By NEIL HARTNELL

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

and NICO SCAVELLA

nscavella@tribunemedia.net

Sandals decision to terminate its 600-strong Royal Bahamian workforce benefited them more than the union’s preferred option, the resort’s attorney argued yesterday, because it ensured they had funds to meet ‘back to school’ expenses.

Wayne Munroe QC said that, in contrast, the Bahamas Hotel, Maintenance and Allied Workers Union’s (BHMAWU) desire for the staff to be “furloughed” would have left many members without money during this critical period.

While Sandals would have retained the existing workforce under this option, they would not have received any pay for the two-month period that the Royal Bahamian property was undergoing a $4 million renovation programme.

Mr Munroe said: “I have heard all sorts of matters about how these people [Sandals] are so harsh with these Bahamian employees.

“Well, the union accepts that the hotel was closing for two months. When occupancy falls, hotel workers’ days are scaled back. We’ve all heard of hotel workers on two days, three days and no days.

“The option was for the people to be furloughed from August through to October without pay at the time when you would be getting your children ready for school, or for them to be terminated, paid, received unemployment benefit in the second month, and then reengaged in October.”

Mr Munroe said he had “heard stories about the workers celebrating” how much severance pay they received under the Employment Act.

“But you still see stories about how bad they are being treated when they are actually being paid for two months,” he added. “If you believe it, their union wants them not to be paid. How in the world is that standing up for workers?

“That appears to me to be the union standing up for that $10 per worker, per week, [union dues] and nothing more. Could you actually imagine? A lot of us live pay cheque to pay cheque, people getting ready to send their people back to school, and the union is saying send them home with no pay, just so that we can be sure that they remain members of the union? Whose interest is being looked out for in that dynamic?”

Mr Munroe continued: “How is it that this union isn’t telling people that it wanted its workers to go home with no pay at ‘back to school’ time? Things like that I find a little disturbing.

“I have all respect for properly-run trade unions. I think that we are faced with a challenge where we have to make sure that the Industrial Relations Act is applied and followed by unions very simply, because there is a temptation to act in their own interest. And I would think that it’s the Government’s responsibility to make sure that a worker who pays $10 a week is getting value for their money.”

Mr Munroe said Sandals Royal Bahamian had not terminated any of its managers, but said some became “disgruntled” as this position and wanted the same severance terms as the line staff.

‘The managers got disgruntled and asked to be offered the same deal, and when they were, 16 of their managers decided that they would like to be terminated along with the line staff; paid their benefits, have the right to reapply and be reengaged in October,” Mr Munroe said.

“For the life of me, I think Bahamian people have to be more careful in what we say or we will be easily lead around by the noise.”

Mr Munroe said too much misinformation was circulating regarding the Sandals terminations, which he attributed to an “information vacuum”.

He explained that the Attorney General’s directive to the magistrate’s court, requiring it to drop the criminal prosecution launched by the BHMAWU’s officers against Sandals Royal Bahamian and its management, stemmed from an abuse of the judicial system’s processes.

Mr Munroe said the criminal case was effectively litigating the same issues as those raised in a pre-existing civil matter, which was already before the Supreme Court. Previous rulings, he added, had established the legal precedent “that you cannot try in a lower court an issue that is presently before a higher court”.

Mr Munroe said he and Sandals Royal Bahamian had warned the Attorney General, Allyson Maynard-Gibson, that unless she acted they would sue both the magistrate and union officers via Judicial Review to have the criminal case quashed.

That case, which was due to be heard before Justice Ian Winder yesterday, appears to have sparked the Attorney General’s rush to finally file the ‘nolle prosequi’ with the courts earlier this week - despite it having been signed more than a month earlier on August 15, 2016.

This explanation was last night backed by PLP chairman, Bradley Roberts, who said Mrs Maynard-Gibson had “determined that it was an abuse of the judicial process to have the matter simultaneously litigated in the courts”.

Mr Munroe, though, said he - like the union - had been aware of the Government’s intentions, and only found out about the move after it has happened.

“There was a private prosecution launched against West Bay Management Ltd, which is Sandals, and two of their managers,” Mr Munroe said. “We were instructed for West Bay Management, and complained to the Office of the Attorney General that Sandals was at that very moment in a case [with] the registrar of trade unions and that union, making a case that the union didn’t exist because it hadn’t complied with the mandatory requirement of the Industrial Relations Act.”

The Supreme Court has still to determine whether the BHMAWU exists, and Mr Munroe added of the criminal case: “This prosecution is about whether this employer failed to negotiate with a union who it is presently saying doesn’t exist in the civil Supreme Court.

“There were issues about statute barring, and issues about them not having followed the process. We cried to the Attorney General that they need to look at this or we would sue them - sue them in terms of bringing a case against the magistrate and the complainant to have the proceedings quashed.”

Mr Munroe said of the Government: “They said nothing to us, although looking at the nolle they must have looked at it and determined to sign it in August, but they told us nothing.

“So we settled the proceedings for leave for Judicial Review to get the proceedings quashed, and to get damages against the magistrate and the individuals bringing the prosecution. We served them on Friday past with our application for leave to bring it, and I’m discovering through the press that they [the Government] promptly ran down to court on Monday and presented this nolle that terminated the procedure.

“So this morning, when we went before Justice Winder for leave, there was nothing for him to give us leave on, and so we got no cost against the Government.”