Munroe
WORKERS AT the Jamalco plant in Clarendon who were laid off following a wildcat strike in early October, took industrial action against the advice of the University and Allied Workers Union (UAWU), which represents them.
"The workers were told what would happen and that is what is now happening," UAWU president Professor Trevor Munroe said.
He said the UAWU has told the management of Jamalco that the strike action was wrong and was regrettable, but at the same time said the workers' action should not justify an equal wrong on the part of the company. "Two wrongs don't make a right," he said.
Professor Munroe was speaking at a breakfast forum hosted by the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce (JCC) at the Terra Nova Hotel, St. Andrew, on Wednesday.
His comments were made against the background of a decision by Jamalco to make the posts of about 120 of its unionised staff redundant by year-end.
Jamalco has closed its Halse Hall plant in Clarendon since October 11 after workers took strike action without the required 72-hour notice and locked the gate to the premises. The Industrial Disputes Tribunal (IDT) ordered a resumption of work by October 15, but the company has since laid off the workers pending what it said was completion of a maintenance schedule.
Professor Munroe cautioned Jamalco against using the workers' behaviour as an excuse or a reason to reverse what he said were the gains made in the partnership between the bauxite industry and the unions.
He said the union has agreed that there would be redundancies at the company as a result of the general economic environment, but appealed to the management not to behave in a vindictive manner towards workers who participated in the industrial action.
"We told the company what we told the workers that the (strike) action was wrong and we regretted it," he said. "The workers were told what would happen (if they went on strike) and that is what is now happening," he added.
Professor Munroe, asked about the role of the union in averting the strike action before it occurred, said it was not a breakdown in union leadership that led to the industrial unrest. Rather, he said, it was a question of
followership.
The workers' irrational behaviour in not heeding the warning and advice of the union was based on their frustration, said Professor Munroe, who later told the Financial Gleaner that the UAWU was "not going to abandon them even though they did wrong."
And president of Red Stripe, John Irving, told business people attending the JCC forum that the controversial tax break granted by the Jamaican Government to the Diageo group, parent company of the local brewers, was not unique to the island.
Against the background of public criticisms over a five-year, $2 billion income tax holiday granted to Red Stripe in exchange for a $1.5 billion investment in expanding the local plant, Mr. Irving noted that Diageo's Guinness business was moved from Amsterdam to Scotland because of very attractive incentives in the latter mentioned country. Diageo has also moved its back office processing to Budapest in Hungary because of the incentives they could get, he said.
Mr. Irving also spoke about a disadvantage in doing business in Jamaica where they have a high target for rate of return on capital, because of the high cost structure in the island. In addition, he said, there was a disadvantage to local companies because they were largely self-reliant on resources and had limited access to capital.
