And while the security forces have their little turf tensions going on, the joint unions have their own bone to pick with the government.
Yesterday, they were finally able to have a meeting with the prime minister, John Briceno, along with Cordel Hyde, Francis Fonseca, Henry Usher, and the FinSec. But while they'd gone into the meeting with a list of requests, the answer they got for most of those was "no."
According to the president of the PSU, Dean Flowers, one of the more important topics included good governance matters, which the government told the unions that that was "in progress." Another topic they had interest in was a proposed insurance scheme for public officers, which was met with a flat "no."
And of course the most pressing issue was whether the public officers would get back their increments… I don't think we need to tell you what the answer to that was.
Here's how Flowers explained it to us via Zoom.
Dean Flowers, President, PSU
"We were the one that were sacrificed in an effort to create fiscal space to allow this country to rebound. Every single other sector of the public service as it relates to ministers, CEO's, contract officers, who lost salaries or allowances, those have been restored. In addition to that, where the CEO's are concerned, their contracts were even varied to give them an increase because the economy is rebounding and continues to rebound. All as a result of the sacrifice that was place on public officers. And so we expected then that as a courtesy, not as a reward, as a courtesy at least that public officers would be given back their increments. Well, without flinching, the prime minister was clear that that ain't gonna happen. And he also stated blankly that not only will there be no reinstatement of increments, but that whenever this administration decides to resume any payment of increments, it has to be contingent on pension reform. When we speak public reform, we're speaking contributory pension for public sector workers. If we have now created the fiscal space for this administration to go down the path that every single administration has gone since 1981, which is borrow borrow borrow and borrow recklessly, we have created that fiscal space, or that fiscal space was created on our back, then the least that we would have expected that a little bit of those supplementals and those borrowing would be for public officers. What's further insulting is that the prime minister was also clear that not a single public officer will be placed on the same pay scale so for those who would have lost four increment, they will remain right where they were, they're not going to be placed four increments up when his administration decides to play Santa Claus and resume increments. You cannot put that on public officers and say because you're not happy with the appraisal system that you're going to freeze and withhold increment and you will resume increment when you see fit and it has to be contingent on pension reform. The only pension reform that this administration should be talking about is to have representatives of the House quality for a pension after the age of 55 after serving 15 years as is required of every other public officer. We will not continue for this administration to be treating us like beggars and to continue to punish us simply because they seem to have a problem with the labor sector. With the labor movement. The private sector doesn't go through these types of injustices. As a matter of fact, recently, they announced that they're giving the private sector a million dollars in duty exemption, this is apart from the other staff loan and grants that they've granted to them. It's an anti labour and an anti union government."
And one of the other issues that the joint unions brought up was the PUP's own manifesto promise that they would get rid of CEO's and bring back permanent secretaries.
Well, while GOB might have been eager to put that in writing, they aren't so eager to implement it since they told the unions they would wait for the recommendations from the People's Constitutional Committee.
But Flowers says the CEO system is a disservice to public officers.
Dean Flowers, President, PSU
"They denied keeping with their Plan Belize manifesto. I keep saying to them, when we come to make a request of you, it is based on the Plan Belize manifesto that you keep beating your chest on. You cannot continue to pick and choose what it is you want to present to the Belizean public. You presented a comprehensive document which included and good governance aspect, a political reform aspect, and a public sector reform aspect. You said that you could implemented these things in 100 days. We're now 720 days in and we still have a CEO system which they implemented in the public service which quickly caused the public service to deteriorate. The reason why they placed it in Plan Belize is because they know it was an error on their part when it was implemented, when they were in government. Clearly they wanted to fix it but guess what. They're living high off the hog now, things sweet. They could pick up anybody out there and make them a CEO and everybody is living happy. So why break up that party in the best interest of public officers? No man! Let public officers take their lick, let Belizeans take their lick, it's our time to eat."
Some of the other topics discussed at the meeting included implementing a Tax Recovery Unit, which the government said is in progress, as well as the timeline for the closure of CBA between GOB and joint unions, and the timeline for the signing of the CBA between BAHA and PSU, none of which which the parties agreed to by the end of the meeting.
