The Ma­ter­ni­ty Pro­tec­tion Act, which was de­bat­ed in Par­lia­ment on Fri­day, is just one of sev­er­al laws need­ed to pro­tect work­ers in Trinidad and To­ba­go, the Na­tion­al Work­ers' Union (NWU) said in a state­ment yes­ter­day. The union said it has been "ag­i­tat­ing for years" for en­act­ment of leg­is­la­tion which would en­sure a "min­i­mum floor of en­ti­tle­ments to ap­ply to all work­ers." These in­clude:

• An­nu­al re­view of the min­i­mum wage which should be no less than two thirds of the na­tion­al av­er­age wage

• Sick leave with pay

• Va­ca­tion leave

• Over­time pay­ments

• Pay­ment for pub­lic hol­i­days

• The right to have a pay slip

• The right to union rep­re­sen­ta­tion in­clu­sive of the griev­ance pro­ce­dure

• The right to a writ­ten con­tract

• Es­tab­lish­ment of a sev­er­ance fund to be fund­ed by em­ploy­ers, cov­er­age to in­clude loss of em­ploy­ment when a com­pa­ny clos­es down

• Pro­vi­sion of un­em­ploy­ment re­lief to be ad­min­is­tered by the NIS

• Abo­li­tion of le­gal dis­crim­i­na­tion against do­mes­tic work­ers

Ac­cord­ing to the NWU, there is a school of thought in the trade union move­ment that these is­sues should be dealt with in the bar­gain­ing process. How­ev­er, the union point­ed out, no more than 20 per cent of T&T's work­force is unionised. "The Na­tion­al Work­ers Union be­lieves that the trade union move­ment should im­ple­ment a wide­spread and con­sis­tent cam­paign to or­gan­ise un­or­gan­ised work­ers.

"The trade union move­ment must al­so cam­paign to change the hor­ren­dous pro­ce­dures con­tained in the In­dus­tri­al Re­la­tions Act re: Ap­pli­ca­tion for recog­ni­tion of trade unions which drags out the process un­nec­es­sar­i­ly and which serves as a dis­in­cen­tive to work­ers to ex­er­cise their con­sti­tu­tion­al right to free­dom of as­so­ci­a­tion.

"The Na­tion­al Work­ers Union un­der­stands that even if recog­ni­tion pro­ce­dures are ex­pe­dit­ed it is utopi­an to be­lieve that all work­ers in the coun­try can be unionised over the short- or medi­um-term, mak­ing a leg­is­lat­ed min­i­mum floor of en­ti­tle­ments for all work­ers a ne­ces­si­ty."