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Ramesar reverses on cops’ extra-duty pay

...Now backs Gibbs on police work at TCL strike
Geisha Kowlessar
Published: 
Friday, April 20, 2012
Police Service Social and Welfare Association president Sgt Anand Ramesar, left, talks with reporters outside the Transport and Industrial Workers Union hall in Laventille yesterday. Ramesar earlier held discussions with Oilfields Workers’ Trade Union president Ancel Roget, next to him, and Banking and Insurance General Workers Trade Union president Vincent Cabrera. PHOTO: ABRAHAM DIAZ

In an unprecedented move, the president of the Police  Social and Welfare Association is throwing his support behind Police Commissioner Dwayne Gibbs. Gibbs put an end to officers being paid extra-duty allowances for working at the Trinidad Cement Ltd (TCL) strike camp in Claxton Bay. Sgt Anand Ramesar now agrees that that approach is correct, and went further, calling for officers found moonlighting at TCL to be disciplined. Ramesar met for close to an hour yesterday with several union heads, including Ancel Roget, president general of the Oilfields Workers’ Trade Union (OWTU), and Vincent Cabrera, president of the Banking, Insurance and General Workers’ Union (BIGWU).

 
They met at the Transport and Industrial Workers Union (TIWU) compound on Eastern Main Road, Laventille. Extra duty, Ramesar said, would be restricted to escorting trucks over eight tonnes on the road, as required by law. “The association will not tolerate any police officer contracting themselves to provide private services within the context of moonlighting,” Ramesar said. He added that the role of the police was independently to maintain law and order and maintain the peace. “Police officers will not be answerable to any instructions from the TCL management, particularly as it creates the perception of bias. “All other duties as it relates to the TCL strike shall be limited to police officers as regular roster duty. “Any officer who acts  without impartiality or is found moonlighting is breaching the Police Service regulations and would be  dealt with according to the regulations...disciplinary action would ensue,” Ramesar added.
 
 
On Monday, Gibbs gave instructions to stop paying extra-duty allowances to police posted at the strike camp. The following day, Ramesar attacked Gibbs for the move. “The commissioner is taking bread out of the mouth of police officers. What he is doing is wrong,” Ramesar had said. After yesterday’s meeting, however, Ramesar agreed that the perception of impartiality needed to be maintained, especially in instances of industrial unrest. “We became worried when we realised that a lot of what was being said was undermining the confidence of police officers—actually, it was creating a perception that police officers were acting prejudicially in a lot of instances,” Ramesar said. Expressing confidence that the association’s decision would not result in a backlash from officers assigned to the camp, Ramesar said this decision was in the best interest of the country. “We recognise that the overall importance is really national confidence in the Police Service and a maintenance that the policeman remains impartial, and that is what we have given precedence to,” Ramesar added.

 

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