Rhon­da Krys­tal Ram­bal­ly

The Bank­ing, In­sur­ance and Gen­er­al Work­ers' Union (BIG­WU) yes­ter­day an­nounced a 33 per cent pay hike for em­ploy­ees of the Pub­lic Ser­vices Cred­it Union. And even af­ter the con­clu­sion of ne­go­ti­a­tions for nine groups - all to re­ceive over ten per cent in new col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing agree­ments in the fi­nan­cial and ser­vice sec­tor - BIG­WU pres­i­dent Vin­cent Cabr­era says there were still some play­ers hold­ing on to a "wage-re­straint ide­ol­o­gy." He was speak­ing at a me­dia con­fer­ence at the Kapok Ho­tel, Mar­aval, yes­ter­day, af­ter sign­ing off on the 33 per cent in­crease for the pe­ri­od 2009 to 2012.He said Re­pub­lic Bank, Amer­i­can Life and Gen­er­al In­sur­ance Com­pa­ny (Al­gi­co) and the Se­cu­ri­ties Ex­change Com­mis­sion (SEC) were re­luc­tant to agree to just and fair salary in­creas­es even though their or­gan­i­sa­tions were more prof­itable than those for whose work­ers he had suc­cess­ful­ly bar­gained.

Cabr­era said a re­cent news re­port showed CEOs and se­nior man­agers of pri­vate com­pa­nies re­ceived in­creas­es close to 20 per cent a year. He said all the in­creas­es he suc­cess­ful­ly con­clud­ed in col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing process­es did not in­volve politi­cians. He added: "The CEOs and se­nior man­agers of this coun­try were hav­ing in­creas­es in the vicin­i­ty of 20 per cent a year. "This means that the labour mar­ket of Trinidad and To­ba­go is one of the fun­da­men­tal con­trib­u­tors to in­equity in the so­ci­ety, and we at present, af­ter hav­ing all these vic­to­ries in the fi­nan­cial and ser­vice sec­tor, are faced with some play­ers in the fi­nan­cial sec­tor who, un­like these play­ers, are hold­ing on to this wage-re­straint ide­ol­o­gy." He said the 2011 Cen­tral Bank Eco­nom­ic Sur­vey showed for the pe­ri­od 2008 to 2010, the av­er­age three-year in­crease was 17.3 per cent, but the cur­rent ad­min­is­tra­tion re­fused to re­view that fig­ure and be­gan pro­mot­ing a five per cent cap.

Can­dle­light vig­il on Prom­e­nade

Hun­dreds of work­ers from the bank­ing sec­tor are ex­pect­ed to host a can­dle­light vig­il on Fri­day on the Bri­an Lara Prom­e­nade, Port-of-Spain, from 6 pm. Bank­ing, In­sur­ance and Gen­er­al Work­ers' Union (BIG­WU) deputy pres­i­dent Mario Als said the vig­il would be held to bring light to is­sues af­fect­ing work­ers. Als said work­ers from Re­pub­lic Bank, First Cit­i­zens, T&T Mort­gage Fi­nance Com­pa­ny Ltd, SEC, Al­gi­co and East­ern Cred­it Union were ex­pect­ed to at­tend.