The Tribune

By NATARIO McKENZIE

Tribune Business Reporter

nmckenzie@tribunemedia.net

NASSAU-based City Markets employees have joined a legal action filed back in February on behalf of the supermarket chain's Freeport staff, their former attorney confirmed yesterday, in an effort to preserve salary arrears and severance entitlements.

Stephen Turnquest, attorney and partner at Callenders & Co, told Tribune Business he had advised some 130 employees at a meeting on Wednesday night to join an action filed by Freeport-based attorney, James Thompson, on behalf of employees there.

Mr Turnquest said: "At the outcome of the meeting, there was a determination by employees - assisted by their advisors - to proceed with legal action in order to preserve the integrity of the pension fund, and recover any arrears of pay and any severance entitlement, so it's really three heads."

He added: "The position is that the majority of the employees are perhaps as much as three to four weeks behind in their salary, but all of them have heard that the company is going to close, possibly as early as Friday.

"The employees have not been notified that they will receive their severance according to law. Some have been there for as much as 30 to 40 years, and would have built up a considerable pension entitlement. One of the overriding concerns is that, particularly since the company has changed hands several times, the pension fund may not be intact. There is a fair amount of concern. The pension has been going for quite some time and really should have tens of millions in there. If it doesn't, then part of the long haul is going to be to chase directors and trustees for misappropriation."

A trade dispute hearing is set for 10am this morning. Whanslaw Turnquest, City Markets' chief inventory control officer, told Tribune Business the employees simply wanted their money and to be out of the company if they were not going to be placed on proper work hours.

Mr Turnquest said: "I was in contact with the staff this morning. As directed by all employees, they no longer want to be employed with the company. They want all the money in their package because they are now employed 16 hours, nine hours and eight hours in the week, and that's every two weeks, so they're not really employed. They want their package, they want their money and they want out. If they are going to stay open then everybody has to be on full-time. You open or you close, you can't be half-way open and half-way close."

Labour minister Dion Foulkes said he had met with the trade union representing City Markets employees, and City Markets principal, Mark Finlayson, yesterday but would not comment further on the matter. Attempts to reach executives of the Bahamas Commercial Stores, Supermarkets and Warehouse Workers Union (BCSWWU) were unsuccessful up to press time.

Mr Finlayson recently told Tribune Business that "two very serious" Bahamas-based players were now assessing the possible acquisition of the struggling five-store supermarket chain, although any deal is likely to focus on store locations.

Mr Finlayson, head of the Finlayson family-owned vehicle, Trans-Island Traders, which holds the 78 per cent majority stake in City Markets' operating parent, Bahamas Supermarkets, told Tribune Business he would probably have closed a deal to sell control on Monday had it not been for the emergence of Bahamas-based interest.

Mr Finlayson said that he was "very confident" that a deal to ultimately save the City Markets stores and 300 jobs would be worked out, suggesting it was now unlikely that the five locations would be closed today - as many staff had feared.

Mr Finlayson said the value of the City Markets' staff pension fund's main asset "supersedes" what is owed to plan beneficiaries by some $2 million.

He added that "in no way, shape or form has the pension been in danger" because of the five-store supermarket chain's financial woes. He also argued that, due to accounting deficiencies stemming from the absence of proper software, some beneficiaries of the Bahamas Supermarkets Profit Sharing Retirement Plan had been "overpaid" - paid more than they were due from the pension scheme - between 2004-2011.

The City Markets pension fund's main asset is the supermarket chain's former warehouse and head office on the East-West Highway, which Mr Finlayson, in his capacity as trustee, is attempting to sell.

The pension fund also owns some $3 million worth of furniture, fixtures and equipment at City Markets' Cable Beach store, via a sale and leaseback deal done some years ago under the former BSL Holdings ownership.

Concerns over the Bahamas Supermarkets Profit Sharing Retirement Plan first surfaced under the disastrous BSL Holdings ownership, the 2010 accounts for City Markets' operating parent, Bahamas Supermarkets, showing that some $971,452 in rental payments on the head office were owing to the pension fund as at June 30 that year. And no contributions had been made to the plan by the company during the years 2008-2010.