National Forum on SSPP issues communique

Social Partners have agreed to commence determination of the National Daily Minimum Wage and Public sector wage negotiation for 2016 on June.23 and conclude by September this year, a 41-point communiqué issued at the end of the 2nd National Forum on the implementation of the Single Spine Pay Policy (SSPP) at Takoradi.

This is to enable the Ministry of Finance (MoF) to incorporate the outcomes into the National Budget of 2016, it said.

Mr Haruna Iddrisu, the Minister of Employment and Labour Relations, Mr Terrence Darko, the President of the Ghana Employers’ Association and Brother Kofi Asamoah, Secretary General of the Trades Union Congress (Ghana), signed the communiqué.

The communiqué said the Controller and Accountant-General’s Department (CAGD) must continue with the Cabinet approved payroll reforms initiatives.

It said the CAGD must be resourced to implement the E-Payroll reforms to complement the Human Resource Management Information System (HRMIS), initiated under the auspices of the Public Services Commission (PSC).

The communiqué asked the government to complete the implementation the E-SPV and E-Zwich system for payment of salary of public servants on government payroll.

It urged the Ministry of Finance (MoF) and the CAGD to integrate the payroll data with the biometric database and continue the ongoing verification and re-validation of employees’ biometric programmes in collaboration with the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT).

Government must also review sanctions for payroll offences and make them more punitive, the communiqué said.

It said the PSC proposals be adopted as the basis for developing a Performance Management System and the establishment of a framework for developing public service productivity indicators.

The communiqué proposed that a National Productivity Forum be organized to determine strategies for enhancing productivity in the public service and adoption of an institutional capacity building instituted to improve human resource capacity in the public service.

It said the implementation of the Market Premium (MP) should be expedited to help attract and retain the needed critical skills in short supply in the public service and effects on pensions should be considered in eliminating the interim market premium.

The communiqué said there should be administrative instructions to guide the implementation of all allowances and negotiations for categories 2 and 3 allowances by June this year.

It said negotiations between managements and unions for payment of non-core allowances should be well coordinated by the Ministry of Finance and the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission to ensure that they are harmonized and standardized within budget constraints. The communiqué said the state is the employer of all public service employees and that there should be no private negotiations in any organization without the prior written consent of the PSC and FWSC.

It said institutions of state such the National Labour Commission or any Alternative Dispute Resolution Centres, public or private, should be given the opportunity to help in the resolution of labour disputes before resorting to the law courts.