Ot­to Car­ring­ton

Se­nior Re­porter

ot­to.car­ring­ton@cnc3.co.tt

Trade union lead­ers are now press­ing ahead with a march set for Oc­to­ber 30, warn­ing that the Gov­ern­ment’s bud­get promis­es on back­pay can­not set­tle their griev­ances over dis­placed work­ers, un­re­solved wage ne­go­ti­a­tions and em­ploy­ees still sur­viv­ing on 2013 salaries.

Sea­men and Wa­ter­front Work­ers’ Trade Union pres­i­dent Michael An­nisette warned that be­ing brand­ed a “trai­tor” or “stooge” will not si­lence him.

“All those who want to say in Cab­i­net that An­nisette is a trai­tor, An­nisette is a stooge, go ahead and say it,” he de­clared.

Speak­ing at a joint union me­dia con­fer­ence at the SWW­TU Hall in Port-of-Spain yes­ter­day, An­nisette said he would con­tin­ue chal­leng­ing the Gov­ern­ment.

He in­sist­ed no one would “put a lid” on his crit­i­cism.

An­nisette said work­ers who had re­ceived pay­ments should stand with col­leagues still await­ing set­tle­ments.

He called on the Fi­nance Min­is­ter Dav­en­dranath Tan­coo to meet the labour move­ment and re­solve out­stand­ing col­lec­tive agree­ments.

An­nisette said the march would al­so ad­dress crime, op­por­tu­ni­ties for young peo­ple and ed­u­ca­tion that pre­pared cit­i­zens for work in tech­nol­o­gy and ar­ti­fi­cial in­tel­li­gence.

Steel Work­ers’ Union of Trinidad and To­ba­go pres­i­dent Tim­o­thy Bai­ley, mean­while, di­rect­ly chal­lenged the Gov­ern­ment’s tar­get for restart­ing steel pro­duc­tion by the end of 2027.

“I am chal­leng­ing the Gov­ern­ment and I am chal­leng­ing this en­ti­ty to pro­duce steel be­fore the end of 2027,” Bai­ley said.

He ac­cused the Gov­ern­ment of fail­ing to seek the right ad­vice and said ex­pe­ri­enced steel­work­ers must be in­volved in restart­ing the in­dus­try.

The bud­get tar­gets first pro­duc­tion at the for­mer Arcelor­Mit­tal plant for the end of 2027, through a project in­volv­ing Pin­na­cle Steel and Vana­di­um Cor­po­ra­tion and its lo­cal sub­sidiary, Ibis Steel.

Bai­ley stressed that his union whole­heart­ed­ly sup­port­ed restart­ing the in­dus­try but want­ed col­lab­o­ra­tion with the work­ers who knew the plant.

Al­so speak­ing as a con­sul­tant to the Trinidad and To­ba­go Air­line Pi­lots’ As­so­ci­a­tion, Bai­ley said pi­lots were still owed more than $20 mil­lion de­spite ne­go­ti­a­tions con­clud­ing in De­cem­ber 2024.

“It was a bud­get of show­man­ship, but it was a bud­get of lit­tle for the work­ing class.”

Amal­ga­mat­ed Work­ers’ Union pres­i­dent Michael Pren­tice wel­comed fund­ing for Port-of-Spain Cor­po­ra­tion ar­rears but ques­tioned why mon­ey he said had been ap­proved dur­ing the midyear re­view had not been paid.

The bud­get al­lo­cates $44.9 mil­lion for those ar­rears, with­in wider wage pro­vi­sions Tan­coo said would put close to $2.5 bil­lion in­to the hands of serv­ing and re­tired pub­lic of­fi­cers.

Pren­tice claimed more than 40,000 work­ers had been dis­placed since the Gov­ern­ment took of­fice, cit­ing CEPEP, URP, forestry and oth­er work­ers.

He urged cor­po­ra­tion work­ers to march in sol­i­dar­i­ty with af­fect­ed fam­i­lies.

Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Work­ers’ Union sec­re­tary gen­er­al Joanne Ogeer ac­knowl­edged pos­i­tive bud­get mea­sures but said un­re­solved bar­gain­ing at TSTT re­mained a con­cern.

She ac­cused Pub­lic Util­i­ties Min­is­ter Bar­ry Padarath of at­tempt­ing to cir­cum­vent bar­gain­ing by say­ing no ten per cent in­crease was on the ta­ble.

Ogeer said ne­go­ti­a­tions would re­sume on Oc­to­ber 28 and urged work­ers to gath­er at Memo­r­i­al Park at 9 am on Oc­to­ber 30, wear­ing union jer­seys or na­tion­al colours.