“[…] During the Petrotrin shutdown saga, the OWTU actually offered to take a 15% wage cut in order to save jobs. The result? All, all, all workers were sent home. “The Communication Workers’ Union (CWU) settled with TSTT for 5% over a five-year period 2014–2019. How many jobs were saved? …
Read More »Mottley: Rethinking confrontation; the pitfalls of the government and public sector’s existing relations
“[…] For many decades, T&T’s highly productive energy sector funded disproportionately high standards of living in its non-energy sectors, including the public service. However, production in the energy sector has been in decline since 2010, masked temporarily by extraordinary recent increases in energy prices. “[…] In such difficult circumstances, governments …
Read More »St Louis: Industrial Court’s T&TEC judgement is a huge body blow for social justice
The Industrial Court delivered a judgement on 18 February 2022 and ruled that it would be too expensive for T&TEC to pay any increased salaries at this time. As such the workers at the Trinidad and Tobago Electricity Commission (T&TEC) were not awarded any salary increases for the period 2015 …
Read More »Paul: Unions must focus on short-term contracts and labour-supply contractors, not vaccines!
“[…] Employers, including state enterprises, […] are retrenching their workforce of both unionised and non-unionised employees and hiring labour-supply contractors, to provide low-wage workers (mostly temporary unsecured, non-benefit workers)—thereby greatly reducing their labour costs. “Many refuse to pay NIS, placing this critical retirement, sickness and injury benefit system in jeopardy. …
Read More »Kangalee: The AG is out of his depth and betraying his ignorance of industrial relations
“[…] In Faris Al-Rawi’s upside-down world, a worker is sent home by an employer in an effort to coerce the worker into accepting the employer’s terms and conditions; and if the worker does not accept, she is deemed to have abandoned the job or been dismissed. “In actual practice, if …
Read More »Noble: The smartest guys in the room; will Angostura, Industrial Court and Integrity Commission pay price for hubris?
In 2001, Enron—named the ‘most innovative company ’ by Fortune magazine for six consecutive years—collapsed. Enron’s chairman and chief executive officer, Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling, were two arrogant and belligerent men who believed they were the ‘smartest guys in the room’. They believed that, through their sheer cleverness and …
Read More »Dear Editor: Government spinning Anansi stories to suppress workers’ wages
“[…] Minister Imbert has […] set the stage for entrenching the austerity programme the IMF has long been advising: privatisation, deregulation, the reduction of the public sector, wage suppression. “This austerity, of course, involves the weakening of the trade unions through the hiving off of the health sector, a de …
Read More »Dear editor: What causes layoffs, what happens after they occur and what the law says
“[…] The period of layoff as generally outlined by the industrial court is a maximum of three months. If there is no resumption of work, a worker is entitled to claim his severance pay… “[…]What we have witnessed since the pandemic, is that employers have been in breach of the …
Read More »NJAC rededication: Gene Miles, Errol Pilgrim and Makandal Daaga come to the fore
“[…] Gene Miles’ evidence before Karl De La Bastide-led commission of enquiry exposed corruption in very high places. The one-man commissioner, Karl De La Bastide, recommended that all evidence recorded at the enquiry ‘should be, without delay, transmitted to the Public Service Commission’ to enable enforcing of ‘Disciplinary Laws of …
Read More »NWU: Class struggle is exploding and unrest is coming; workers must pick a side
“[…] Public sector workers, including health care workers, teachers and public servants, have not had a wage increase since 2013. They have not even had the full retroactive payments due to them and owed to them for more than six years. “The widespread use of the contract system has turned …
Read More »Dear Editor: Confused about Judge’s advice to TTUTA
In a recent high court ruling, Justice Vasheist Kokaram dismissed a lawsuit filed by the Trinidad and Tobago Unified Teachers Association (TTUTA). The teachers asserted that the marking of school-based assessments (SBAs) for the CSEC and CAPE examinations did not fall under their contractual obligations. The following Letter to the …
Read More »NWU: The one percent, with govt’s help, is eroding protection of Industrial Court; time to fight back
“The one percent has, it seems, taken full control of the industrial relations policy of the government. This is not surprising because these mark-up merchants are the ones who finance the leading political parties and, as is well known, he who pays the piper calls the tune. “The government has …
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