THE Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union (Popcru) have rejected the implementation of a new public sector wage deal.
The police said the public sector wage increase of 1.5 percent was an insult to the union’s members, who are frontline workers.
The union further demands that employer must consider incorporating non-pensionable gratuity into the baseline to effect real increase into public servants salaries.
Several unions have accepted the government’s wage offer, including the South African Democratic Teachers Union, the Health and Other Services Personnel Trade Union, Denosa, Naptosa, and the PSA, who represent more than 60-percent of the public sector workforce.
The PSA, which represents 230,000 public servants, said it regarded government’s interim wage offer as a temporary measure in the absence of no agreement being reached on their other salary demands related to a housing allowance and medical aid.
“The PSA was set to serve the employer with a strike notice after its members voted in favour of such action to apply pressure on the employer to pay attention to employees’ pleas for a salary adjustment to sustain themselves. The PSCBC, however, reconvened on 6 July 2021 and the employer presented a revised offer as a stop-gap measure to alleviate financial pressure on public servants,” said PSA in a statement.
“Clause 3.3 of the agreement provides that the cash allowance will remain in force until a new agreement is reached, indicating that the agreement does not respond to workers’ demands and is regarded as a temporary measure in the absence of no agreement being reached on tabled salary demands.”
Several unions previously took the government to court for reneging on a multi-year agreement.
- Inside Politics
