By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

The private sector has “no legitimate case” for opposing the Government’s proposal to criminalise a business’s failure to inform it and the relevant trade union of planned redundancies, the Trades Union Congress’s (TUC) president said yesterday.

Obie Ferguson told Tribune Business that the proposed amendments to the Employment Act were merely adding the threat of penal punishment should employers fail to do something that was already required.

Acknowledging that the proposed criminal sanctions were causing concern in the Bahamian business community, Mr Ferguson said it was only “logical” that companies consult both the Government and relevant union ‘bargaining agent’ before significantly downsizing their workforce.

“When I look at what the Chamber is saying, they don’t have a case,” Mr Ferguson told Tribune Business.

“I don’t see a legitimate case being put forward by the Chamber. What is being proposed is a penalty for not doing what they’re supposed to be doing now.

“All the changes that the Government is proposing to make are to preserve the industrial relations system, make it run smoothly and avoid strikes and walk outs. These are the sort of things we’re trying to avoid, and I hope they’d [the Chamber and private sector] come around and agree with us that’s the proper thing to do.”

The Christie administration wants to make it mandatory for employers to provide two months’ (60 days) notice to itself and the relevant bargaining agent (trade union) whenever they are about to make 10 or more workers redundant, with failing to do so becoming a criminal offence.

And, joining this proposal in the “emergency legislation” the Government wants to bring to the House of Assembly by September 30, the Government also wants to remove the Employment Act’s existing ‘12-year cap’ on severance/redundancy pay.

Such a move has long been demanded by Bahamian trade union leaders, while the ‘advance redundancy warning’ measure appears to be a “knee jerk” reaction by the Government to what occurred at Sandals.

While both proposals must be discussed by the National Tripartite Council, in a bid to achieve consensus before they become draft legislation put before Parliament, the Government has made little effort to disguise its determination to move them forward.

Sandals said it had little choice but to terminate its 600-strong Royal Bahamian workforce in order to facilitate $4 million worth of upgrades, as the existing hotel industry industrial agreement - with the Bahamas Hotel, Catering and Allied Workers Union (BHCAWU) - had expired.

However, it is the rival Bahamas Hotel, Maintenance and Allied Workers Union (BHMAWU), an affiliate of Mr Ferguson’s TUC, that has been recognised as the bargaining agent that has been trying, in vain, to start industrial agreement talks with Sandals.

The resort chain also said the BHCAWU industrial agreement’s expiry meant its provisions relating to redundancy were no longer in effect, something that Mr Ferguson argues is contrary to long-established industrial relations practice in the Bahamas.

He told Tribune Business that when industrial agreements expire, the custom has been both parties - employer and union - to continue to abide by that deal’s provisions until a new agreement is negotiated.

Mr Ferguson said the Sandals Royal Bahamian case was the “first time” that a company had not abided by such a convention, an action that set a dangerous precedent for the wider trade union and labour movement if left unchecked.

“This is the very first time that a company decided not to honour the BHCAWU agreement,” he told Tribune Business. “It’s really created a tremendous amount of problems. If allowed to go unchallenged, it will have far-reaching consequences for the future of the labour movement.

“For a civil society looking to avoid industrial unrest and friction and that type of stuff, we thought the path was very clear to resolving this type of thing.

“From 1958 we’ve operated in a certain way with regard to expired industrial agreements; not necessarily in law, but in terms of practice.”

Mr Ferguson confirmed that the trade unions wanted the 592 persons terminated by Sandals Royal Bahamian, including the 12 BHMAWU officers on its staff (some of whom were terminated earlier) to all be reinstated.

This is likely to prove difficult to achieve, though, and is likely to be viewed by Sandals as unwarranted interference in its hiring practices, especially as just 64 per cent of the former workforce reapplied for their jobs.

Mr Ferguson, though, again pulled back from previous threats that the trade unions would “shut the town down” unless they had their way over the Sandals situation and other labour grievances.

He added that talks with the Government, including Prime Minister Perry Christie; attorney general, Allyson Maynard-Gibson; and Shane Gibson, minister of labour and national insurance, were continuing amid hope that a resolution will be achieved this week.

“It’s always better to negotiate. Negotiation must be, and ought to be, the basis on which matters are resolved,” Mr Ferguson told Tribune Business.

“When you take the position of ‘closing the town down’, that must be the last resort. If the parties are serious about resolution, there’s no way we can’t meet and agree.

“If it’s dictatorial, and my way or the highway, then we have a problem.”

Mr Ferguson continued: “I’m satisfied we ought to find consensus on all these issues, and do what we’re supposed to be doing - making the Bahamas a more marketable place for tourists, and making it a more liveable place for Bahamians.”