And we also asked the Minister of Labor about the newly increased minimum wage. Last month, you heard the policy analyst at the Belize Chamber of Commerce explain that the Taskforce - which included representation from the Ministries of Economic Development and Labor - recommended a gradual increase. Still, the government - who put together the Taskforce - jumped straight to the $5. Today, we asked Minister Requena the reason for not heeding the recommendation for gradualism.
Oscar Requena, Minister of Labor
"Maybe we should invite you to go and do a poll, talk to the workers who are working very hard out there and ask them whether they are not happy hat finally after so long, we saw an increase in the minimum wage. Ladies and gentlemen, let me tell you something, we all know the realities that our country is going through, there is a high level of inflation, the cost of living has gone up, and yes, in our meetings, in our deliberations, our consultations, the Chamber had recommended that we phase it in, but that is not being real. We made a commitment under Plan Belize that we were going to increase the minimum wage and I am very happy that we have done well on that commitment that we made, and I am going to say to you, in the beginning there were some noise, there were some employers that were making some noise, but go out there and take a poll, people will tell you that we want more than five dollars, so can you imagine if we were to phase that in? That's not practical."
