The Teachers Service Commission (TSC) has been given Sh17 billion by the Treasury to implement a pay increase for teachers in July 2025.
The National Treasury’s budget estimates, which were presented to Parliament, state that wage changes will cost Sh10 billion. There will also be a Sh6.9 billion increase in teachers’ base pay.
Teachers’ unions and TSC are still negotiating a salary agreement. About Sh4.7 billion has been set out to cover teachers’ contributions to MAKL, the mandatory health insurance program.
The amounts are also to settle teachers medical insurance woes, which saw hospitals turn many of them away.
The Kenya National Union of Teachers (Knut) tabled a number of proposals when it met the Commission officials in Naivasha in January this year.
Knut wants TSC to scrap job group B5 and replace it with job group C1 as the entry grade for primary school teachers inline with its policy framework.
Knut also want TSC to promote automatically all teachers in job group C1 to job group C2 in July CBA 2025 – 2029.
Also on the table is a plan to promote all primary school headteachers hosting junior secondary from job group C5 to D1.
The more than 10,000 headteachers want their title changed to that of principal in line with the comprehensive schools they head.
According to Kenya Primary School Headteachers Association (KEPSHA) the headteachers want an enhanced pay to commensurate their responsibility of managing Junior Secondary School domiciled in their institutions.
In the budget estimates teachers, prison staffers, university lecturers and staff are the biggest winners in the additional Sh88 billion budget the National Treasury wants MPs to approve.
Of the amount, Sh68 billion will go to ministerial expenditure of which Sh24.7 billion is for recurrent and Sh43 billion for development.
The 2024-25 second supplementary estimate budget books sent to the National Assembly for approval show that Teachers Service Commission has the biggest portion of the additional provisions.
The commission has been allocated Sh17 billion more paving the way for a pay rise for teachers.
Recently, teachers lamented being turned away by hospitals over insurance debts amid reports that their employers had not remitted capitation funds.
The police, who were also affected by the insurance mishaps, have been allocated an additional Sh5 billion.
A further Sh2.1 billion has been added to the police budget for international peace keeping missions, ostensibly for the Haiti mission.
CBA AGREEMENT FOR UNIVERSITY LECTURERS
University lecturers are set to get their 2021-24 collective bargaining agreement settled with part of the additional Sh6.5 billion allocated to Higher Education department.
The varsity lecturers and non-teaching staff need Sh4.3 billion for their CBA. Treasury has also provided additional amounts for police and prison officers.