‘PM wants to take TT back to 1937, when workers had no rights’

Couva South MP Rudranath Indarsingh.
Couva South MP Rudranath Indarsingh.

FORMER minister in the Ministry of Labour Rudranath Indarsingh has said the agenda of the Prime Minister’s administration is to return the working class to a period before 1937, when workers had no rights.

The Couva South MP said the signals to “lick up and eliminate the trade union movement, the working class and the middle class” were unfolding with the restructuring of Petrotrin. He cautioned that workers at the Water and Sewerage Authority, TSTT, the Board of Inland Revenue, Customs and Excise and the regional corporations are next on the chopping block.

Petrotrin, in its present configuration, will cease to exist on November 30.

All of its 3,500 permanent employees who are represented by the Oilfield Workers Trade Union will be dismissed. Approximately 1,000 have been promised re-employment in the two new entities replacing Petrotrin, namely the Heritage Petroleum Company Ltd and Paria Fuel Trading, which should become effective on December 1.

The two entities, which are locally registered, are owned by Trinidad Petroleum Company Ltd, a new holding company. A document under the Companies Act 1995, which bears a stamp from the Registrar General’s office dated October 5, shows the directors of the Heritage Petroleum Company Ltd are Wilfred Espinet, the current chairman of Petrotrin, and Reynold Ajodhasingh.

Speaking at the United National Congress (UNC) Monday night forum in Couva, Indarsingh said when the government is finished with Petrotrin, “We would return to the days prior to the birth of the labour movement in 1937, when there was no decent working conditions, no trade union, no collective bargaining and no pension plans.

“There were no Industrial Relations Act (IRA) and no labour laws.”

He trained his guns on Espinet, questioning what right he had to tell the trade union movement it had outgrown its worth and relevance and that there is no role for the Industrial Court in TT.

“When you want to get rid of institutions, when you want to undermine the rule of law and the Constitution of the country, we are setting a dangerous precedent.

“When they get rid of labour laws in this country, when they get rid of the Industrial Court, they will turn their guns on civil liberties and rights and freedom of the people of TT,” Indarsingh argued.

He called on Dr Rowley to answer where is the transparency he campaigned on before the 2015 general elections, in the entities to take over the role of Petrotrin. He also demanded of Rowley that he, and not Wilfred Espinet, must be the spokesman of the people.

“I ask the PM, when were these companies formed? How many fired and dismissed employees will be re-employed by these two companies? What are the criteria for being employed by these two new entities? Where are the advertisements?”

He also asked why HRC and Associates “has been allowed to hijack the recruitment of staff for the two new companies.”

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