Will Unions Acquiesce to GOB’s Ten Percent Salary Cut?

Gerald Henry

With less than three days left before Prime Minister Briceño presents the 2021 budget in parliament, time is running out for the unions trying to stave off government’s proposed salary cut.  P.S.U. President Gerald Henry, during an appearance on Open Your Eyes this morning, admits that while pressure is being brought to bear on the unions, the ultimate decision about whether the proposal will be accepted or not lies with their respective memberships.

Gerald Henry, President, Public Service Union

“I wouldn’t say that there is not pressure considering the fact that, like you said, there is a timeline and what can happen if it is that we don’t try to right this ship ourselves.  But again, we have to make sure that membership drives this decision and so whatever takes or how many times we have to go back to our membership to get a mandate, we have to do that.  We cannot make the decision on our own simply because we are considered the leaders of our various unions.

There were some additional carrots, if you want, for lack of a better word, that were thrown in, you know, one of them being a reduction in the working hours for the week where public officers, well the proposal was for four hours a week to be reduced.  We asked for at least five hours but that does not mean that if they gave us the five hours that we would agree, it’s just that we wanted an additional hour for the week simply because the work week has five days and the idea was to perhaps look at establishing a nine-to-five sort of work week.”