[UPDATED} On The Job trainees got 10% stipend increase

Labour Minister Jennifer Baptiste-Primus. -
Labour Minister Jennifer Baptiste-Primus. -

TRAINEES in the On the Job Training (OJT) programme have received a ten per cent rise in their stipend,  Labour Minister Jennifer Baptiste-Primus said last Wednesday at a sitting of the House of Representatives Standing Finance Committee.
The increase was given from last December.

She said 5,000 trainees were sharing in a monthly increase of $3 million, which works out to an average of $600 extra per month for each person.

Baptiste-Primus said while the ministry usually aims to train and place 400 trainees per month into paid jobs in various sectors, covid19 restrictions on gatherings had interrupted this, with the ministry now having to make fresh calculations.

The minister gave figures to show that by far, most OJT trainees are in the public sector, which has 3,548 females and 1,272 males.

The private sector has 65 females and 32 males, she said,, while the NGO sector has 68 females and 28 males.

Baptiste-Primus lamented that during the pandemic, private-sector companies had said that until their businesses could recover, they could not retain some 100 trainees.

Replying to Chaguanas East MP Fazal Karim’s query, she said the ministry owes $350,000 to private employers, which she aimed to pay as soon as possible so as to stimulate the firms to retain their trainees. The ministry got an extra budget allocation of $21 million overall, prompting Karim to complain this rise was less than last year’s supplementary appropriation of $39 million, but with Finance Minister Colm Imbert saying last year’s figure was completely irrelevant to the present case.

Editor's note: This story was updated on June 15, 2020. The original story is below.

People enrolled in the On the Job Training (OJT) programme can soon expect to enjoy a ten per cent increase in their monthly stipend, Labour Minister Jennifer Baptiste-Primus on Wednesday told the House of Representatives' Standing Finance Committee.

She said 5,000 trainees will share in a monthly increase of $3 million, which works out to an average of $600 extra per month for each person.

Baptiste-Primus said while the ministry usually aims to train and place 400 trainees per month into paid jobs in various sectors, covid19 restrictions on gatherings had interrupted this, with the ministry now having to make fresh calculations.

The minister gave figures to show that by far, most OJT trainees are in the public sector which has 3,548 females and 1,272 males.

The private sector has 65 females and 32 males, said Baptiste-Primus, while the NGO sector has 68 females and 28 males.

Baptiste-Primus lamented that during the pandemic, private sector companies had said that until their businesses could recover, they could not retain some 100 trainees.

Replying to Chaguanas East MP Fazal Karim’s query, she said the ministry owes $350,000 to private employers, which she aimed to pay as soon as possible so as to stimulate the firms to retain their trainees. The ministry got an extra budget allocation of $21 million overall, prompting Karim to complain this rise was less than last year’s supplementary appropriation of $39 million, but with Finance Minister Colm Imbert saying last year’s figure was completely irrelevant to the present case.

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"[UPDATED} On The Job trainees got 10% stipend increase"

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