Petrina Francis, Staff Reporter

As the Government and trade unions prepare to sign a third Memorandum of Understanding (MoU3), the Nurses' Association of Jamaica (NAJ) said yesterday it was still holding Finance Minister Audley Shaw to his promise to double nurses' salaries.

It was at a Founder's Day function on July 19, 2006 that nurses claim Shaw, then opposition spokesman on finance, made the promise to double the pay of public sector nurses when he took office.

"Minister Shaw has an obligation to keep his word and his word is - he is committed to double our salaries etc.," Edith Allwood-Anderson, president of the NAJ, told The Gleaner yesterday.

"In all fairness, when he is writing the MoU3, he should proviso that he has already made a commitment to the nurses and he stands by his commitment. And he is willing to negotiate with us, not for a reduction, but certainly based on his commitment," added Allwood-Anderson.

Shaw, last year, denied claims that he had promised to double nurses' salaries. However, The Gleaner later published excerpts from his speech in which he claimed that doubling the nurses salary was not "overly ambitious" and he could find the money to do it.

Meanwhile, Allwood-Anderson wants the Government to address outstanding MoU2 issues. According to her, some nurses were still not getting their on-call stand-by payments regularly.