vote buying in the slightest anymore. and everyone is just okay with it.
Pretty sad state when this is the kind of thing that the Deputy Premier is spending his time on. He has evidently become a player in the game of West Bay politics.
Deputy Premier has now crossed the line…
We knew that from the time he threw Wayne under the bus while clutching his rosary beads (which we’ve never seen before, nor since).
These elected people, educated or not are so juvenile. They are not incurring any costs during the summers so why should they get a stipend? While I don’t know how much they are being paid for this service they should be able to save some money to take them through 2 months. Pray tell us what they will do when they get too old to drive! I wish these politicians would tell us where the money trees are growing that they shake every morning!
Eventually CIG will be supporting everyone and there won’t be anyone paying for that support.
And yet pensioners cannot access more than 15k a year of their pensions regardless of what they have put in, but yeh give the bus drivers more money for not working.
so let me understand this. Finally the civil service outsourcing jobs to the private sector. But the UPM finds a pay to continue to pay the employees from Government coffers.
you can’t make this stuff up.
election were are you.
UPM. study, get a job, work hard and we will redistribute your money to someone who didn’t.
You all should FOI how much this government and previous governments have given to Jamacia! I bet your mouths will never close. Its ridiculous.
What a load of crap. This new government has done so much damage it’s not even funny. They all need to GO!
Will this be in addition to what they are getting now for driving the buses around without any school kids?
I have seen them dropping off cleaners and helpers to their places of employment and using their stoplights in the process!
More money thrown at the Jamaican voters. Choo choo goes the vote buying train.
How convenient this how only now come up? The business can’t afford the staff for their contracted bid?
How many of them are working multiple jobs? Disgusting. Where the fuck is the governor here? This place is as bent as TCI and BVI if not more!
3:27, Do you want direct rule? Then the Governor will have the power to get involved.
The Governor, due to Sir Alden effectively watering down her constitutional power, can only get involved in foreign policy, defense, security and safety.
The way things are going increasingly believe that direct rule is the way to go.
Direct rule for a decade is the only, the ONLY savour for our islands. Dissolve parliament, the governor takes charge and for the next 10 years every chief office reports to a non biased, non garrison committed civil servant from the UK.
In ten years time. Set us free again to mess it all up again.
? Is there an election coming up soon?
He will either give it away as a stipend or give it away as a NAU benefit. One way or another people are smart enough to know how to work around a system which encourages them to ask for more and more handouts.
Absolutely unnecessary for the private companies who have contracts with Government. Am sure they have enough sense to factor the cost of operating the bus service for the months they operate. Not sure if they have to pay their bus drivers for the off periods. Or if they are just paid by the hour for the work they actually do.
I’m a Caymanian working for a private bus company as bus warden until you are in the position then u can voice ur opinion as we all know the coat of living is really high rent and food has gone up tremendously the most of private bus company doesn’t pay for public holidays or school leave do u prefer that people live off of NAU I think the Government need to force the private bus companies to pay their works more 1,200 for the month is nothing to live off of and it depends on the days we work sin the month of April and December we only receive about 700 because of the holidays how can you live from that salary come on Cayman people please be realistic
Jobs that are not full-time work should not require full time pay..
Elections can’t come soon enough so this wasteful spending will stop.
Wasteful spending will not stop. A different government will have their own set of people in mind on who to give money away to.
Remember the proposed stipend for starving artists? Well they put one of them to work on Cayman Brac painting street signs – and he does a very very good job.
Maybe they could be allocated to a summer camp with paid staff? The children are going to be ‘somewhere’
This is nonesense. Does government directly compensate construction workers when the rain falls too hard for them to work and be paid? Does the government compensate tourism workers directly when a cruise ship doesn’t turn up?
My only guess is that Andre owns the bus company and is too cheap to pay his employees a living 12 month salary.
WHY is CIG supplementing private companies employees wages? Surely this isn’t the first year this has occurred, and why wasn’t this addressed in the contract with the private bus companies? Where is the Education Minister in all this?
If I had a job that paid me to work 10 months but didn’t pay me for the two months I didn’t work, I might look for a job for those two months. It wouldn’t occur to me to ask the government (i.e. the taxpayer, us) for a handout. I guess different people have different mindsets.
But it’s ok to give our millions of dollars away to these parasites????? Along with our supplies, using our airlines which we tax payers will have to pay. This is exactly why the cost of living is soaring. Premier O’Connor -conoly and her pack of rouges. Damn ridiculous!
it’s called adulting and good for you!
I was recently almost involved in an accident with a school bus. The driver flew past me on a blind bend, and when a car came the other way, he then pulled across into my path, forcing me off the road to avoid a collision. Pretty shaken, I followed him as he pulled into the school bus bay and asked him why he had done it. His response? He had right of way as he was overtaking, he was absolutely adamant that he had done nothing wrong. You seriously want to pay these guys more??! Perhaps spend the money on some remedial driving training instead, it’s scary that these guys are driving our children!
Seems like a lot of people can’t read past the headline.
“ However, the deputy premier has not suggested that the bus companies pay their employees more so that they have enough to live on in the summer months, even if that means increasing the value of their contract with the government.”
It’s gonna cost government more either way. Either directly or indirectly.
What a load of crap!!! Election is in full swing!!!! I expected better from Andre.
Why should government foot this expense??? The private companies that provide this service can either increase the contract to government or ensure that their employees are being paid fair wages. We don’t know what it costs the private companies to pay salaries, do repairs, etc. but I am pretty sure they are making money on this and not doing this out of the goodness of their hearts.
Of all the crap!!! Stay tuned folks cause these clowns are going to veer off the budget to secure their seats.
For bus wardens maybe. But for bus drivers why?? Aren’t the bus companies under contract? Compensation for their employees are their responsibility? That should be factored into the cost of their contracts, not an add-on!!
This Government is just a distribution team of free public money!
What???
Talk about free hand outs. Why not give these persons jobs.
Cayman we can’t have another 4 years of this.
Yeah, well the election alternatives are bad too. Our choices are awful.
Problem here is that the political talent pool is so, so, so low.
free handouts for all….zzzzzz
this placed is doomed.
If you don’t work for government, you don’t matter.
Fortunately, there are enough work permit holders to pay for the parasites. This does however make Cayman extraordinarily vulnerable to competition in the financial services sector from other locations.
So the bus companies don’t factor all that into the contract?
This is nothing short government subsidies for businesses that can’t be bothered to pay a living wage. And a little vote buying mixed in.