Ot­to Car­ring­ton

Se­nior Re­porter

ot­to.car­ring­ton@guardian.co.tt

Port work­ers have been or­dered back to work fol­low­ing an In­dus­tri­al Court in­junc­tion. The move has been de­scribed as a vic­to­ry for the na­tion’s econ­o­my by the Port Au­thor­i­ty.

The rul­ing comes amidst es­ca­lat­ing ten­sions over labour dis­putes be­tween port work­ers and the Port Au­thor­i­ty.

The in­ter­im ex parte in­junc­tion marks a turn­ing point af­ter more than a month of in­dus­tri­al ac­tion led by the Sea­men and Wa­ter­front Work­ers Trade Union (SWW­TU).

The mat­ter was heard be­fore In­dus­tri­al Court pres­i­dent Heather Seale, vice pres­i­dent Her­bert Sover­all, Chair­man of the Es­sen­tial Ser­vices Di­vi­sion Lawrence Achong, His Ho­n­our Mor­ton Mitchell, and His Ho­n­our Vin­cent Cabr­era.

The union was served around 9 am yes­ter­day to ap­pear in court lat­er that day at 1.30 pm. The mat­ter is ex­pect­ed to be heard on De­cem­ber 6, when the union will present its case.

How­ev­er, SWW­TU pres­i­dent gen­er­al Michael An­nisette crit­i­cised the Port Au­thor­i­ty’s ap­proach, stat­ing that the sit­u­a­tion could have been re­solved through di­a­logue with the union rather than re­sort­ing to le­gal ac­tion.

An­nisette said the union would re­spect the court’s judg­ment and await the writ­ten or­ders.

Works and Trans­port Min­is­ter Ro­han Sinanan de­scribed the court’s de­ci­sion as a “vic­to­ry for Trinidad and To­ba­go,” em­pha­sis­ing the im­por­tance of re­sum­ing op­er­a­tions at the port.

The in­dus­tri­al ac­tion, which per­sist­ed for more than six weeks, caused sig­nif­i­cant dis­rup­tions to busi­ness­es and crit­i­cal sec­tors of the econ­o­my.

The ma­jor is­sue of con­tention for the work­ers has been a 12 per cent wage in­crease, which they claimed was agreed to with the port man­age­ment for the bar­gain­ing pe­ri­od from 2014 to 2019. 

How­ev­er, Sinanan said that the of­fer was not sanc­tioned by the CPO (Chief Per­son­nel Of­fi­cer). The Gov­ern­ment coun­tered with a four per cent of­fer, fu­elling dis­con­tent among the work­ers.

Sinanan lat­er said talks were un­der­way with Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert to place the of­fer of five per cent for the 2020 to 2022 pe­ri­od for the SWW­TU mem­bers. 

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia short­ly af­ter the judg­ment, Sinanan re­it­er­at­ed that the court’s de­ci­sion was a “vic­to­ry”, high­light­ing its sig­nif­i­cance in restor­ing op­er­a­tions and sta­bil­i­ty.

“It’s a vic­to­ry for the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty, for the rep­u­ta­tion of the Port of Port-of-Spain, and for do­ing busi­ness in Trinidad and To­ba­go. It’s al­so a vic­to­ry for the work­ers at the port be­cause we are act­ing in the best in­ter­est of all stake­hold­ers, in­clud­ing the work­ers,” he said.

Sinanan said the im­por­tance of re­solv­ing the dis­pute am­i­ca­bly. “We will use this op­por­tu­ni­ty to find a so­lu­tion to this dis­pute. How­ev­er, shut­ting down the port every oth­er day is not a vi­able so­lu­tion. With the port now ful­ly op­er­a­tional, we can fo­cus on meet­ing and chart­ing a way for­ward.”

The Works Min­is­ter em­pha­sised that the port had al­ways re­mained open to dis­cus­sions, but the union had cho­sen not to en­gage. “There are rules and reg­u­la­tions re­gard­ing how we ne­go­ti­ate with work­ers. If the union is their bar­gain­ing unit, we will en­gage the union. The port has al­ways been open to meet­ing with the unions, but it is the unions that have tak­en a stand of 12 per cent or noth­ing,” he ex­plained.

“Ne­go­ti­a­tions re­quire com­pro­mise. If both sides hold firm to their po­si­tions, no progress can be made. The port is will­ing to meet with the unions, pro­vid­ed they are open to com­ing up with a sen­si­ble so­lu­tion for the prob­lems go­ing for­ward.”

An­nisette ex­pressed dis­ap­point­ment over the Port Au­thor­i­ty’s ac­tion, stat­ing, “It is un­for­tu­nate that the port chose this path rather than meet­ing with the union. In my view, such dis­cus­sions would have re­sult­ed in a de­ci­sion that tru­ly serves the best in­ter­ests of Trinidad and To­ba­go.”

An­nisette said there was a need for a col­lab­o­ra­tive ap­proach. “We were dis­cussing pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, ef­fi­cien­cy, and align­ing the Port Au­thor­i­ty with in­ter­na­tion­al best prac­tices to make it more com­pet­i­tive. It is re­gret­table that the Gov­ern­ment or the Port Au­thor­i­ty did not en­gage the union in these dis­cus­sions, which are crit­i­cal for the na­tion’s progress. Nonethe­less, we will con­tin­ue to ad­vo­cate for a bet­ter, more ef­fi­cient port for Trinidad and To­ba­go, as en­vi­sioned in the frame­work agree­ment.”

In a me­dia re­lease yes­ter­day, Port Au­thor­i­ty Chair­man Lyle Alexan­der said the ur­gency of re­sum­ing op­er­a­tions was crit­i­cal, es­pe­cial­ly with the Christ­mas sea­son ap­proach­ing. “Pro­longed dis­rup­tions at the port threat­en busi­ness­es, with sev­er­al Cham­bers of Com­merce and en­ter­pris­es voic­ing con­cerns about im­pacts on sales and op­er­a­tions,” Alexan­der said. “We nev­er want­ed to take this ac­tion, but the work­ers’ steps are jeop­ar­dis­ing op­er­a­tions and liveli­hoods. We have a du­ty to pro­tect stake­hold­ers and the coun­try.”

The port han­dles 59 per cent of the na­tion’s con­tain­er vol­umes, mak­ing con­tin­ued dis­rup­tions a sig­nif­i­cant risk to the econ­o­my and es­sen­tial sup­ply chains. The Port Au­thor­i­ty said it re­mains open to di­a­logue to re­solve the wage im­passe but stressed that the cur­rent sit­u­a­tion is un­sus­tain­able and harm­ful to na­tion­al and re­gion­al in­ter­ests.