Philipsburg:--- President of the Windward Islands Chamber of Labour Unions Theophillus Thompson called on workers to pay keen attention to the contracts they sign. Thompson said workers must be respected and workers have the right to peruse all labour contracts that are presented to them before signing the document. He further explained that companies are also required to submit these contracts to the labour department.Thompson said it is important for everyone to understand that there are two agreements in contractual agreements. However, employers seem to always put things in these contracts that will benefit them and their company. Nevertheless, employees have the right to ask for amendments in these contracts and the employer has to submit the contract to the labour department prior to giving it the employee.
Thompson said there are also Collective Labour Agreements between the unions and the employers. He said the CLA is an umbrella for workers rights and it's the only policy that supersedes the law regarding workers rights.
In the meantime, Vice President of the WICLU and President of the Windward Islands Teachers Union (WITU) Claire Elshot endorsed the sentiments shared by Thompson regarding the contracts. Elshot said just recently a teacher was fired from her job while on maternity leave because of these phony contracts. Elshot said a faith based school on St. Maarten fired a teacher because she was involved with someone and got pregnant out of wedlock. Elshot explained that the contract states that teachers are not allowed to engage in sexual activities when they are not married nor are they to have children unless they are married.
However, that teacher later married the person who fathered her child. She said the WITU dealt with the school board and they identified the problems in the contract. Elshot said the teacher tried to change her status to "married" but this did not happen until after the birth of her child. Elshot said the WITU did not make this matter public because they thought they could have regulated the matter with the school board.
Regarding the SBRMC, Thompson said the legal battle is still ongoing and while many persons want to see an end to this saga soon he is not able to say when that would happen. Thompson said to date the SBRMC has not respected the April 2nd court ruling which states that the company has to respect the worker's rights based on the CLA between the company and Workers Institute for Organized Labour (WIFOL). Thompson described the owners of SBRMC as defiant, the only company he has seen thus far that refuses to comply with court orders even though there is a penalty involved. Thompson said the union is also questioning the resignation of Jules James who was the Managing Director of SBRMC. The President of WIFOL said that James has been working for Royal Resorts and while he might have resigned from SBRMC he is still working at the Resort and giving orders down there.
He said today (Thursday) is the workers' pay day, the second since the April 2 verdict and already they have indications that the workers will not be paid. Thompson said that the CLA stipulates that the workers have to be paid between 12pm and 3pm and if that is not done then the WIFOL and its legal team will meet to discuss another strategy on their course of action against the SBRMC. However, the SBRMC has filed an appeal against the April 2 verdict and the court case is expected to be heard sometime in June 2012.
The WIFOL president said he is still surprised in how the UP/ DP government and the labour mediator dealt with the SBRMC saga. He said that if St. Maarten was still under of the umbrella of the Netherlands Antilles, he is of the opinion that the matter would have been resolved already.
When asked if he believes that the company is facing financial predicament, Thompson said that Royal Resorts and Quantum Group of Companies are involved in propaganda because the company is still renovating while they said they have no monies to pay their workers. He made clear that Royal Resorts managed to grab the Pelican Resorts from the homeowners association for almost nothing and now they are doing all they can to deprive the workers of their rights but the WIFOL will not relinquish the rights of the workers. He said so far the timeshare association, the SHTA, and government have been very silent even though the economy has been affected by the Pelican legal drama.