Pretoria - The Department of Correctional Services says solving the delays in the implementation of new salary packages for correctional services officials is a priority.
Minister Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, who was addressing over 100 Eastern Cape correctional services managers and officials at the East London Correctional Centre on Saturday, said the delays should be sorted out before the end of June.
The delays came about because of the diverse interpretations of the agreements reached in 2007 on the Occupation Specific Dispensation (OSD) for various categories of public servants.
"These matters were dealt with at a special workshop of ministers and representatives of labour organisations held in Gauteng last week," the minister said.
She said there were also several other issues that compounded efforts to find solutions in Correctional Services that must be dealt with separately.
These include incorrectly placing Correctional Services in the General Public Service Coordinating Bargaining Council instead of the Security Bargaining Council where matters of security could best be understood and lumping of the introduction of Seven-Day working week that should have been implemented some time ago.
"For sure some problems could have been solved long time ago if we were appropriately located at the Security Bargaining Council with the police," said the minister.
She added that salary scales of Correctional Services officials have not acknowledged the security element of their function.
"People need to appreciate dangers involved in managing daily anger of offenders. It must be our starting point, the safety of men and women responsible for keeping dangerous offenders inside facilities who are exposed to dangers."
With a staff complement of over 40 000, most of whom are at the coal face of service delivery, the implementation of the OSD for Correctional Services officials is expected to cost about R1.4 billion.
She said correctional facility's main responsibility, as an essential service institution, was to protect the public from dangerous offenders.
The minister is scheduled to visit all facilities, following a series of introductory meetings with among others the Portfolio Committee on Correctional Services and the Parole Review Board.
