The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

Bahamian employers and workers appear to be in rare consensus on the need to enhance the Industrial Tribunal, which one union leader recently described as “a toothless poodle”.

Both trade union umbrella bodies, the Trades Union Congress (TUC) and the and the National Congress of Trade Unions (NCTU), are pushing for the Tribunal to be upgraded to “the industrial side of the Supreme Court” - something an employer representative yesterday said he had no objection to.

Peter Goudie, who is one of the private sector’s representatives on the National Tripartite Council, the body created to deal with all workplace/labour issues, said: “I don’t think anyone will be objecting to it.

“It’s a matter of whether it can get done; I don’t think anyone will object to that at all. It would be up to the Government to do that, and that would have to be through legislation. That could take forever.”

This rare agreement potentially allows the private sector, trade unions and the Government to move forward on what is probably the least contentious aspect of the proposed labour law reforms.

Through the National Tripartite Council, they can address ‘low hanging fruit’ while setting aside the proposed removal of the Employment Act’s redundancy pay ‘cap’ and the fines/penalties planned for employers who fail to give adequate notice of impending redundancies.

Both Mr Goudie and Obie Ferguson, the TUC president, agree that the Industrial Tribunal is failing to deliver on its mandate, and objective, of providing swift, impartial resolution for employer-worker disputes.

Mr Ferguson told Tribune Business in a recent interview that the Industrial Tribunal had become “a toothless poodle”, as matters took years to come before it, and it had no ability to enforce its own rulings.

He argued that the increased time and expense involved, with litigants having to go to the Supreme Court to enforce Tribunal rulings, left many workers unable to pursue and collect what has been awarded to them.

“We have asked the Government to make the Tribunal the industrial side of the Supreme Court,” Mr Ferguson said. “That’s a stroke of the pen.

“There’s no cost to the Government, no cost to the employer, no cost to the unions. We cannot be unable to do something as basic as that.”

Arguing that the Industrial Tribunal was “not functioning”, Mr Ferguson added: “It cannot enforce its own judgments. If the Tribunal makes a ruling, for you to enforce that ruling you have to go to the Supreme Court, and make application to convert it to a judgment of the Supreme Court and enforce it.

“If it’s $500 you win, where’s the incentive to spend $2,500-$4,000 - depending on the situation at the Supreme Court - to convert and enforce it? It’s expensive.

“The Tribunal was intended to be a one-stop shop situation. It was intended to be the end of it, but if you succeed you have to go to the Supreme Court, and the average worker does not have the funds to go there.”

The TUC chief said making the Industrial Tribunal an arm of the Supreme Court would “give it some teeth”, although it could retain its “informality” compared to other judicial branches.

Mr Ferguson said that in reforming the Industrial Tribunal, besides being given the power to enforce its own rulings and give directions to the parties in dispute, it also needed “the discretion to fast track a matter which ought to be addressed to avoid a strike.

“The Tribunal ought to be able to fast track a matter and have it dealt with immediately,” Mr Ferguson told Tribune Business.

“If you file a matter now, it goes into the list and takes three to four years for it to be heard.”

Mr Goudie voiced similar complaints to Mr Ferguson over the length of time taken by the Industrial Tribunal to resolve employer-employee disputes.

“The Industrial Tribunal just doesn’t move,” he told Tribune Business. “It’s years behind.”