PM tells Imbert: Meet union on TSTT audit

THE Prime Minister has directed Finance Minister Colm Imbert as Corporation Sole to meet TSTT and the Communication Workers Union (CWU) on the matter of a forensic audit at TSTT.

Maurice Suite, permanent secretary in the Office of the Prime Minister, announced this development in a letter to CWU head Clyde Elder.

The letter was dated February 2 and stamped by the union as being received on Friday. The letter referred to another from the CWU to Dr Rowley dated January 28.

In light of TSTT's announcement of its restructuring, the CWU has anticipated the retrenchment of hundreds of its members and questioned the running of TSTT.

On Friday, TSTT said in a media release that it will borrow privately to fund its restructuring and not rely on any government guarantee.

This came after the company met on Tuesday with majority unions the Communication Workers Union (CWU) and Estate Police Association (EPA)

CWU head Clyde Elder believes 425-455 unionised workers may soon be out of jobs, along with 100-plus contract and executive staff.

EPA president Deryck Richardson says the same is expected for his 36 members who work as estate police.

The company said, "TSTT has this week commenced the process to secure funding from the financial markets to cover the separation costs of its proposed restructuring exercise.

"TSTT anticipates that, if given effect to, the high anticipated cost of the proposed restructure will be readily offset by savings in personnel costs, the elimination of maintenance costs associated with obsolete plant and technology, and revenue from new streams of business which will partially offset the loss of revenue from voice calling services, local and international."

The company blamed the restructuring on several factors. These included economic fallout from the covid19 pandemic plus consumer adoption of WhatsApp and Zoom as alternatives to local and international switched calling.

TSTT also blamed the legacy costs of redundant technology in TSTT plus an industry-wide trend of lower-margin data services replacing voice services.

"These and other factors continue to have a crippling impact on the company’s business and its results, with TSTT’s revenue falling by $453 million during the past financial year ended March 31, 2021, 18 per cent less than the prior year."

Despite reducing non-personnel costs to counter these trends, TSTT reckoned that to survive and return to profitability it had to restructure its operations.