Philipsburg: --- The Chamber of Labour Unions is calling on the cabinet of the Lt. Governor of St. Maarten as well as the Minister of Justice David Dick to publish the “Brooks Tower Accord” which was signed on March 2 2007 by the Minister of Justice and all the Lt. Governors of the each island territory of the Netherlands Antilles.
At a press conference on Wednesday members of the Chamber Claire Elshot and Theophilus Thompson said that since the revised labour policy, which was implemented in January 2009, is creating confusion they believe that implementing the Brooks Tower Accord with regulate the loop holes relating to foreign labour. Elshot said the island government (former executive council) has referred to the Brooks Tower Accord in several of the articles even though the policy has never been published. Elshot said while the policy was drafted a tripartite setting it was not totally finalized when the former government implemented it.
Elshot said the unions on St. Maarten who is falling under these policies (Brooks Tower, and revised labour policy) on a daily basis; she said that with the present situation it is adding more confusion to their member’s brain.
Elshot said it in the opinion of the unions that the two policies should have been implemented together since the objective of the Brooks Tower Accord is to structure the foreign labour force on St. Maarten. Elshot said that several persons who gained their residency during the grace period is now living on the island illegally since their working and residency permits have expired. She said the Brooks Tower has three approaches to which foreign workers can gain their residency.
One of the procedures in this accord would deal with persons who have been living and working on St. Maarten up December 31 2001, the second category would deal with those persons who have been living and working here since January 1 2002 to December 31 2005 while the third category deals with persons living on St. Maarten from January 1 2006 to present. Elshot further explained that because neither the Lt. Governor nor the Minister has published this accord, which is referred to in the new and revised policy has left everyone in a limbo.
The unionist said that instead of revising the revised policy in August the island government should see to it that the Brooks Tower Accord be published for the sake of clarity and that of the workers. The chamber feels that if the Minister of Justice was interested in changing the situation regarding labour/ immigration and education to change then he would have to honor and implement the accord, which was signed off by all islands. Elshot said if this is not done then St. Maarten would forever have a chaotic situation when it comes to immigration and labour.
The chamber feels that this is perfect timing for the Minister to publish the document now that there are so many controversies regarding the new revised labour policy.
Elshot a teacher by profession said the policies in place makes it almost impossible for school boards to get teachers to fill critical vacancies. She is said it is practically impossible for these school boards to have teachers they badly in need of to wait outside of the island as the work and residency permits are processed. Elshot said if the two policies are brought together then the unions is of the opinion that the shortage of teachers and certain other workers would be regulated since workers would know how to register and how to demand their rights.
Theophlius Thompson who is a member of the tripartite committee said the unions have taken the decision to call on parties to have the policies implemented since according to him two wrongs can never make a right. Thompson said the former executive council implemented the policy prematurely and they had contested the implementation. Thompson said even though the tripartite worked on drafting the policy they never saw the final document before it was implemented. He said after that the had a consensus to meet in August to further debate the policy but now that the National Alliance/ Heyliger executive council has decided to withdraw the revised policy it creates more confusion. Thompson said they already met with the labour commissioner once and they discussed the policy but were also scheduled to meet with the commissioner on Thursday but that meeting was cancelled due an emergency island council meeting. In an invited comment, Minister of Justice David Dick said that the people in the labour department should begin doing their jobs and stop blaming others for their failures. Dick said he would not be making the same mistake as others and the policy would be implemented when police affairs and immigration affairs are housed in the same building. He made clear that there is no backlog in immigration and once the labour department grants a working permit then a residence permit is also granted.