Published 8 March 2023
Basseterre
Buckie Got It, St Kitts Nevis News Source
DEPARTMENT OF LABOUR TO PRESENT TO CABINET MINIMUM WAGE INCREASE RECOMMENDATIONS
Basseterre, St. Kitts, March 8, 2023 (SKNIS): The Policy and Labour Relations Unit in the Department of Labour will make a Cabinet submission recommending an increase in the minimum wage, said Honourable Marsha Henderson, Minister of Employment and Labour, during her presentation at the sitting of National Assembly on March 7, 2023.
“The last administration would have put together a minimum wage advisory committee in 2018 and they would have submitted a report to the government in 2019,” Minister Henderson.
“The last time the minimum wage increased was in 2014 under a Labour-led Administration and I can report that the next time minimum will be increased will be under this labour-led administration,” she added.
“We have the report, and the report did make some recommendations as to what needed to be done. We met as a Cabinet and we have put together the committee that is going to embark on the work that is coming out of that same report that was made available in 2019,” she said.
Honourable Henderson indicated that the Labour-led Administration of St. Kitts and Nevis is serious about labour and labour relations within the Federation.
Honourable Henderson also said, “The second significant suggestion being considered by the policy and labour relations unit is something referred to as a four-day work week which came out of COVID-19 and the practices that we adopted as a result of the pandemic.”
“In fact, when we met with the central bank as a Cabinet about two Mondays ago, we inquired about this as well and we had that unit working on the submission to be made to the Cabinet,” she said.
She also stated that a pilot project will be undertaken once the Cabinet agrees with the Ministry’s recommendations.
