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Physician Assistants at the University of Cape Coast say they will lay down their tools by Monday if government fails to migrate them onto the Single Spine Salary Structure.

The leader of the Physician Assistants, Emmanuel Adjei Henaku who confirmed this to Citi News said they feel cheated since their counterparts in other institutions have all been upgraded onto the Single Spine Salary Structure.

“Government implemented the Single Spine for Ghanaian workers on government payroll about six years ago. The physician assistants with the University hospital[were also expected to benefit] but the university implemented the Single Spine and they left us out.

“Some of us were even medical assistants initially so they were comfortable putting us on the medical assistant range. After a year of that we thought it was just administrative oversight so in 2012 we wrote to them around March or April and since that day up till now we have not achieved anything,” Mr. Henaku complained.

He said several attempts to get the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission, the Vice Chancellors of Ghana (VCG) and the National Labour Commission to negotiate better salaries for them have proven futile.

Mr. Henaku said the Physician Assistants have therefore decided to lay down their tools until government devises measures to address their concerns.

“We have to get the greenlight that they are now ready to accept our name, the Physician Assistant title, which is our professional title and two, to pay us according to the Single Spine rule…We want to see something positive before we start work.”

There have been some disparities in the payment of salaries since the Single Spine Salary Structure was introduced.

The board of the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission in a bid to resolve these challenges promised to devise a strategy that will help it tackle all the challenges associated with the introduction of the salary structure.

The board was commissioned by the President to oversee all activities of the Commission.