…gov’t urges GTU to consider conciliation, call off strike
…as union presses for arbitration

THE Ministry of Social Protection has urged the Guyana Teachers’ Union to allow the conciliation process to move on as it seeks a solution over the impasse on salary increases for teachers.

However, the union says they will not agree to move forward to the conciliation stage, as it has been compromised and has insisted that they are willing to call off the strike “immediately” if the issue moves to arbitration. “The ball is in their court. We have indicated to them that if they call us midnight tonight we’ll be ready [to call off the strike], once they decide to go to arbitration,” GTU President Mark Lyte said on Wednesday, after exiting a conciliation meeting held at the Department of Labour (DoL) headquarters on Brickdam.

“We’re sticking to arbitration, because the conciliator ought to come from the Department of Labour and they would have compromised their position by being at the two [negotiation] meetings.” Wednesday’s meeting, organised by the Department of Labour, was expected to be the first round of talks with the Department of Labour as the conciliator; however, it was considered to have ended in deadlock with the GTU asking for the process to move to arbitration, but the Ministry of Education wants conciliation to continue.

The meeting was chaired by Chief Labour Officer (CLO) Charles Ogle, while heading the MoE team was Chief Education Officer Marcel Hutson. After the GTU maintained that they want to move straight to arbitration, the meeting was adjourned to a yet-to- be-determined later date and time. The MoE and GTU were expected to move on to conciliation after the two negotiation meetings, held earlier this month, between the two bodies ended in a deadlock over salary increases and other issues.

However, the GTU is contending that since the Minister with responsibility for Labour, Keith Scott, along with CLO Charles Ogle and other labour officials were all present on behalf of the MoE at the negotiation meetings, the conciliation process has been compromised. “They [MoE] are insisting that they want conciliation, we are insisting that the conciliation process has been compromised, which to some extent has been admitted to by the Ministry of Labour. And it is the MoE now to decide to meet the GTU terms and once those terms are met, we are prepared to call the strike off immediately, should those conditions be satisfied,” Lyte further informed.

Speaking on the issue last week, Scott said he did not believe that his presence during the negotiations stage should bar his department from being the conciliator. Further, in a press release issued following the adjournment of Wednesday’s meeting, the Ministry of Social Protection, under which the Department of Labour falls, outlined that the conciliation process is still necessary, before the process can move to arbitration.

“The Ministry of Social Protection maintained that the grievance procedures as contained in the Collective Labour Agreement (CLA) subsisting between the parties provide for the exhaustion of conciliation before arbitration can be contemplated. The Ministry of Social Protection also maintained, that before any progress could be made at conciliation, the current strike action initiated by the union must be called [off] after a memorandum containing Terms of Resumption has been signed by the parties,” the release informed.
The GTU maintained that they are not agreeing to move forward to the conciliation stage. They came to yesterday’s meeting issuing a brief to the MoE, which laid out a list of terms that, once met, would see them calling off the strike, which began last Monday.

The demands, as per a release issued by the GTU, are: “The extant issues be referred to an arbitration panel; the chairmanship shall be agreed upon before the resumption of work; the status quo ante shall be respected by everyone involved in this situation; there shall be no victimisation by either party; there shall be no loss of pay and seniority.”

The arbitration process would see the use of an independent party coming up with a solution to the dispute. Both sides will have to abide by whatever decision is made by the arbiter. For this arbitration process, the GTU is calling for the appointment of a chairman, mutually agreed by the MoE and the GTU, in addition to a nominee from the GTU’s side and a nominee from the MoE.

The committee will be tasked with making an award that is “just and on the evidence taken.” Moreover, the award shall be final and binding on both parties, MoE and GTU. In the interim, Lyte called upon the teachers to continue the struggle. “We are still hopeful as a union that we are going to have a resolution to this problem and we ask our teachers to remain resolute behind the union in our decision on the way forward,” he expressed