Cabinet approves 12,000 housing units for teachers, health workers

Cabinet approves 12,000 housing units for teachers, health workers Cabinet has approved the construction of 12,400 housing units for health workers and teachers across the country. Money for the construction, which will be undertaken by a local contractor, is yet to be approved by Parliament. A Deputy Minister of Water Resources, Works and Housing, Dr Hanna Bisiw, made this known at the opening of a two-day seminar by the Health Service Estate Managers Association of Ghana (HESEMAG) in Accra on Tuesday. The two-day workshop is on the theme: “Housing the health worker for effective health delivery in Ghana: The role of the health estate manager”. It is being attended by estate managers in the health sector from all the regions. The deputy minister, who did not give further details on the housing unit, said to further improve the housing deficit in the country, the government was encouraging a public-private partnership in housing delivery for public sector workers to buy on mortgage. She said the government had identified housing as a critical sector of the economy for addressing poverty and ensuring social stability.

He said the provision of residential accommodation for staff of the health service remained a top priority on the government’s better Ghana agenda. She said the government was also implementing a special housing programme for workers, aimed at delivering 5,000 housing units nation-wide, in collaboration with organised unions. Those interventions, she said, had become necessary, particularly at a time when the gap between public workers and the availability of official accommodation was widening. She called on the estate managers in the health institutions to re-examine their roles and adopt innovative management approaches to help improve the conditions of health facilities and housing units. continued