The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

and YOURI KEMP

Tribune Business Reporters

Trade unions yesterday unveiled an ambitious “wish list” of pro-labour reforms that are designed to address what one leader described as a “rudderless” industrial relations environment.

Obie Ferguson, the Trades Union Congress (TUC) president and main driver behind the “United Labour - Workers Agenda 2021” document, told Tribune Business that the union movement “cannot operate the way we have been” as it sought to use the numerous votes it represents to influence the major political parties’ priorities ahead of the upcoming election.

Arguing that workers must “have a say in the governance of the country”, Mr Ferguson said the unions’ proposals “might be ambitious, but I don’t think they’re unrealistic” when challenged by Tribune Business about the likelihood very few will be adopted by the next government.

Among the labour-friendly reforms are proposals that trade union representatives be involved in Heads of Agreement negotiations with foreign investors, and that they also play a role in deciding whether to approve work permit applications. 

Both are likely to be non-starters as far as the government and private sector are concerned. The document also called for tips, gratuities and all forms of compensation to be included in the Employment Act’s definition of wages, with the government urged to remove the 12-year “cap” for calculating statutory redundancy pay.

A “minimum living wage” of $300 per week, a near-43 percent increase in the present sum, is also being urged together with the allocation of crown land to the labour movement. Other suggestions call for “reactivating” the National Development Plan; enforcement of consumer protection legislation; passage of a Legal Aid Act; and full implementation of National Health Insurance.

“This is the right time in the history of the labour movement to document and put on paper the issues we consider to be important in this upcoming election,” Mr Ferguson argued. “We cannot continue to operate the way we have been operating.

“As soon as the union decides to use one of the most powerful tools it has, and that is to take industrial action, an injunction is issued and that stops the union from doing what it is trying to do, which is protect the workers and do a greater good for the community as a whole.

“We’ve been having issues with the nurses, we’ve been having issues with the doctors, issues with the Bahamas Hotel, Maintenance and Allied Workers Union at Sandals, issues with the Bahamas Hotel Managerial Association, issues with the air traffic controllers, issues at Water & Sewerage, issues with BPL. The beat goes on.”

Asserting that the union movement’s “agenda” proposals had been drafted by a committee featuring other union leaders as well as himself, with the general secretary from the other union umbrella group, the National Congress of Trade Unions (NCTU, also present, Mr Ferguson delivered a message to the major political parties that could not be much clearer.

“Our position is: ‘If you are for me, than I am going to be for you’,” he said. “If you are not prepared to adopt this and make it part of your message, we have agreed as a group to invite the members not to support you.”

Asked whether the unions were simply throwing their weight around ahead of the general election, Mr Ferguson replied: “I don’t know if it’s doing that. We are saying we cannot get anything done. I don’t think any union opposes this. I made sure the document is very comprehensive. The way we are going is without a rudder.”

He pointed out that, in the absence of any recall system or such like, MPs elected to the House of Assembly will remain in their posts for five years. As a result, Mr Ferguson argued that the unions need to know where they stand on labour-related matters before they are elected to office.

He added: “If they come to you, you tell them ‘you for me, I for you’. I’m not going to help you to get strong to destroy me. We use the workers for all sorts of things. We now say, for the first time, we are now making demands that any political party that is interested in supporting them, the requirement is to document that you have that they accept it publicly, they sign off on it for it and it is dated.”

The ‘United Labour - Workers Agenda 2021’ also calls for the establishment of a Cultural Heritage Encouragement Act, the creation of a National Pension Act and a Redundancy Act.