Duke: PM has been a naughty boy

PUBLIC Services Association (PSA) head Watson Duke said the Prime Minister has “been a naughty boy” in his treatment of workers and now has only five weeks to make up before his performance appraisal is delivered on election day.

He lamented that while most public servants saw no wage hike, Government has eroded the purchasing power of their stagnant salaries by putting 12.5 per cent VAT on food and raising the price of gasoline and diesel, three times, which had spin-off effects.

Duke, National Union of Government and Federated Workers (NUGFW) head James Lambert and Seamen and Waterfront Workers Trade Union (SWWTU) head Michael Annisette held a briefing at the Port of Spain office of their umbrella body, the National Trade Union Centre (NATUC),which was also attended by officials of the Contractors and General Workers and Amalgamated Workers unions.

The trio in turn each lamented that TT’s 89,000 public servants are surviving on 2012 salaries, due to eight years of stalled wage negotiations.

Lambert said while Government had financially assisted maxi-taxi drivers, credit union members and farmers during the covid19 lockdown, they have not settled wage talks for daily and monthly paid public servants, now outstanding for seven years.

“We are ashamed of the disrespect you have shown public servants. It is the worst government we ever had,” Lambert declared. He said past governments met with his union, even if he had not liked their proposals, but not this current administration. Lambert challenged the Prime Minister’s recent statement that MPs got no salary rise by saying their pensions had in fact been improved.

Annisette scoffed at any notion of austerity economics from the Government by saying workers should get good wages so their spending can stimulate the economy.

He found it passing strange that Government could say they had no money to pay wage hikes, yet after the covid19 lockdown, somehow found $15 billion to stimulate recovery of the economy.

“This Government is anti-labour,” Annisette hit. He said a letter seeking to meet Finance Minister Colm Imbert had not even received an acknowledgement of receipt. Annisette later told Newsday front-line workers were feeling a sense of betrayal at stalled negotiations.

“We can’t live on claps. I can’t afford to pay my mortgage. I’m living from salary to salary,” he said, speaking on behalf of workers. Annisette recalled his shock at some people’s living conditions when he delivered covid19 hampers in deprived areas such as the Beetham, Morvant and Maloney.

“You would have cried to see it. The level of poverty existing in our society which otherwise has so much wealth. While some houses have eight bedrooms and six cars parked outside, elsewhere there are seven or eight people in a one-bedroom apartment.”

He said upheaval and poverty cannot be addressed by passing more laws and hiring more police but by building a society collectively and empowering communities to be productive. “We need a new social contract to empower the most vulnerable.”