Akash Sama­roo

The Gov­ern­ment has un­apolo­get­i­cal­ly ac­cept­ed the rec­om­men­da­tions of the Salaries Re­view Com­mis­sion (SRC), which will pave the way for a pay in­crease, sub­stan­tial in some cas­es, for politi­cians and oth­er pub­lic of­fi­cers.

Break­ing his si­lence on the mat­ter at yes­ter­day’s post-Cab­i­net news brief­ing, the Prime Min­is­ter said he ac­cepts that some mem­bers of the pub­lic will not be hap­py with their de­ci­sion, but a de­fi­ant Dr Kei­th Row­ley said, “I bear that cross with­out fear of ret­ri­bu­tion.”

The 120th SRC re­port pro­posed salary in­creas­es for the Prime Min­is­ter, Op­po­si­tion Leader, MPS, mem­bers of the Ju­di­cia­ry, and the Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er, among oth­ers.

And while the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress has re­ject­ed out­right, the pro­pos­al that would see the PM’s salary in­crease from $59,680 to $87,847, Dr Row­ley cat­e­gor­i­cal­ly stat­ed the mat­ter would not be up for de­bate.

“The Gov­ern­ment ac­cepts the rec­om­men­da­tions; to im­ple­ment it, it will re­quire a cir­cu­lar from the Min­is­ter of Fi­nance, and the pol­i­tics will start or it will end,” the Prime Min­is­ter re­vealed.

De­fend­ing their po­si­tion, Dr Row­ley said, “We be­lieve that we bring val­ue by work­ing hard, by work­ing hon­est­ly for the peo­ple of the coun­try, and the ben­e­fits are there to be seen by those who want to see ben­e­fits.”

He said he an­tic­i­pat­ed that this de­ci­sion would be used against him on the po­lit­i­cal plat­form with a gen­er­al elec­tion due next year, but he said he was ready for it.

And for mem­bers of the pub­lic who be­lieve they should be ashamed for ac­cept­ing an in­crease, the Prime Min­is­ter said, “And as for the peo­ple in this coun­try who be­lieve that if the mem­bers of the gov­ern­ment and the par­lia­ment are in fact to ac­cept the rec­om­men­da­tions of the com­mit­tee that is set un­der the con­sti­tu­tion for that ex­press pur­pose, it is for them to be ashamed, then so be it, so be it.”

The Prime Min­is­ter added, “I take full re­spon­si­bil­i­ty for ad­vis­ing the Cab­i­net that af­ter 13 years of this work that the mem­bers of the Gov­ern­ment who run this coun­try, a $60 bil­lion en­ter­prise, that the ac­cep­tance of the SRC re­port af­ter 13 years is a mat­ter for the Cab­i­net, and the Cab­i­net should have no dif­fi­cul­ty in con­clud­ing that mat­ter in the way the Gov­ern­ment is say­ing that we would con­clude it.”

Asked by Guardian Me­dia if he be­lieves the new salary pro­posed for the Of­fice of the Prime Min­is­ter is fair and jus­ti­fi­able, the Prime Min­is­ter re­spond­ed, “Whether it is fair or not is not the point. Those who were giv­en the as­sign­ment to do it have done it; these are the rec­om­men­da­tions. I ac­cept it with­out more on this oc­ca­sion.”

He even com­mend­ed the work done by the SRC.

“I’m say­ing that the body that has been asked to look at it in the widest pos­si­ble con­text is the Salaries Re­view Com­mis­sion. I am sim­ply say­ing I have ac­cept­ed the work they have done; the rec­om­men­da­tions have come af­ter work I be­lieve to have been good work, and I am pre­pared to ac­cept their work. And as far as I am con­cerned, that is the end of the sto­ry,” he added.

Guardian Me­dia pressed him on the mat­ter, say­ing that this was com­ing at a time when sev­er­al unions are al­so mak­ing a case for a wage in­crease.

