Raphael John-Lall

Gov­ern­ment needs to amend labour leg­is­la­tion in T&T, in­clud­ing the Com­pa­nies Act to en­sure that work­ers are pro­tect­ed.

Vin­cent Cabr­era, sec­re­tary gen­er­al, Bank­ing, In­sur­ance and Gen­er­al Work­ers' Union (BIG­WU), said this in a state­ment re­leased to the me­dia yes­ter­day in its Labour Day mes­sage. "A for­mer at­tor­ney gen­er­al has ad­vised, and I agree with the ad­vice, that if we are se­ri­ous about en­sur­ing work­ers re­ceive sev­er­ance pay­ments in the event of com­pa­ny clo­sure, it is nec­es­sary to amend the Com­pa­nies Act. "We de­clare that the banks should not have hege­mo­ny on com­pa­ny's as­sets. While the bank in­vests de­pos­i­tors' mon­ey, work­ers in­vest their lives in the work­place. I use this op­por­tu­ni­ty to again reg­is­ter our con­cern about the to­tal lack of pro­tec­tion which the present Re­trench­ment and Sev­er­ance Ben­e­fits Act (RS­BA) pro­vides.

"It is sim­ply a poor ex­cuse for leg­is­la­tion and the Privy Coun­cil has, on at least two oc­ca­sions, il­lus­trat­ed leg­isla­tive de­fi­cien­cies in this failed law and we look for­ward to its re­peal and re­place­ment with gen­uine labour leg­is­la­tion. "It is the re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of the Gov­ern­ment to ap­pro­pri­ate­ly amend labour laws where de­fi­cien­cies are re­vealed through lit­i­ga­tion," Cabr­era said. He ar­gued that at present the un­der the Com­pa­nies Act work­ers are the last ones to get pay­ments if a com­pa­ny changes own­ers or clos­es down. "There's a process of pay­ment to the bank, then the share­hold­ers, then the debtors and who­ev­er else. But the work­ers are the last ones to get their monies." He pro­posed that a fund be set up by com­pa­nies, so that if the com­pa­ny closed down then work­ers would get their sev­er­ance pay­ments.

He said con­tract labour is one of the "gravest prob­lems" af­fect­ing the work­force. "Through­out the pub­lic sec­tor as well as the pri­vate sec­tor, con­tract labour abounds. Con­tract labour refers to a type of em­ploy­ment re­la­tion­ship which is ex­ploita­tive and pre­car­i­ous. In the large ma­jor­i­ty of cas­es, con­tract em­ploy­ment is used to de­ny these work­ers both trade union pro­tec­tion as well as le­gal pro­tec­tion. The em­ploy­ment re­la­tion­ship must be char­ac­terised by com­plete le­gal and trade union pro­tec­tion. "In the Eu­ro­pean Union, the non-per­ma­nent work­force has in­creased to 40 per cent, and in Cana­da, to 37 per cent. Here, in T&T, we es­ti­mate that over 40 per cent of jobs now fall out­side per­ma­nent clas­si­fi­ca­tion. "Too many work­ers be­come trapped in a suc­ces­sion of short-term low qual­i­ty jobs with in­ad­e­quate so­cial, le­gal and trade union pro­tec­tion, leav­ing them in a most vul­ner­a­ble po­si­tion," he said.

He point­ed to oth­er pieces of leg­is­la­tion that need to be amend­ed or re­pealed. "There are al­so oth­er items of labour leg­is­la­tion which were placed on the statute books dur­ing the colo­nial pe­ri­od and which re­quire re­peal or amend­ment. These in­clude the Trade Union Act, Chap­ter 88:02, the Trade Dis­putes and Pro­tec­tion of Prop­er­ty Act, Chap­ter 88;03, the Work­men's Com­pen­sa­tion Act, Chap­ter 88:05, and the Mas­ters and Ser­vants Or­di­nance." He said the Trade Union Act and Mas­ters and Ser­vants Or­di­nance need to be re­pealed. "The Mas­ters and Ser­vants Or­di­nance is from colo­nial times. That re­la­tion­ship has now been re­placed by the em­ploy­er and em­ploy­ee re­la­tion­ship. These acts are out­dat­ed," he said.