Raphael John-Lall

The Em­ploy­ers Con­sul­ta­tive As­so­ci­a­tion (ECA) holds the view that the In­dus­tri­al Court must con­tin­ue to dis­play fair­ness in its ad­ju­di­ca­tion of labour dis­putes.

This is es­pe­cial­ly so, said the em­ploy­ers’ or­gan­i­sa­tion, in an en­vi­ron­ment where both the busi­ness class and trade unions have de­bat­ed over the years the stake­hold­er group that has been the ben­e­fi­cia­ry of more pos­i­tive rul­ings in their favour.

The ECA sent the Busi­ness Guardian a state­ment in re­sponse to ques­tions con­cern­ing the ap­point­ment of new In­dus­tri­al Court judges in Sep­tem­ber and how it will af­fect em­ploy­ers and busi­ness own­ers in gen­er­al.

“With­in our in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions land­scape, the In­dus­tri­al Court is in­dis­pens­able and fun­da­men­tal to the ar­tic­u­la­tion of the prin­ci­ples of equal op­por­tu­ni­ty and nat­ur­al jus­tice, as well as the ad­ju­di­ca­tion of labour dis­putes. Like sim­i­lar in­sti­tu­tions around the world, our In­dus­tri­al Court is bound by the prin­ci­ples of fair­ness and jus­tice to all who may be af­fect­ed by its de­ci­sions, and by its con­tri­bu­tion to in­dus­tri­al har­mo­ny, whether in the in­ter­est of the par­ties in­volved, or the wider com­mu­ni­ty of stake­hold­ers,” the ECA’s state­ment said.

A me­dia re­lease from the In­dus­tri­al Court in Sep­tem­ber an­nounced the ap­point­ment of three new mem­bers to the bench. They were Rudra­nauth In­dars­ingh, Dr Sel­wyn Sama­roo and Bramb­hanan Dubay.

“The new mem­bers were for­mal­ly pre­sent­ed with their in­stru­ments of ap­point­ment by His Ho­n­our Mr Her­bert Sover­all, act­ing pres­i­dent of the In­dus­tri­al Court, dur­ing a brief cer­e­mo­ny held on Tues­day. He was ac­com­pa­nied by Her Ho­n­our Mrs Kath­leen George-Mar­celle, act­ing vice pres­i­dent and Mrs Kathy Ann Alexan­der-Fras­er, act­ing reg­is­trar, who warm­ly wel­comed the new­ly ap­point­ed mem­bers to the Court.

“Their Ho­n­ours Mr Rudranath In­dars­ingh and Dr Sel­wyn Sama­roo will pre­side over dis­putes un­der the Es­sen­tial Ser­vices Di­vi­sion, while His Ho­n­our Mr. Bramhanan Dubay will pre­side over dis­putes un­der the Gen­er­al Ser­vices Di­vi­sion,” the me­dia re­lease in­di­cat­ed.

The ECA al­so stat­ed in the eco­nom­ic and busi­ness world, fair and im­par­tial judge­ments are im­por­tant.

“In labour mat­ters, where de­ci­sions can car­ry sig­nif­i­cant eco­nom­ic and rep­u­ta­tion­al im­pli­ca­tions, em­ploy­ers re­ly on the Court to be con­sis­tent and im­par­tial. These must re­main fun­da­men­tal char­ac­ter­is­tics of the Court.”

The ECA al­so tack­led the con­tro­ver­sial top­ic of de­bates over the years over whether the In­dus­tri­al Court’s judge­ments have been more pro-labour or pro-busi­ness.

“Over the years, both em­ploy­ers and trade unions have in­deed ex­pressed con­cerns about judg­ments that they per­ceived as un­favourable or un­fair, and a sim­ple analy­sis of the In­dus­tri­al Court’s de­ci­sions seem to give some cre­dence to the fact that, on av­er­age, more dis­putes re­sult in rul­ings that are not favourable to em­ploy­ers. While each case is in­her­ent­ly unique and must stand on its own, it is al­so pos­si­ble that a care­ful ex­am­i­na­tion of these judg­ments may re­veal that many dis­putes be­fore the Court stem not on­ly from sub­stan­tive is­sues, but from how pro­ce­dures are ap­plied and man­aged at the en­ter­prise lev­el.”

The ECA in its state­ment said as the main body that rep­re­sents em­ploy­ers, they will con­tin­ue to en­gage in train­ing and oth­er ex­er­cis­es that will help ben­e­fit their mem­ber­ship.

“This is an area in which the ECA said it is well placed to sup­port em­ploy­ers, whether through in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions ad­vice or train­ing and de­vel­op­ment sup­port.”

At the same time, the ECA added that it notes with con­cern that the Court it­self con­tin­ues to face ap­par­ent in­sti­tu­tion­al and op­er­a­tional chal­lenges that can al­so hin­der its ef­fec­tive­ness.

“This in­cludes per­sis­tent staffing short­ages, out­dat­ed fa­cil­i­ties, and lim­it­ed tech­no­log­i­cal in­fra­struc­ture. Suc­ces­sive pres­i­dents of the Court have high­light­ed these re­source gaps, un­der­scor­ing the ur­gent need for mod­erni­sa­tion and in­vest­ment. If we are se­ri­ous about en­sur­ing that this vi­tal in­sti­tu­tion can up­hold its man­date of fair­ness and nat­ur­al jus­tice, these gaps must be ad­dressed. Strength­en­ing the In­dus­tri­al Court is not mere­ly an ad­min­is­tra­tive ne­ces­si­ty. It is an eco­nom­ic im­per­a­tive es­sen­tial to sup­port­ing a sta­ble and pro­duc­tive labour en­vi­ron­ment.”