Court orders equal pay for UHC nurses amid absorption plan
Justice Stella Rutto said the Ministry of Health and the Public Service Commission (PSC) must ensure that nurses performing the same roles receive equal pay, emphasizing that contractual status should not justify lower wages.
The Employment and Labour Relations Court has ordered the government to address salary differences between nurses employed under the Universal Health Coverage (UHC) programme on contract and their counterparts with permanent and pensionable terms.
Justice Stella Rutto said the Ministry of Health (MoH) and the Public Service Commission (PSC) must ensure that nurses performing the same roles receive equal pay, emphasising that contractual status should not justify lower wages.
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The ruling comes shortly after President William Ruto announced that UHC nurses would begin permanent employment this month.
The case arose from a petition filed by the Kenya National Union of Nurses (KNUN) in 2024. Justice Rutto noted that even if nurses had initially accepted less favourable terms, the government had a legal obligation to guarantee fairness.
Records show that the PSC had offered the 2,500 UHC nurses a monthly salary of Sh50,000 for diploma holders and Sh40,000 for certificate holders.
In comparison, permanent staff earn Sh100,000 to Sh120,000 for diploma holders and Sh80,000 for certificate holders.
The court also highlighted that UHC nurses had been excluded from allowances common to permanent staff, including nursing service, commuter, hardship, health risk, leave, and uniform benefits.
Justice Rutto described the pay gap as a violation of workers’ constitutional rights to equality and freedom from discrimination under Article 27(5) of the Constitution and Section 5(3) of the Employment Act.
“The court finds that the respondents (MoH and PSC) have subjected the claimant’s members to pay discrimination as they have failed to demonstrate non-discriminatory reasons and justify the pay disparity,” she said.
“The remuneration ought to be equal for the staff in the same category performing the same work, despite their terms of engagement. Indeed, the respondents herein have not suggested or indicated that the work performed by the staff under the UHC programme is not of the same value as that performed by staff on permanent and pensionable terms.”
MoH, PSC, Council of Governors (CoG), and National Treasury had opposed the case.
The ministry argued that PSC’s August 3, 2021, circular prevented the translation of short-term programme staff into permanent positions due to limited funding.
PSC added that it could not legally approve the absorption of UHC nurses by county governments, noting that any approval would have no binding effect at the county level.
The CoG stated that nurses were aware of their contract terms when employed and that permanent absorption would only be possible after national funding was provided.
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