TEMPERS flared on Monday morning outside the gates of the Registrar General’s Department (RGD) office in Twickenham Park, St Catherine, where a sick-out by the staff over wages and other issues led to a clash between frustrated customers and police.

As a result of the clash, some of the people who had spent hours waiting, with hopes of being allowed to conduct business, were left rubbing their eyes and crying after the cops used pepper spray to subdue the rowdy crowd.

Shirlene Campbell, who had travelled from rural Jamaica to the office, complained that at no point did anyone from the RGD come out to explain what was happening. While she demonstrated an understanding of the reason for the industrial action, Campbell felt that the management should have moved assiduously to have someone attend to the people who travelled long distances to get there.

“No management came out and said anything to us. They have us out here burning in the sun like animals. I came all the way from the country and I paid $3,000 on transportation alone to come. Last week, they told me the system was down and I must come back on Monday. I was travelling from Sunday night and when I reached here early Monday morning, the gate nuh open.

“I need Prime Minister Andrew Holness to stand up for poor people. Take a look at the things happening in government offices. Some of them don’t know how to treat people. The PM needs to flush out a lot of those in management because dem nah do weh dem fi do. If they even strike, the management should see to it that they take in a portion of the people who come from far and make the rest come back another time,” Campbell suggested.

Oneil Grant, president of the Jamaica Civil Service Association, told the Jamaica Observer on Monday that, following meetings with Government, a decision was taken to have workers return to their posts today while the relevant parties work to settle grouses.

According to Grant, the main causes of the workers’ frustration were the non-payment of promised incentives due to staff, as well as the structure of salary bands and the proposed alignment of the RGD.

“The incentives were promised December 2022. The issue of alignment is as a result of what has been described as an error. The Transformation Implementation Unit would have sent a 14-band structure to the RGD. They revised it to a 13-band salary structure which would have affected the top four management levels of the organisation.

“The staff felt that the alignment is not serving the interest of the RGD. They also felt that some of the concerns were not being addressed in the structures that have been sent out, particularly the four levels, and those persons who are supervising people who are on the same pay level. They have asked the union to represent those concerns to the Ministry of Finance to get a response from them this week so we can reconvene on Monday in relation to those responses,” Grant said.

“In light of the conversations we had, we have decided to suspend any action with the view that we will receive a comfortable level of response from the Government that can reduce dissatisfaction,” Grant said. “The staff became very anxious and some have been grief-stricken about how their compensation is being dealt with. The length of time is also a concern. People have concerns with meeting their obligations and we were hoping that it would have been resolved in time to meet those obligations. It caused a jolt.”