The development came today as Prime Minister Perry Christie said firmly that the government simply cannot afford to make the payments at this time.
Mr. Christie said in the House of Assembly this morning that meeting those payments would add 0.5 percent to the projected GFS deficit of 2.2 percent.
The prime minister told parliamentarians that he had no intentions of seeking the wrath of Bahamians. However, he added that his job is not to win a popularity contest, but to do what is in the best interest of the country.
He intimated that Bahamians need to be sensible and realize that the government has to make sound decisions to ensure economic stability and job security.
Mr. Christie said the government will continue to exercise fiscal prudence, but he added that he is open to dialogue with all union leaders regarding the decision to delay the salary increases.
He made the announcement a week ago to hold off on paying civil servants an extra $100 per month for the next 12 months. But he promised that the government will look at the issue again at the end of the year. Those increases would have amounted to $24 million.
Certain union leaders like President of the Trade Union Congress Obie Ferguson are supporting the government, accepting the explanation for a delay.
While some unions like the Bahamas Utilities Services and Allied Workers Union support the government’s move, others like the Bahamas Union of Teachers and the Bahamas Public Services Union are hinting that they would stage industrial action if the payments are not made as scheduled next month.
Both the BUT and BPSU are members of the National Congress of Trade Unions.
Disgruntled public school teachers, meanwhile, are calling on the government to “live up to the terms of its contract” and pay the $1,200 public sector salary increases as originally scheduled beginning next month.
President of the Bahamas Union of Teachers Kingsley Black said at a press conference at the union’s headquarters yesterday that his members have instructed him that no compromise will be accepted – they expect their salary increases to be paid and they expect them to be paid beginning in July.
“My members are grossly disappointed that the government has made a unilateral decision to set aside the provision of our employment contract to pay the salary increases beginning next month,” Mr. Black said.
He added that union members take exception to the government seeking to make public servants appear to be “the bad guys.”
Mr. Black made the statements following meetings with teachers in Grand Bahama and New Providence on what strategies they would adopt to obtain payment of the salary increases beginning in July. Mr. Black believes the government can afford to make the payments this time.
He added that the increases were agreed to from four years ago and the government should have been preparing from that time to make the scheduled payments.”The fact that no commitment was made in the national budget to meet the obligation to pay the salary increase amounts to a fundamental breach of the collective agreement by our employer, the government,” he said.
Mr. Black also dismissed claims that taxes would have to be raised in order to accommodate the increases.
“Our thing is that $24 million in a $1 billion budget is next to zero,” the union president said. “Twenty-four million dollars amounts to literally about 2 percent of $1 billion and consequently it can’t be reasonable for us to expect that the government has to increase taxation dramatically simply to pay $24 million.”
According to Mr. Black, the union members might have considered working with the government to have the increases paid at a later date, but the manner in which the decision not to pay the increases was made and announced destroyed any such possibility.
He added that the government’s “critical mistake” was to seek to unilaterally change the terms of the employment contract.
“We’re not even prepared to debate the economic issues or the budgetary issues,” Mr. Black said. “As far as we’re concerned they are not our issues. Our issue is on the July pay day we expect an additional $100 to be added to our pay cheques.”
Mr. Black, who heads the over 3,000-member strong BUT, said the decision to delay the increases could negatively affect morale in the public service.
“I don’t see for the life of me how the government can expect civil servants to do their best to increase productivity to bring the many [investment proposals] to fruition,” he said, “because it isn’t politicians who will work with the investors at the end of the day.
“It’s the public servants who will work with the investors to make certain that these projects come to fruition so how will the civil servants feel when they are helping the government to increase revenue, but at the same time the government is reneging on its obligation?”
Mr. Black pointed out that some teachers were so irate at the government’s decision to delay payment of the increases that they called for a work stoppage by public school teachers, threatening to interrupt the end of year examinations.
He said, however, that such action was deemed unnecessary at this stage.
Mr. Black added that the union members have not yet decided what will be the next step in seeking to obtain payment of the increases next month, but he said that union officials have deliberately left their options open.
“We know the range of options and we are seeking to employ some of them now,” he said. “The government has already launched its public relations campaign and we are simply joining the government by launching our public relations campaign to make certain the public understands our story.”
The Bahama Journal
