This week, government re-opened negotiations with the striking teachers and public service unions, but, tonight, after two days of talks, there are no public pronouncements of progress or talks of a resolution.
Tonight, we begin our team coverage at the start of that 10am meeting a the House of Culture in Belize City, when the leaders were hopeful that some interim resolution was within reach.
Courtney Menzies has the story.
Tensions were high as the unions and the GOB met for the second time this week after 11 days of strike action from the BNTU and 3 from the PSU.
And as usual, the union members showed their support by protesting in front of the House of Culture, sending a strong message to the government that they remain resolved.
Before he stepped into that meeting, the president of the PSU said that they were hopeful that they would meet a quick and amicable solution.
Gerald Henry - President, PSU "We hope that we will continue in the same fashion that we started this round of what I believe is more negotiations now and I'm hoping that we make some great in roads and hopefully we finish today that's why we wanted to start earlier than the last time. We are still hopeful that there can be some medium ground that can be met, we just have to wait and see how it goes, today we'll be sharing what our responses are from both consultations that the two sides have been having and we'll see where it goes from there. We are hopeful that we will reach to that point but it's up to them really, they're the ones who have to back down from whatever position, and we also have some room to play with, not much, but we'll see how it goes."
Still, Henry conceded that realistically, the meeting would not be so straightforward since in Tuesday's five and a half hour meeting, they were only able to get through two of their eleven points.
But is one of those points land compensation for the union members facing the 10% salary cuts? Henry said it may be on the table.
Gerald Henry "It has been brought up and so we'll see what exactly that entail and then we go ahead and see how membership will feel about that."
And while the prepared to enter this second round of negotiations, Henry stated that the Prime Minister's presence was missing from this important event. In fact, he noted that amid the protesting and strikes, they have yet to hear from the PM himself.
Gerald Henry "For me personally, I think as the leader of the country, meeting with the other leaders of the organizations that he says are his partners or partners to the administration that he leads, I believe that as the leader he should be here as well. I know that PSU had sent out an invitation to him, to simply a courtesy call, and that has been met with silence and so I really wonder when he says that we are partners, are we really partners? You don't even want to meet with us for a courtesy call."
The Prime Minister had been out of the country on Tuesday during the first set of negotiations and had returned yesterday.
