Unions tell Imbert: Don’t hide behind covid19

CITING collective agreements which remain outstanding from as far back as 2007, Michael Annisette, president of the Seamen and Waterfront Workers Trade Union and National Trade Union Centre, along with several other union heads, said covid19 is no excuse for not making good on wage increases.

Aside from the collective agreements, Annisette said negotiations for port workers for 2014-2017 were settled in 2015, but had not yet been paid.

“For them to use covid19 as a cover is misleading and it shows a lack of sensitivity to government employees working on 2012 salaries in a 2021 where goods and services have gone up.”

Annisette added that the only way to resolve the issues surrounding wage negotiations is if government meets at the table with union leaders, but it had “consistently failed” to do so.

“If government is having difficulties, why hasn’t it met with the unions so we can talk?” Annisette said.

President of the Police Social and Welfare Association (PSWA) Gideon Dickson asked the same question as he told Newsday the PSWA had, up to last week, written to the Minister of Finance concerning salary negotiations.

Dickson said the PSWA proposed a 13.5 per cent increase over a three-year period for their negotiations for 2014-2016 but had not got a response as yet.

“We are working on 2013 salaries, and it is becoming increasingly challenging. In fact it is worrying,” Dickson said.

He noted the cost of living had risen over the past few years but salaries remained the same.

“A dollar in 2013 is not the same in 2021. All things, including our responsibilities as police officers, have gone up. We are into the third year to which police officers have been holding out and providing support. We believe we can resolve the matter, as we have several alternatives. We can come to a position where workers and government can come to an agreement – but the process has to begin.”

Banking, Insurance and General Workers Union (BIGWU) president Mario Als told Newsday the union was yet to complete negotiations for the Cipriani Labour College, the Export Centres Company Ltd, OSHA, the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Central Bank.

He said the last concluded agreement expired in 2010 and is in the hands of the Ministry of Labour; the Export Centres Company’s last agreement expired in 2012 and negotiations at the ministry broke down; OSHA had a first agreement in the processing stage pending a hearing at the Industrial Court; and the Securities and Exchange Commission and Central Bank were seeking a revision of agreements which expired in 2014 and 2017 respectively, and were before the Industrial Court.

“In all of these and other state-sector negotiations, a common pattern is the employer claiming they have no remit or authority to negotiate, as no directive has been given on cost items from either their line ministry or the CPO, which effectively acts as an obstruction to the free collective bargaining process and compels the parties to have negotiations determined by the Industrial Court,” Als said.

In Wednesday’s Newsday, Imbert was reported as saying government would face an “astronomical cost” if it agreed to high wage increases this year. He said early in 2020 government gave the CPO a remit to start talks with trade unions on allowances and gave them a $765 million allocation to meet the unions’ requests.

But covid19 came along and the relatively good economic state of the country made a 180-degree turn. Government, Imbert said, found itself with a shortfall between revenue and expenditure of $15-$16 billion.

“We simply did not have that $765 million to make available at that point,” Imbert said.