MMABATHO – The Democratic Nursing Organisation of South Africa (DENOSA) in North West warmly welcomes yesterday’s ruling by the Johannesburg Labour Court on the review application by Department of Health in North West of the Public Health Social Development Bargaining Council (PHSDSBC) arbitration award to DENOSA to have an assistant nurse paid 8 percent Rural Allowance, backdated to April 2018 when she commenced her employment for government.

Upholding the previous ruling by the PHSDSBC Arbitration, that the nurse must be paid Rural Allowance retrospectively, proves that DENOSA has been right all along that PHSDSBC Resolution 2 of 2004 has been implemented inadequately as it has been excluding Enrolled Nurses (ENs) and Enrolled Nursing Assistants (ENAs), when in fact the Resolution includes them.

DENOSA took this matter on behalf of the nurse in December 2020. The nurse works in one of the rural healthcare facilities in the North West, and has not been receiving Rural Allowance since she commenced her employment, leaving her 8 percent poorer in terms of salary every month.  

At the centre of the matter is the wrong interpretation of PHSDSBC Resolution 2 of 2004 by the Department of Health in North West, and by extension other health departments in the country. The Department interprets the Resolution as saying only a category “Professional Nurse” should be paid the 8 percent Rural Allowance if they are working in a clinical area in areas that are designated as rural areas, whereas this term in the Resolution is used to describe a nurse that is registered at the South African Nursing Council, the country’s regulatory authority for nursing, not to a nursing rank.

The Resolution is clear that those who are excluded from the Resolution are student nurses.

Since 2004 when the agreement was signed in the public sector, the Enrolled Nurses and Enrolled Nursing Assistants have been excluded from getting Rural Allowance. The ruling by the court will have far-reaching effects as thousands of other Enrolled Nurses and Enrolled Nursing Assistants are in the same quagmire countrywide.

DENOSA will enforce the implementation of this ruling by the Department of Health so that justice and fairness are served on the affected nurses.

DENOSA is happy that, finally, justice has been served.

End.

Issued by DENOSA in North West.

For more information, contact:

Reuben Molete, DENOSA Provincial Secretary.

Mobile: 071 645 6336.

Mzwakhe Seleke, DENOSA Provincial Chairperson.

Mobile:  071 643 6240.