Retroactive Allowances for Emergency Workers 

The government has approved long-awaited allowances for firefighters, NEMO officers, and other emergency personnel, a move welcomed by labour unions and frontline workers nationwide. The payments will be made retroactively to May 1st, 2025. Minister of Public Service Henry Charles Usher spoke about the importance of these allowances and what they mean for front-line workers.

 

Henry Charles Usher, Minister of Public Service

“I think that they are celebrating because there has been. So the allowances that we’ve been working on is something that I met when I got the portfolio of disaster risk management. I didn’t realize that our firefighters, that our NEMO officers were not getting this allowance that they should have gotten. We’ve been working on it for some time and I’m happy that those allowances have been approved and Ministry of Finance has gone ahead to make sure that they will be paid retroactive to May the first. So our firefighters and members from NEMO and some medical officers will be getting his allowances retro.”

 

Shane Williams

“What the amount of money we’re looking at for this retroactive renumeration?”

 

Henry Charles Usher

“Cumulative, I’m not sure, but it’s different allowances that you have. It’s on call allowance, it’s hazard allowance, things like that. There’s, there are different things and different officers qualify for these different allowances, but it’s only that they should have been getting for a long time. I know we’ve been working with the union to get those done, so I’m happy that we’ve had the resolution and that we were able to have it retroactive so that they can collect from May first and going forward.”