The Tribune

WHERE is your heart? Where is your compassion? Do you have a soul?

These were the words of Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis yesterday as he turned to business owners who have laid off workers despite having considerable personal wealth.

“I am extremely disappointed when I see Bahamian companies laying off individual who had worked with them 10, 20 years,” he said.

He did not name businesses specifically, but spoke of employees “who had made them wealthy; who had given them the opportunity to send their children to university both here and abroad; who have given them opportunities for their children to become professionals and leaders in this country; who have given them opportunity to live in lavish homes and have great lives… yet after all the sacrifices these Bahamians did, those who have attained wealth have laid off such Bahamians. I ask you, are you humane?”

Businesses in the current environment do face a tough balancing act. Owners must protect the long-term survival of the business – there is little use keeping staff on if it swiftly bankrupts the company and leaves those employees out of work anyway. But those weren’t the businesses the Prime Minister was referring to – it’s not the businesses living from their own pay cheque to pay cheque but the ones who are well established and whose owners have personal wealth to draw upon to assist in this period.

Without doubt, some businesses have been quicker than others to point their staff towards the door, shifting the burden onto the public purse and NIB rather than digging deeper themselves. Some have been exposed as failing in even their basic duties to pay NIB the contributions that have been deducted from employees’ pay cheques.

But other businesses have shone in the way they have treated their employees. And now, as there are the first glimmers of more businesses starting to open in a limited fashion, it is the businesses who still have their employees on the payroll that the Prime Minister is calling on to hold the course.

Dr Minnis said he wanted to make a “strong plea to business owners who are in a strong financial position to do so, to hold off from laying off employees for as long as possible”.

Money in people’s pockets does more than just give them enough money for their food and their bills, it keeps the economic wheels turning. That money goes to food stores and delivery companies, to water suppliers, to gas stations and, as things start to open up again, each of the businesses opens its doors in turn. The longer people are able to be kept on payrolls, the quicker the economy overall will start to rebound. The more we can minimise individual losses, the more people will be able to spend when we get back to normal.

Those businesses that watch the bottom line closer than they watch the amount of money they have in reserve may be too quick to act in getting rid of employees. They will also be slower to rebound if they are unable to hire all of those employees back again, having to retrain any replacements they get. Some will even struggle despite that - more than one business has found itself on the wrong side of public opinion with the manner it has treated employees, with some vowing never to use that business again.

As Dr Minnis signalled, however, it is also a matter of honour – of standing by the employees who have been the engine driving the business’ success. Right now, it is an act of patriotism to keep paying workers. It is an act that not every business can afford, but there are those that can, and if they can do so, they play their own part in aiding the nation.

But we would also add that as well as waving a stick, perhaps the government should remember a carrot. For those businesses who do hold the line, incentives for the future can be an encouragement. The government has offered deferrals and loan facilities, but perhaps there is more to support those who do keep on their staff, from licence breaks to contract priorities when all this is done.

No one is under any illusions that it will take the resumption of the tourism market to lift us back to where we were – but the better functioning our internal business market is at that stage, the sooner we will be able to take advantage of open borders.

There will be an end to this. We will come out the other side. And the better shape we come out of it, the better for The Bahamas.