Asked what mes­sage he had for them, the Prime Min­is­ter said, “All of these mat­ters are part of com­part­ments of the gov­ern­ment’s busi­ness, and every sin­gle one of them will be dealt with un­der the arrange­ments to deal with it. It took 13 years for the SRC re­port to be where it is here in front of us. But be­fore there was a time when you were deal­ing with pub­lic ser­vants and giv­ing them a 15 per cent in­crease.”

Piv­ot­ing to the po­si­tion of the Op­po­si­tion Leader on the mat­ter, the Prime Min­is­ter urged the pub­lic not to be fooled by the UNC. “Pub­licly they could pre­tend they are not in­ter­est­ed in it; pri­vate­ly they are rins­ing out your ears that they want it,” he claimed.

He added that the mat­ter does not even con­cern the Op­po­si­tion Leader. “Be­cause as a for­mer prime min­is­ter, her pay­ment from a pen­sion an­gle is al­ready set in un­der the pen­sion act, and in so far as long as she is still func­tion­ing in the Par­lia­ment, arrange­ments are be­ing made that even if the new high­est lev­el that is of­fered to her falls in­to play, she still is not af­fect­ed in any way,” he said.

Dr Row­ley said if ac­cept­ing the SRC’s rec­om­men­da­tion is to be his lega­cy, then he has no fear of that. Guardian Me­dia sug­gest­ed that the com­mis­sion should, for trans­paren­cy’s sake, pub­li­cise how it ar­rived at the new wage struc­tures, a rec­om­men­da­tion that the Prime Min­is­ter said was a good idea.

The Prime Min­is­ter added that some mem­bers of the Ju­di­cial and Le­gal Ser­vice Com­mis­sion (JLSC) had an is­sue with the SRC’s pro­pos­al re­gard­ing their re­mu­ner­a­tion pack­ages, and the Prime Min­is­ter said that sec­tion of the pro­pos­al has been sent back to the SRC for re­view.

Kam­la: It’s a mas­ter­class in shame­less­ness and ar­ro­gant greed

In an im­me­di­ate and scathing re­sponse to the Prime Min­is­ter’s ac­cep­tance of the SRC re­port, the Op­po­si­tion Leader said, “Row­ley is a lazy, greedy old man who should get a pay cut, not an in­crease! His press con­fer­ence to­day was a mas­ter­class in shame­less­ness and ar­ro­gant greed.”

Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar said she was not sur­prised by the PM’s an­nounce­ment. “This is char­ac­ter­is­tic of his self­ish and neg­li­gent be­hav­iour, which is dis­con­nect­ed from cit­i­zens’ strug­gles and fo­cused on self-preser­va­tion,” she said. Per­sad-Bisses­sar ar­gued that it is now abun­dant­ly clear that the Prime Min­is­ter does not care about the av­er­age cit­i­zen.

“That’s why to­day he said noth­ing about the out-of-con­trol vi­o­lent crime and mur­ders, the high cost of liv­ing, poor health­care, no forex, job loss­es and in­creased util­i­ty rates and tax­es. But shame­less­ly found time to do a lengthy press con­fer­ence to jus­ti­fy his ac­cep­tance of a pay in­crease for him­self.”

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said the irony was that this is com­ing from the same Prime Min­is­ter who said dif­fi­cult times are ahead.

“Row­ley is whol­ly tone-deaf and ig­no­rant of the pulse and pain of the pop­u­la­tion, who are fed up, an­gry, and frus­trat­ed, liv­ing in a coun­try be­sieged by crime and where its so­cial fab­ric is de­te­ri­o­rat­ing,” the Op­po­si­tion Leader stat­ed.

The Op­po­si­tion Leader who stands to see her month­ly salary in­crease from $29,590 to $47,500, re­it­er­at­ed that she does not want it. She warned that there will be ret­ri­bu­tion when the gen­er­al elec­tion bell is rung.