Hav­ing cur­rent col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing agree­ments (CBAs) is vi­tal for en­sur­ing fair labour prac­tices, pro­mot­ing pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, and pre­vent­ing in­dus­tri­al un­rest.

The fail­ure of the pre­vi­ous ad­min­is­tra­tion to en­sure that such agree­ments are cur­rent is be­ing sig­nalled by trade union­ists as they mark Labour Day to­day.

Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Work­ers’ Union (CWU) sec­re­tary gen­er­al Joanne Ogeer told Busi­ness Guardian cur­rent CBA are fun­da­men­tal in­stru­ments in T&T’s in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions land­scape, shap­ing the in­ter­ac­tions be­tween em­ploy­ers and em­ploy­ees.

She said their cur­ren­cy and con­sis­tent ap­pli­ca­tion are not mere­ly pro­ce­dur­al for­mal­i­ties, but are crit­i­cal for fos­ter­ing eco­nom­ic sta­bil­i­ty, pro­mot­ing so­cial jus­tice and en­sur­ing har­mo­nious work­place en­vi­ron­ments.

“The im­por­tance of hav­ing cur­rent CBAs stems from their role in pro­vid­ing a frame­work for fair labour prac­tices, pro­mot­ing pro­duc­tiv­i­ty and pre­vent­ing in­dus­tri­al un­rest.”

Ogeer in­di­cat­ed that when CBAs are up-to-date, they re­flect the cur­rent eco­nom­ic re­al­i­ties and the evolv­ing needs of the work­force.

“This en­sures that em­ploy­ees re­ceive com­pen­sa­tion and ben­e­fits that are com­men­su­rate with their con­tri­bu­tions. Out­dat­ed agree­ments, on the oth­er hand, can lead to wage stag­na­tion, in­ad­e­quate ben­e­fits and a sense of ex­ploita­tion among work­ers, po­ten­tial­ly lead­ing to de­creased morale and pro­duc­tiv­i­ty,” she de­tailed.

When asked what are some of the chal­lenges CWU has over­come over the years, Ogeer said from the pe­ri­od from 2018 to 2022 was the most chal­leng­ing for the union as over 1,000 work­ers were placed on the bread­line by ma­jor­i­ty state-owned Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions Ser­vices of Trinidad and To­ba­go (TSTT).

She said since then CWU has sought to im­prove ed­u­ca­tion as its great­est re­source by in­tro­duc­ing pod­casts that seek to im­prove the “Rights of Work­ers”.

“This ini­tia­tive is a vi­sion to pro­mote aware­ness among the work­ing class of per­sons who may not be aware of their right to join or not to join trade unions, ac­cord­ing to the In­dus­tri­al Re­la­tions Act (IRA). Fur­ther and al­ter­na­tive­ly, a bril­liant stu­dent en­ter­ing the world of work does not recog­nise the im­por­tance of join­ing a union. While they may feel that be­cause of their aca­d­e­m­ic qual­i­fi­ca­tions, the ques­tion begs, which body pro­tects your ‘terms and con­di­tions’ of em­ploy­ment while you are on the job? A trade union,” she em­pha­sised.

On whether the In­dus­tri­al Court needs im­prove­ment, es­pe­cial­ly with the speed­ing up of cas­es, the union head made the point that “de­lay de­feats eq­ui­ty” vig­i­lan­tibus non dormi­en­tibus Ae­quitas sub­ven­it.

This, she said, was es­tab­lished to re­solve trade dis­putes and pro­mote har­mo­nious in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions, and faces sig­nif­i­cant chal­lenges stem­ming from case de­lays and non-com­pli­ance with its or­ders.

“These is­sues un­der­mine the court’s ef­fec­tive­ness, erode pub­lic trust and ul­ti­mate­ly hin­der the na­tion’s eco­nom­ic and so­cial de­vel­op­ment. These de­lays and non-com­pli­ance with judg­ments have a detri­men­tal im­pact and there is need to ex­plore their con­se­quences for work­ers, em­ploy­ers, and the over­all in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions land­scape,” she ex­plained.

One of the most sig­nif­i­cant im­pacts of de­lays in the In­dus­tri­al Court, Ogeer said, is the pro­longed un­cer­tain­ty and hard­ship ex­pe­ri­enced by work­ers in­volved in dis­putes and lengthy wait­ing times for case hear­ings and judg­ments can leave em­ploy­ees in a state of lim­bo.

Sea­men and Wa­ter­front Work­ers Trade Union (SWW­TU) pres­i­dent-gen­er­al Michael An­nisette said it is im­por­tant for com­pa­nies and the Gov­ern­ment to be up to date with col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing agree­ments.

