Derek Achong

The In­dus­tri­al Court has or­dered the T&T Na­tion­al Pe­tro­le­um Mar­ket­ing Co (NP) to pay three re­trenched em­ploy­ees 24 months of back wages and salaries.In the rul­ing de­liv­ered on Oc­to­ber 24, the court al­so or­dered that the for­mer em­ploy­ees be paid all fixed al­lowances, in­clud­ing any in­creas­es ap­plic­a­ble dur­ing the 24-month pe­ri­od.The ac­tion was brought by the Oil­field Work­ers' Trade Union (OW­TU) on be­half of the work­ers-Court­ney Bar­row, Louis Whar­ton and Ed­mond Arneaud.

The work­ers were told of their re­dun­dan­cy on Feb­ru­ary 15 and 17, 2000, by their im­me­di­ate su­per­vi­sors at the com­pa­ny. The mat­ter was be­fore In­dus­tri­al Court judges Ram­c­hand Lutch­me­di­al and Bindi­mat­tie Ma­habir, who de­liv­ered the judg­ment.The for­mer work­ers claimed they were dis­missed in harsh and op­pres­sive cir­cum­stances, con­trary to the prin­ci­ples of good in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions prac­tice.

At­tor­neys rep­re­sent­ing NP de­nied the union's al­le­ga­tion, say­ing the ter­mi­na­tion of the em­ploy­ees' was a re­sult of gen­uine re­dun­dan­cy caused by ra­tio­nal­i­sa­tion of the com­pa­ny's or­gan­i­sa­tion­al struc­ture.Bar­row, an en­gi­neer, who was 50 at the time of his dis­missal, was un­able to gain em­ploy­ment, with his age be­ing a prob­a­ble fac­tor. In his tes­ti­mo­ny, he said he had since be­come a maxi taxi own­er.Whar­ton, who was 56, was un­suc­cess­ful in se­cur­ing em­ploy­ment, while Arneaud got a job with a ship­ping com­pa­ny.

In pass­ing the judg­ment, Ma­habir said: "It is not dis­put­ed that re­trench­ment is a valid man­age­ment pre­rog­a­tive."NP must en­sure that they fol­low the pro­ce­dures set in the Re­trench­ment and Sev­er­ance Act and en­gage in be­hav­iours that are con­sis­tent with the prin­ci­ples of good in­dus­tri­al re­la­tions prac­tice," she said.In the 20-page judg­ment, Ma­habir said NP failed at this, as it led no cred­i­ble ev­i­dence of a fair cri­te­ria in choos­ing the for­mer em­ploy­ees for dis­missal.