TRADE unionist Senator Lambert Brown says doctors have welcomed the Industrial Disputes Tribunal (IDT) ruling on emergency duty payments, urging the Government to comply with the award and work out a disbursement plan with the Jamaica Medical Doctors’ Association (JMDA).

“We are pleased, the doctors are pleased, and we know that the panel was unanimous in respect to the overtime rate,” Brown told the Jamaica Observer on Monday.

Brown, who represents the JMDA in the dispute, was responding to the IDT’s October 5 ruling which ordered a new framework for emergency duty payments and rejected the Government’s proposal to place doctors under a standardised Extra Hours Worked (EHW) system.

The tribunal ordered that the new Emergency Duty Allowance (EDA) rates be based on the JMDA’s March 15, 2024 cost-reduction proposal, with some adjustments, and that the payments be applied retroactively from April 1, 2023.

The ruling also ordered the reinstatement of the incentive allowance for eligible medical officers from

April 1, 2023. Tribunal member Berita Locke, JP, dissented on that aspect of the award, while Chairman Dr Noel Cowell and member Beatrice Rhoden formed the majority.

Brown said the focus must now shift to implementing the award.

“I hope the Government will comply with the ruling of the IDT and will sit down with the doctors and work out a payment schedule, a payment plan to effect their award… the doctors have been suffering for too long, it’s time to put an end to this dispute. Forty-two months is too long,” he said.

Minister of Labour and Social Security Pearnel Charles Jr, in his response to the ruling, said the ministry has acknowledged the tribunal’s decision and would continue to focus on maintaining stable industrial relations.

The dispute centred on whether junior doctors should be placed under the Government’s standardised EHW policy or continue under a system that recognises the different types of emergency duties they perform.

The Government’s EHW policy was designed to establish a standard overtime system across the public service. Under the policy, overtime was generally paid at 1.5 times the normal rate for the first day and twice the rate for the second day and public holidays.

The policy also included a 15-hour weekly limit on extra hours worked, with an exception where an employee was unavoidably required to work beyond that limit to achieve a clearly defined objective and permission was obtained from the appropriate senior official.

The JMDA argued that the arrangement was unsuitable for doctors because of the nature of hospital services and the need for continuous medical care.

The tribunal agreed, finding that emergency duty payments were different from generic public sector overtime because they reflected the specific demands placed on medical officers.

It noted that junior doctors may be required to work 16-hour overnight emergency shifts during weekdays, from 4:00 pm to 8:00 am, as well as 24-hour weekend shifts. Doctors may also be required to cover multiple hospitals and deal with emergencies that cannot be treated as ordinary scheduled overtime.

The tribunal described EDA as a specialised form of overtime pay that takes account of the intensity of doctors’ duties, continuous 16-to-24-hour rotas, cross-coverage and location-based differences.

The JMDA had proposed retaining a multi-tiered emergency duty payment system while reducing the number of existing categories.

The association’s March 15, 2024 cost-reduction proposal grouped the payments into four main areas: rostered duty, covering multiple hospitals, Type C hospitals, and premium rates.

The tribunal accepted that proposal as the basis for its award, with minor adjustments.

Under the new arrangement, the EDA hourly rate is to be calculated using the midpoint of the relevant medical officer salary scale.

For rostered emergency duty, doctors are to receive 1.5 times the applicable hourly rate for a normal weekday, 1.75 times the rate for the first day off, and twice the rate for the second day off.

For doctors covering multiple hospitals, the rate is 1.75 times the applicable rate for a normal weekday, twice the rate for the first day off, and 2.25 times the rate for the second day off.

Ward sessional duty is to attract a rate of 25 per cent above the rostered duty rate, while premium duties — including casualty, Type C hospitals, health centres, and cross-coverage — are to attract a rate 50 per cent above the applicable rostered duty rate.

The tribunal ordered that the EDA payments under the new framework be made retroactively from April 1, 2023.

The Government had argued that revised sessional compensation rates should instead take effect from August 1, 2024, when the standardised EHW policy was issued.

The tribunal rejected that date, saying there was “no legal, contractual, or equitable justification” for using August 1, 2024 as the implementation date. It pointed to the March 16, 2023 Memorandum of Understanding between the Government and the JMDA, which required discussions on revised allowance policies by March 31, 2023.

The tribunal also found that the Government had not established that applying the April 1, 2023 date would create the level of financial or administrative disruption claimed. It noted that other public sector groups, including the University Hospital of the West Indies (UHWI) and the Jamaica Urban Transit Company (JUTC), had received overtime retroactivity dating back to April 2022 without causing a “knockon” effect.

The tribunal also ruled on the incentive allowance, which had been a separate point of disagreement between the parties.

The Government argued that the allowance had been discontinued and absorbed into the restructured basic salaries of medical officers, while the JMDA argued that it had not agreed to the removal of the allowance and that it remained protected by the March 2023 agreement.

The tribunal found that the JMDA’s position was supported by the evidence and concluded that the incentive allowance had survived the signing of the March 16, 2023 agreement. The majority therefore ordered its reinstatement from April 1, 2023.

Eligible non-rostered medical officers, including interns, senior house officers, and medical officers levels 1 to 3 working in emergency and clinical specialties at the Ministry of Health and Wellness’s head office, are to receive an allowance equal to 40 per cent of the midpoint of their respective salary scales.

An allowance of 55 per cent of the midpoint is provided for medical officers levels 2 and 3 serving as medical officers (health), as well as medical officers otherwise eligible under the 2017-2021 heads of agreement.

However, a medical officer who performs rostered emergency duty during a particular calendar month is disqualified from receiving the incentive allowance for that month.

Locke agreed with the EDA decision but issued a minority award arguing that the incentive allowance fell outside the tribunal’s terms of reference and that the tribunal therefore did not have the authority to reinstate it.

The dispute dates back to the March 2023 agreement between the Government and the JMDA, under which the parties settled the restructuring of doctors’ basic salaries, but negotiations on the EDA remained unresolved.

After months of unsuccessful negotiations, the JMDA took industrial action in December 2024. The matter was subsequently referred to the IDT on January 15, 2025.

The tribunal said the parties made written submissions and oral presentations over 53 sittings between April 24, 2025 and April 1, 2026, with evidence from 10 witnesses and 162 exhibits.

The JMDA represents approximately 2,500 public sector medical officers, including locum interns, medical interns, senior house officers and medical officers levels 1 to 3.