News24 reports that the Federation of Governing Bodies of South African School (Fedsas) is outraged at what it claims to be a "u-turn" by the Department of Basic Education (DBE) regarding the vaccination of certain education sector employees.

According to Dr Jaco Deacon, acting CEO of Fedsas, the DBE has backtracked on the inoculation of non-teaching employees, including food handlers, ground staff and hostel staff, who are employed in SGB posts. Deacon said the department informed the federation that there were no longer vaccines available for the non-teaching staffers, which was relayed to them during a meeting held with the DBE on Sunday. He indicated: “That came as a huge shock to us yesterday. And the reason they gave us is that in their planning, they figured that at least 20% of the people in the sector would prefer not to get vaccinated. And now more people want to be vaccinated, so they don't have enough to cover those people appointed by SGBs in the non-educator posts.” Deacon said this decision was in contrast to Minister Angie Motshekga's announcement two weeks ago that everyone in the sector, including non-teaching staff, would be vaccinated. But according to DBE spokesperson, Elijah Mhlanga, no one has been excluded from the programme. He, however, confirmed there were challenges and said on Tuesday that the department was working with provinces to schedule "different categories of employees at different stages (of the programme) based on the availability of vaccines".

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Sesona Ngqakamba at News24

Get other news reports at the SA Labour News home page