The Tribune

By NICO SCAVELLA

Tribune Staff Reporter

nscavella@tribunemedia.net

ANGRY hotel union members yesterday threatened to petition for the National Congress of Trade Unions Bahamas (NCTUB) to serve as their “interim” bargaining agent over their dissatisfaction with their union’s handling of the One&Only Ocean Club’s temporary closure for hurricane repair efforts.

Members of the Bahamas Hotel Catering Allied Workers Union (BHCAWU) stationed at the Ocean Club, speaking on condition of anonymity, called on NCTUB President John Pinder, as well as Trade Union Congress (TUC) President Obie Ferguson, to “intervene” over their frustration with the BHCAWU, and its president Nicole Martin’s handling of the Paradise Island luxury hotel’s closure.

The employees claimed the union has not met with them yet to provide some sort of reassurance, nor offered to provide financial assistance and otherwise to the hotel’s 350 employees during the five-month closure.

Mr Pinder, when contacted yesterday, declined to comment, advising this newspaper to seek a response from Ms Martin or other BHCAWU senior officials before soliciting him for a response.

However, Darrin Woods, BHCAWU secretary general, told The Tribune that the union has scheduled a meeting with officials at the luxury hotel for tomorrow, after which he said union officials will inform members.

Mr Woods also denied assertions that the BHCAWU and Ms Martin are being complacent on the matter, charging that the union, through its various shop stewards and representatives for the Ocean Club, have informed its members “exactly what we’re doing” on the matter.

Last Friday, One&Only Ocean Club General Manager John Conway confirmed that the hotel had delayed its reopening date to Valentine’s Day next year, stating that the hotel is still reeling from the aftermath of Hurricane Matthew.

Management did not specify what will happen to the 350 staff in the meantime, but said they and the union have been informed of the extended period of closure. The hotel was originally expected to re-open in December.

“We have the union there, we’re paying $10 every week,” one employee told The Tribune. “At the end of the day, I know the union is not responsible for the closure, but at least her (Ms Martin) being the union head, she has yet to meet with the staff to try and reassure us that we’re going to have our job back, for one. Secondly, whatever changes (management) makes they (should) include the union or at least include the staff.

“Thirdly, we’re home from October 14 to February 14, that’s if they decide to open (the hotel). She has yet to meet with the staff. At least she could help with some food vouchers or help people pay mortgages, help people pay rent. Right now our only source of income is unemployment benefit. And that’s what the hotel referred us to do.”

The employee added: “We’re supposed to get Christmas bonus in the next couple of weeks, like the second week in December. I sure they’re going to want to take out their little $10 out of our Christmas bonus, even though we ain’t working, even though they don’t represent us.”

Another employee, in an email sent to The Tribune, claimed that since the hotel’s closure in October, he has had difficulty meeting his mortgage payments and is “behind” on his other bills.

Attempts to reach Ms Martin on her cell phone were unsuccessful yesterday.

Mr Woods denied assertions that the union has shirked its duties on the matter. He claimed that once the union received Mr Conway’s statement on Friday, it subsequently requested a meeting to determine the extent of the hotel’s damage, the closure itself, as well as “how the employees are going to be engaged.”

Once that is done, Mr Woods said the BHCAWU would then inform its members of the way forward.

“A meeting before we meet with the hotel is a premature meeting, because what could we say to the members if we haven’t met with the hotel yet?” he asked. “And it’s not as if we’re not doing anything. The persons would call and we would say to them exactly - through the shop stewards and through the representatives for the area, exactly what we’re doing. But only until we get the meeting, because it would only be a gathering, not a meeting, until we meet with the hotel.”

When asked if the union had previously received any formal complaints from employees at Ocean Club on the matter, Mr Woods said: “Well, we had a meeting with a group of employees there at the Dune restaurant, just after the hurricane when they were using them for clean-up, in terms of how they would be compensated for it, and we worked out that issue.

“But as it relates now to the extended closure, because bear in mind the company communicated directly with the employees before they communicated to the union. And that is what we said to them, how could you communicate to the employees before you communicate to the union? So what they did was put the cart before the horse.

“So now we are trying to get a meeting with them. Once we have a meeting with them we can say to the members exactly what is happening.”

He added: “We can’t meet with them until we would have met with the hotel.”