According to a reports from a Global News Correspondent states that some government employees in the Turks and Caicos Islands have received termination notices this week.
There had earlier been some specific leaks relating to certain employees being targeted for redundancy coming out of offices in Grand Turk last week, which are this week being borne out by actual layoffs.
It appears that, despite some layoffs occurring previously in specific government agencies, more than 600 government employees who do not have official civil service tenure status remained on the government payroll.
The failure of the interim government to investigate job descriptions, productivity issues, work assignments and actual government needs since the direct rule takeover by Britain in August 2009 is said to have added significantly to the territory’s financial deficit.
In addition to civil servants with tenure, the previous internal government led by the Progressive National Party (PNP) used the mechanism of discretionary hiring through the offices of permanent secretaries to swell the ranks of government employees..
Based on figures now available that provide the present breakdown of government workers, there are almost 1,660 civil servants with tenure. Some 618 more remain on the payroll but received their employment without approval of the Public Service Commission. There are also 140 employees who are known as ‘contract officers”.
The break down by islands, excluding contracted employees, is as follows:
| Island/Population (as reported by NHIP) |
Civil Servants |
Other government employees |
| Grand Turk 5,375 | 838 | 353 |
| Providenciales 21,340 | 627 | 157 |
| North Caicos 1,242 | 93 | 53 |
| Middle Caicos 141 | 8 | 42 |
| South Caicos 1,128 | 82 | 99 |
| Salt Cay 120 | 10 | 14 |
With the Permanent Secretaries writing to the Civil Service Association (CSA) to announce their position that redundancies must occur in what they referred to as a “padded” civil service, attention has been focused in every community on the people who received these jobs and are now receiving notice.
One example has come out of South Caicos, where the last elected representatives McAllister Hanchell and Norman Saunders saw the ranks of government employees grow larger in percentage terms than any other island, including North Caicos, where Michael Misick and Royal Robinson were the representatives.
This week, an employee who received notice had a checkered past before being hired on the government payroll. Having been sentenced to 20 years in prison for child battery, he was released in 6 years for good behaviour. Later, he was convicted of homicide but had the conviction reversed on appeal due to what some report as sloppy police work. It is unclear what his assignment was in the government service.
RTC News is following up to confirm the information presented by the popular website.
Source: Global News
