Leave suspended, cops grumble

It also means officers who were sent on long leave recently may be recalled to duty so that all hands will be on deck to deal with Christmas and Carnival seasons. Yesterday, President of the Police Social and Welfare Association (PSWA) Inspector Michael Seales said the Association was never consulted on this decision and added that the rank and file are not pleased with this decision.

He said coupled with this, hundreds of regular police officers and about 1,600 SRPs have not yet received back pay.

He said enquiries revealed that because the financial year ended in September, there was no back pay payment in October but he is hoping that the payment will resume at the end of November.

Failing this the Association intends to deal swiftly with the matter to ensure that applicants owed back pay receive their money before Christmas.

According to Inspector Seales he will have meetings with various sections and branches and officers are not happy with the move to restrict leave and he and his Executive intend to meet with Acting Police commissioner Harold Phillip to discuss the matter.

He said that the Acting CoP has already cancelled two prior meetings which were scheduled to take place but he is hoping place t hat no cancellation takes place the third time around so that he could inform the Acting CoP that based on his own information through social media he has learnt that some officers are planning to sick out from December 9 to March 2017 in protest over the restriction of leave.

He said that he had been advising officers to exercise restraint but he is hoping that good sense will prevail and the Commissioner will make some adjustment to his decision.

Newsday understands that some officers who had applied for leave at the end of October and who were turned down sought assistance from the PSWA, but up until yesterday the situation was not rectified.