CABINET has welcomed the decision by the Guyana Power and Light (GPL) and the National Association of Agricultural, Commercial, and Industrial Employees (NAACIE) to have their matter arbitrated by a tribunal.

This pronouncement came on Thursday last from Head of the Presidential Secretariat, Dr Roger Luncheon, who also disclosed that among the terms of reference to be dealt with by the panel would be the issue of the Collective Labour Agreement (CLA) signed by the two entities.

The tribunal, Dr Luncheon said, would be investigating claims made by NAACIE relative to perceived violations of that CLA by the power company, and would also determine the actual status of the CLA.

The Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Guyana (FITUG) had come out in solidarity with its affiliate, NAACIE, calling the power company’s position a flagrant breach of the CLA; but THE GPL’s CEO, Bharrat Dindyal, has held out that the CLA the unions have been harping on is an agreement that has expired in its totality.
Chairman of the GPL Board of Directors, Winston Brassington, is of the opinion that a new CLA has to be negotiated.

In reference to NAACIE, Dindyal has told media operatives that the union continuously refers to the 2001 CLA, but that had expired in 2003. Its expiration was with the proviso that wages negotiation would continue from 2004.

“As we understand it, that agreement has expired in its totality,” Dindyal reminded, and said that the position of the union now is that it wants the elements provided for in the CLA to be respected.

In his recent engagement with the media on the matter, Brassington had said, “We have to sit and reach a new CLA,” adding that there are certain “clauses that really we need to flesh out.”

Brassington suggested there could possibly be “consolidation” of aspects of the agreement, but he maintained that a new CLA has to be negotiated.