The Tribune

By LEANDRA ROLLE 

Tribune Chief Reporter 

lrolle@tribunemedia.net

PETER Goudie, the Bahamas Chamber of Commerce and Employers Confederation’s (BCCEC) labour division head, wants the government to target “mom and pop” food stores and other businesses not paying NIB for their employees to help reduce poverty in the country.

He also called for dialogue on converting “informal” economy workers into formal employees.

The topic was one of several he discussed in a presentation yesterday at a labour legislation reform symposium.

He said there are too many informal workers, a type of employee not subject to income, benefits or social safety protection.

Dealing with this, he said, “would help reduce some of our poverty levels because some of these people who are in the informal economy don’t get paid very well”.

He recommended that the government target small “mom-and-pop stores” and illegitimate businesses, especially since the government has prioritised down on businesses that do not comply with the law.

“They started it in some ways,” he said, “You know there was this controversy about them going around with the police with long guns. I don’t think that’s necessary but we don’t need to go after legitimate businesses. We need to go after those who appear to be legitimate and we need to go almost business by business.”

“And that’s what I’m concerned about because it’s a huge piece of our economy. People don’t think about it because people think, oh that’s only one little store.”

Mr Goudie wants the government to run the country more like a business.

“It’s very difficult to get people who aren’t performing terminated and we’re saying let’s change the general orders and let’s start running government like a business and be responsible instead of having people working who really aren’t performing,” he said.