Unvaccinated teachers in St Vincent and the Grenadines receives termination letters from govt

St Vincent and the Grenadines: Numerous teachers are now unemployed as they have been formally discharged for not complying with the government’s COVID-19 vaccination policy. 

The teachers’ trade union confirmed the news as they got information from about 12 teachers who have received termination letters. Meanwhile, it is expected that this number would rise.  

Addressing the media on the issue, the union’s president Oswald Robinson asserted, “We are expecting more termination letters would come in today, and we are monitoring very closely what is happening, but the union is committed to assisting all of its members, both vaccinated and unvaccinated“. 

Robinson added that even teachers have also not received their salaries which were to be paid by December 16, 2021. While as per the government’s mandate, vaccination policy, teachers and the other frontline workers presence would not be considered at their work if they are not fully inoculated, neither they will get their salaries. 

The termination letter sent to a teacher cites, “Accordingly, on behalf of the – Public Service Commission – I have to inform you that you are deemed to have resigned from your office with effect from December 7, 2021, & have ceased to be an officer in accordance with Regulation 31 of the Public Service Commission Regulation, – Chapter 10 of the Laws of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines“. 

Talking about the next step, Robinson noted that the union would be fighting for teachers rights, adding, he talked to them on the phone, assuring them that the union is proceeding ahead with a legal procedure. 

“We are monitoring very closely & we are definitely taking action. Our legal counsels are supposed to be filing sometime today or tomorrow, and we are going forward in full force, straight to the end. We are not going to give up here, we are not going to leave anybody unaccounted for,” the union leader emphasized.