Belize City-based members of the Belize Communication Workers’ Union met on Wednesday night and unanimously agreed to take industrial action following the recent termination of three workers who were liaison between BTL workers and the union. BCWU president, Paul Perriott, claims that the terminations violate the existing collective agreement between the company and the unions, and thwart negotiations for a new collective agreement which were in progress at the time of the terminations.
The union says it plans to issue a 21-day strike notice if the workers are not reinstated. The union would send a letter to the Ministry of Labor by the end of the week to inform them of their intentions, Perriott said.
BTL employees from the districts are also in support of the industrial action, he told us.
“We have drawn swords and the collective agreement has been set aside deliberately by the company. That is most regrettable, but we are happy to oblige! We, therefore, write to advise that, unless the workers are reinstated immediately and the consultative process mandated by the agreement and the MOU is immediately activated, we reserve our rights within the law to do as we please.”
So read a letter from the president of the Belize Communication Workers Union, Paul Perriott, to Dean Boyce, chairman of the executive committee of the Belize Telecommunications Limited (BTL). The letter is dated Wednesday, January 31, 2007.
For some time now the union and management have been discussing the terms of a new agreement. They last met on Wednesday, January 24. Another meeting was anticipated this week, but talks have been suspended since the terminations, Perriott said.
At their last meeting they discussed the issue of sick days, which Perriott says management wants to cut down from 28 days.
Then on Tuesday, January 30, Nelson Young, Enrique Monima and Andy Sutherland were terminated without any reason being cited for the terminations, the union claims.
While there have been rumors that the workers have been terminated for some phones that had gone missing from the BTL’s store in Ladyville, the union claims that their termination is revenge for the 2005 protests the union led against the return of Carlisle Holdings/Michael Ashcroft to the helm of BTL.
When we asked Perriott why they have that conviction, he said that it is because management did not follow proper termination procedures.
The phones were reported missing since last July – six months ago. The workers had asked for the police to be brought in to investigate but none were brought in, said Perriott.
He further claimed that when the three liaison officers were terminated, the union and BTL’s management sat in suspension hearings for another worker, and similarly, the union could have been called in to discuss the terminations of Young, Monima and Sutherland.
Perriott informed that the termination letters were not linked to the missing cell phones. The union says that the terminations are a part of a wider retrenchment plan at BTL.
BTL’s management has not said much about the matter. However, Karen Bevans, head of business development and marketing of BTL, rebutted Perriott’s claim when we asked for a response from BTL today. She said that BTL is not undergoing a retrenchment, as the union has alleged. The union was informed of the terminations, and if the terminations were wrongly handled, there is a grievance procedure to settle it, she added.
Bevans also said she could not discuss the reason for the terminations, since employment information is confidential.
The BCWU has raised concern to members on the following issues:
1. The wrongful termination of 3 union liaison officers, namely, Andy Sutherland, Nelson Young, Enrique Monima
2. Union busting – dividing tactics and threats
3. Collective bargaining process
4. Unending uncertainty
5. Ownership of BTL – as the union points out, the court had made a ruling in favor of Jeffrey Prosser holding 4 seats on the BTL board.
The Prosser matter is another dimension to the story that was highlighted today, since the terminations have been effected under Ashcroft’s control. When the Government of Belize regained control of BTL from Prosser over a year ago, it was negotiating with workers to purchase majority interest in the company; but instead those shares were sold off to Lord Ashcroft because workers disagreed with the terms of the sale – one of which was that a trust company controlled by Ashcroft would have held on to those shares until workers paid the multi-million-dollar bill for the shares.
Last week we reported on the termination of three workers from Port of Belize, which the Christian Workers Union also claimed was done in violation of the collective agreement between the CWU and management.
At the same time the medical staff of the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital is also threatening industrial action in protest of Government’s decision to settle a $30 million debt of Universal Health Services and integrate the private hospital into the public health care system.
The BCWU said that it stands in solidarity with the Port and KHMH workers.