With the trade unions head­ing in­to to­day’s Labour Day cel­e­bra­tions heav­i­ly bruised by job loss­es in the last year, an­a­lysts be­lieve that their re­cov­ery hinges on their abil­i­ty to unite.

For­mer Oil­field Work­ers’ Trade Union pres­i­dent and for­mer Labour Min­is­ter Er­rol McLeod said if there is greater sol­i­dar­i­ty among trade unions, they might get the re­spect they seek.

While there have been splits in Labour Day ac­tiv­i­ties over the last few years, the fo­cus will be on Joint Trade Union Move­ment (JTUM) pres­i­dent An­cel Ro­get’s pre­sen­ta­tion at Char­lie King Junc­tion in Fyz­abad. Like 2019 where he gave the gov­ern­ment a fail­ing grade in JTUM’s per­for­mance ap­praisal, he is ex­pect­ed to give his as­sess­ment again. Dur­ing the last year, Ro­get, who is al­so the pres­i­dent of the OW­TU would have fought as gov­ern­ment shut down Petrotrin and re­trenched 4700-plus work­ers. The ef­fect of that de­ci­sion was al­so felt by con­trac­tors at Petrotrin who al­so had to re­duce staff. 

McLeod, who led the OW­TU for 21 years, said he ex­pects all work­ers who had been re­trenched, who are un­em­ployed for long pe­ri­ods and who are hold­ing on to jobs in ten­u­ous sit­u­a­tions to hit the streets to­day.
He said this would bring some much-need­ed uni­ty to labour move­ment, which he said is in a chaot­ic state.

“I ex­pect them to come out. They will come out what­ev­er the dif­fer­ences of move­ments. They must come out and show strength, might and de­ter­mi­na­tion to fight against what is tak­ing place. I hope that what I have seen over the past cou­ple weeks is go­ing to ce­ment a re­la­tion­ship that will en­dure and take more se­ri­ous­ly, the plight of work­ers and the poor of the coun­try,” McLeod said.
He said work­ers should be to­geth­er all the time, so that there will be a bet­ter re­sponse to what he termed the fi­as­cos that had tak­en place at Petrotrin, Arcelor­Mit­tal, TSTT and oth­er com­pa­nies. 
He said the trade unions have not put their best foot for­ward in ad­dress­ing these is­sues as the gov­ern­ment has been tak­ing ac­tion that has been dele­te­ri­ous to the move­ment and poor peo­ple of T&T.

Po­lit­i­cal sci­en­tist Dr Maukesh Bas­deo said that he al­so ex­pects the lay­offs at Petrotrin, TSTT and UTT to be ma­jor talk­ing points in Fyz­abad.

Not­ing that there have been rifts be­tween the JTUM and the Na­tion­al Trade Union Cen­tre, Bas­deo said that what would send a clear mes­sage is if both or­gan­i­sa­tions ap­pear on the same plat­form.
“What we have seen in the last year is the com­ing to­geth­er of the ma­jor fac­tions in the move­ment. They had joint state­ments of sol­i­dar­i­ty and is­sues. As we go in­to the next year, it will be in­ter­est­ing to see if they put on a unit­ed front with­in the State and pri­vate sec­tor. They can have a joint state­ment to­mor­row. What comes af­ter to­mor­row and on how they ap­proach labour is­sue is the re­al key. If they speak about it on a joint plat­form, it will pri­mar­i­ly be di­rect­ed to the po­lit­i­cal di­rec­torate, the poor re­la­tion be­tween em­ploy­er and em­ploy­ee. Af­ter to­mor­row, whether we will see sol­i­dar­i­ty across all the is­sues af­fect­ing the labour move­ment is an­oth­er thing,” Bas­deo said.

Labour Day ac­tiv­i­ties be­gin with the But­ler Clas­sic Road Races at 5 am. It will be fol­lowed by wreath-lay­ing cer­e­monies at Tubal Uri­ah But­ler’s gravesite at Apex Ceme­tery, Fyz­abad and La Brea Charles’ grave site along the South­ern Main Road, Fyz­abad. Sol­i­dar­i­ty speech­es by var­i­ous trade union lead­ers at Av­o­cat Junc­tion will be­gin at 9 am. Mem­bers will then march to­wards Char­lie King Junc­tion. There, Ro­get will de­liv­er the fea­ture pre­sen­ta­tion. The day’s events end with a cul­tur­al show. (KF)