As it per­tains to wage ne­go­ti­a­tions, An­nisette not­ed that un­der the Peo­ple’s Na­tion­al Move­ment (PNM) gov­ern­ment, there were sev­er­al out­stand­ing wage ne­go­ti­a­tions, but he said the pri­vate sec­tor has been spot on in this area.

The union head said the Port of Port Spain work­ers have been work­ing since 2014 with­out a new agree­ment and de­spite the many at­tempts by the SWW­TU to get the last gov­ern­ment to set­tle at 12 per cent of­fer, they re­fused.

“Cost of liv­ing is go­ing up every day. What can be the jus­ti­fi­ca­tion for any gov­ern­ment, not recog­nis­ing that and en­sur­ing that wage ne­go­ti­a­tions are done on time so that the ben­e­fit of the ne­go­ti­a­tions can go to­ward the work­ers? Be­cause back pay doesn’t solve the prob­lem. I can­not buy in 2025 what I could have bought in 2014 with the same salary. Then the same analy­sis that was done for the Prime Min­is­ter and his team, who re­ceived be­tween 22 per cent and...That is what would be re­quired for the work­ers or any Gov­ern­ment in­sti­tu­tion that did not get wage in­creas­es go­ing back from 2014 to the present,” An­nisette stressed.

He said what the union pro­posed to the Port back then was an in­ter­est-based ne­go­ti­a­tion, which would have ben­e­fit­ted the Port Au­thor­i­ty as well and saved them $10 mil­lion over the years.

“The port is still work­ing over­time, and the Port has to con­sume and as­sume the over­time from the old of­fers which in­ter­fere with the Port. Al­so, the Port gen­er­ates suf­fi­cient rev­enue in or­der to pay the work­ers. The Port work­ers, from the rev­enue that they gen­er­ate, do not go to the Gov­ern­ment for any sub­si­dies or wages,” An­nisette point­ed out.

He said the union, which was formed in 1919, has been able to keep fi­nan­cial­ly afloat by form­ing a con­struc­tion com­pa­ny with the Na­tion­al Union of Gov­ern­ment and Fed­er­at­ed Work­ers (NUGFW), which he said was formed af­ter the mas­sive re­trench­ment at the Port of Port-of-Spain in 1995.

An­nisette said the com­pa­ny built 400 hous­es in Val­sayn South and 200 in Lopinot.

“We want­ed to make our­selves rel­e­vant. Com­ing out of that, we were the on­ly union that en­tered in­to a part­ner­ship with the pri­vate sec­tor. We formed what you call Port and Mar­itime Ser­vices Ltd and sev­er­al sub­sidiary com­pa­nies, which have been suc­cess­ful, which have worked well, and which have demon­strat­ed that busi­ness and labour can be a unique com­bi­na­tion,” he de­tailed.

And the Pub­lic Ser­vice As­so­ci­a­tion Pres­i­dent Fe­l­isha Thomas, said the union’s fi­nan­cial sta­tus is in a favourable po­si­tion, but it is still ex­plor­ing new rev­enue streams that will be re­vealed as they are fi­nalised and im­ple­ment­ed.

With the scrap­ping of the T&T Rev­enue Au­thor­i­ty (TTRA), Thomas said the op­tions pre­sent­ed un­der the last gov­ern­ment were il­lu­so­ry and lacked a struc­tured plan for move­ment from the pub­lic ser­vice to the Au­thor­i­ty.

“To­day, the PSA is re­lieved to see its mem­bers in a po­si­tion where they can fo­cus on pro­duc­tiv­i­ty rather than sur­vival. We are al­so com­fort­ed that our mem­bers are as­sured of their liveli­hood and can now re­sume plan­ning their fu­ture en­deav­ours.”

Asked if the PSA which rep­re­sents 100 min­istries, di­vi­sions, and au­thor­i­ties has met re­cent­ly with the Gov­ern­ment about the salary in­crease of not less than 10 per cent that was promised, Thomas said “The Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) ad­min­is­tra­tion made sev­er­al com­mit­ments to the trade union move­ment. In less than two months, they have al­ready de­liv­ered on two of their com­mit­ments, which has re­sult­ed in the se­cu­ri­ty of al­most 10,000 jobs for work­ers in the Board of In­land Rev­enue, Cus­toms and WASA.”

On whether there has been a de­cline in mem­ber­ship, over the years, she said mem­ber­ship tends to fluc­tu­ate based on var­i­ous fac­tors, in­clud­ing an­ti-labour man­age­ment that threat­ens work­ers, de­ter­ring them from be­com­ing mem­bers or per­suad­ing them to with­draw.