The lawyer representing president of the Public Services Association (PSA) Watson Duke says there is no evidence to prove that his client encouraged staff of the Immigration Division to breach an injunction stopping them from engaging in industrial action.Senior Counsel Douglas Mendes made the statement yesterday as he presented a no-case submission asking a five-member panel of the Industrial Court to dismiss contempt charges against Duke, the union and immigration officer Purdy Babwah, one of the staff members who allegedly breached the injunction.
Speaking at the Industrial Court's headquarters at St Vincent Street, Port-of-Spain, Mendes said the legal team representing Labour Minister Errol Mc Leod failed to prove that Duke and the union had aided and abetted workers to stay away from work after the injunction was granted on July 3.Refering to a statement from his client on the closure of the department's Frederick Street, Port-of-Spain, office, which was cited by Mc Leod in his grounds for the contempt motion, Mendes said that was not capable of inciting workers as it was directed at frustrated members of the public waiting outside.
He also claimed Mc Leod failed to make out a strong case against Babwah as attendance registers provided by the department could not show she signed and left work or if the union played a role in her absence.He also said Mc Leod's attorneys had not been able to deflect his clients' defence that their actions did not contravene the injunction as refusing to work under hazardous health and safety conditions was exempted from the definition of industrial action under industrial relations legislation.Mendes asked the court to ignore the testimony of Occupational Safety and Health Authority (Osha) chief inspector Gaekwad Ramoutar, one of Mc Leod's main witnesses who gave evidence that although the department's building was in violation of several health and safety requirements, it did not pose a danger to staff working there.
As he described Ramoutar's evidence as "manifestly unreliable," Mendes pointed to the fact that he (Ramoutar) failed to inform the court that the member of his staff, who found the violations during a site visit a day after the injunction was granted, had suggested that the department be served with a prohibition notice for the building.Although Industrial Court president Deborah Thomas-Felix invited Mc Leod's legal team to respond to the application immediately, Senior Counsel Russell Matineau said he needed additional time to consider Mendes' submissions.
If Mendes's no-case submission is dismissed, he will then be given the option to call defence witnesses or invite his clients to testify in their defence, before the court gives its final decision.
The case resumes on Thursday morning.