P.S.U. President and Minister of Public Service Discuss Pension Reform with Public Officers

Dean Flowers

Earlier this week, Dean Flowers, the President of the Public Service Union joined Minister of Public Service Henry Charles Usher on a tour of several government offices in Belmopan. This exercise is part of the union’s annual presidential visits to various government ministries. The group visited the Ministry of Home Affairs and New Growth Industries, the Belize Police Department, the Treasury Department, the National Fire Service, the Audit Department and the Payroll Unit. During the tour, Minister Usher and Flowers engaged public officers on various issues, including the proposed Pension Reform Act. Today, we spoke with Dean Flowers about the outcome of the discussion held with public officers on that topic. Here is what he told us.

Dean Flowers, President, P.S.U.

“Of course, that was, I think, the big ticketed item on the minister’s responses to public officers. And what we presented to them, of course, is currently what is before us. And what is before us is the IMS proposal, which proposes to increase the retirement age to sixty-five. Of course, the government has not formed a position on that. The minister also alluded to that it could be sixty as well. And of course, the contribution rate public officers, of course, are apprehensive towards contributing and some of them refer to it. It’s just another tax on their salary, and it simply means less money in their pocket. And of course, their biggest concern is how would that contribution offset as it relates to their salaries. Now,  as I’ve stated before, and as I informed those public officers that we met with on Monday,  there is no set formulas yet. All right, government has not established a position and neither has the joint union agreed on a position in terms of what we will be proposing to the government. But all in all, I have to say that it would appear from the feedback that we got that most public officers have come to the realization and understanding that the reform is coming and that they will have to support the reform the specifics behind the reform in terms of who would be exempted. We have a general idea that we will be proposing the government has their own. Ideas in terms of who should be exempted. We believe that certain individuals should be exempted from contributing altogether, but those will have to come, of course, with certain terms and conditions. I believe the issue of the pay scale was touched clearly. If you’re going to extend the retirement age, you cannot keep the current pay scale because the current pay scale only has twenty points, and it was designed primarily for a thirty-five year work life, as the minister explained. And so now if you want to extend that for an additional ten years, then you either have to restructure that entire pay scale, which is something that we would like to propose.”