As hundreds of Wales sugar workers cope without their severance benefits, the war of words has continued between their representative union and employer. On Wednesday, the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union (GAWU) in a strongly worded statement condemned the contentions of a June 30, 2017 Guyana Chronicle report titled “Keep your job” which focused on the events which
Sugar operations at Wales ended in December 2016
surrounded a Wales Community Centre meeting, hosted by the Guyana Sugar Corporation (GuySuCo) one day prior.
The article quoted GuySuCo’s Chief Industrial Relations Manager (CIRM) as saying “…if the employees continue to refuse work they are liable to terminate their own employment and lose severance pay as well as all those benefits”. However, the union said on Wednesday that it was disturbed by the newspaper article, and reminded that the sugar corporation’s stance in refusing some 350 workers their termination benefits is “contrary” to the Termination of Employment and Severance Pay Act (TESPA).
“On this score, we wish to again point out that the Union was forced to take the matter to the Courts in order for the workers’ rights to be respected and upheld. In view of the matter in Court, should the Corporation decide to terminate the workers concerned, as articulated by the CIRM, it would be engaging in, obviously, contemptuous behaviour,” the union body observed.
On March 23, counsel for GAWU Ashton Chase, SC, filed legal proceedings in the High Court but the matter is yet to be called up before a judge.
GAWU in its press statement further highlighted that the CIRM saying that workers had agreed to remain on the Wales Estate payroll and be transported to Uitvlugt for work was “plainly wrong and deceptive”, suggesting that the official could be “imagining things”. “To set the records straight, the Corporation invited the Union to a meeting on February 01, 2017 at the LBI Staff Club where it communicated that it wished to have the Wales workers going to Uitvlugt. The workers representatives and Union in response suggested that the workers be consulted individually since previously the Corporation had committed to providing them with their redundancy pay should they so desire. The request was agreed to by GuySuCo,” GAWU clarified.
It further explained that consultative exercises were to be held on February 8 and 9, 2017 at the Wales Community Centre but at the first meeting, the workers demanded their severance. As such, scheduled consultations in the afternoon of February 08 and 09, 2017 were not held.
“The Corporation’s ill-defined threat by its CIRM shows the depth to which it will pursue to compel the workers to go to Uitvlugt. The fact is that the law is on the side of the workers and all that the Union is seeking from the Corporation is for it to honour its statutory obligations and abandon its cunningly crafted schemes that promote the wretched system of forced labour in our society,” the representative body for sugar workers expressed.
The problems associated with the non-payment of the workers severance benefits stems from the workers refusing to travel from the West Bank Demerara Wales Sugar Estate to Uitvlugt on the West Coast of Demerara. The workers strongly contended that they could not be compelled to travel 22 miles to take up employment. As such, the frustrated Wales workers, often times supported by their union, scheduled a number of protests at their place of employment and at key spaces in Georgetown.
However the protest actions in front of Parliament Buildings were subsequently curtailed, for what the police said was security concerns for members of the National Assembly.
When the Wales workers met with GuySuCo at the community centre last week Thursday, they stormed out following a dispute with the former Estate Manager of Wales Factory. Sugar workers had long been arguing against the treatment of the sugar corporation concerning their redundancy and redeployment.
At one point in February 2016, some categories of workers were given just three days to decide if they wanted to remain at Wales or have their services transferred to Uitvlugt but GuySuCo quickly shelved these plans after the media got wind of the plans. Sugar operations officially ended at Wales in 2016 and many workers have been without employment from the corporation since early 2017.
