Georgetown: Minister of Governance, Raphael Trotman said Government is not “numb to the concerns of the people” but that the decision to award Cabinet members a salary increase, was taken in an effort to remove disparities and asymmetries that existed under the previous administration and to bring some semblance of parity to the salary structures of government ministers and judicial and constitutional office holders.
The Minister was at the time responding to questions posed by media operatives at a post-Cabinet press briefing, held earlier today, at the Ministry of the Presidency.
“A judge at the High Court upon commencement at the most junior level receives a salary in excess of $1M. There are three branches of government; the Judiciary, the Legislature and the Executive. It is expected that there is some parity between the three,” the Minister explained.
He added that Cabinet had studied two proposals, which were submitted by independent sources, for salary increases. In the end, both proposals were rejected, because the proposed salaries, in those documents, were even higher than what was finally decided on. A compromise position was finally approved and the Minister assures that both the budget and the treasury could sustain the increases.
Minister Trotman noted that the issue of salary increases for politicians and judges has never gone down well in any part of the world. He acceded, “It is not a popular decision.” However, it was deemed necessary, since the Government inherited an uneven pay scale for Government Ministers and Members of Parliament.
Over the past two weeks, this issue has attracted much public commentary even as several government ministers tried to explain the basis for the increase. The most recent being Minister of Finance, Winston Jordan who comprehensively outlined the anomalies that had existed.
In an article in the Kaietuer News, Minister Jordan explained that the coalition government inherited a system where the President was receiving salary of about $2M non-taxable, the Prime Minister-$1.5M, the Attorney General- $1.5M and the Chancellor and the Chief Justice- $1.6M each. On the other hand, the junior and senior ministers were receiving about $579,000.
He went on to explain that this system does not exist anywhere in the Caribbean, where junior and senior ministers are paid the same salary. There were even instances where several high-ranking contracted employees were earning more than Ministers and as such, the Government sought to institute increases to regulate this system.
In addition, since the current administration has a different structure, which includes Vice Presidents, adjustments had to be made
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