The Honourable Member of Parliament Mr. Joseph Hamiliton, in his capacity as Minister of Labour, successfully defended his ministry’s 1.3 billion Guyana Dollars budgetary allocation. During his line of questioning the minister revealed that five hundred (500) Million dollars is dedicated to providing technical training for the residents of Region Seven, through the Board of Industrial Training (BIT).
The Minister underscored the establishment of a new training course birthed by Ministry of Labour’s Board of Industrial Training and the Reunion Gold Corporation to benefit gold miners in Region Seven.
According to Mr. Hamiliton, the money will be utilized to renovate and enlarge the Mongrippa Hill BIT training center in Bartica in order to accommodate this training. Ten to twenty people from the Cuyuni-Mazaruni area will participate in the course
Opposition MP Tabitha Sarabo-Halley brought attention to the increasing tendency of Guyanese to receive government-funded training before seeking employment in the private sector. Minister Hamilton responded by saying that “right now you have more people leaving the private sector to come work in the public sector because of better remuneration packages,”
Nevertheless, the Minister admitted that in some instances individuals do leave the public service and work in the private sector but emphasized that these persons are still “serving the Cooperative Republic of Guyana”
The Minister reaffirmed the government’s commitment to ramping up training and collaborating with both the private and public sectors.