| The deferring of leave passage payment to senior municipal workers was cited as a means through which the Guyana Labour Union (GLU)-represented workers can be afforded the retroactive sum of their wage increase for the year 2007 and 2008.This proposal was made by Councillor Junior Garrett when the municipality held its statutory meeting yesterday.According to acting Town Clerk of the municipality, Yonette Pluck, the municipality has been in receipt of a report from the arbitration panel which was requested to settle a dispute last year between the GLU and the municipality with regards to increased payment for the workers.Pluck pointed out that the award that will be afforded to the workers for the year 2007 would be seven per cent, and a six per cent increase for the year 2008,NFL Jerseys China, bringing the total increase to 13 per cent.According to her,Cheap Baseball Jerseys, the seven per cent would amount to more than $19 M, as will the six per cent, thus the municipality is obligated to pay the workers some $38 M.The Town Clerk pointed out that the union had written in December, prior to Christmas, for an advance on the retroactive amount, a request the municipality was incapable of fulfilling.But, according to acting City Treasurer Andrew Meredith,NFL Jerseys Wholesale, he is not convinced that the municipality will be able to sustain the increased payment if the efforts of restructuring are not engaged urgently.He disclosed that, parallel and in conjunction with the agreement, there were plans to cut costs,Authentic MLB Jerseys Online, a development which should have been realised this year.“For me to say without doubt that we could fund this wage bill every month would be difficult,Wholesale NFL Jerseys, because I am not seeing that there is that drive to control or reduce the wage bills…There is cost going up (in) other areas and there is this competing requirement for the financial resources…”According to Meredith, it would not be prudent for the municipality to keep throughout this year the size of staff it currently has, monies will have to be spent.However, Garrett rationalised that once the senior staffers’ leave assistance pay package is deferred, there will be substantial funds to pay workers an initial amount of their retroactive increase.“I would strongly recommend that the workers be paid 50 per cent, which would come from us deferring the senior staff leave passage. I am saying that senior staffers must not be paid until the retroactive payment is paid to the junior staff,” Garrett insisted. Offering her opinion of the financial predicament,Cheap Jerseys, Councillor Patricia Chase-Green highlighted the fact that officers of the council did not work in unison to prevent the challenge which now faces the municipality.According to her, enough information was not provided by the officers involved in the arbitration process to substantiate their claims that the municipality was not in a financial position to pay the amount that has been recommended.“If you look on page four (it is noted) that the Personnel Officer was giving one set of figures and the Town Clerk was giving another set. This shows that the officers did not collaborate properly; they did not sit together and decide that we are going forward with this position.They have put us now, because of their justification to the arbitrators, in a more serious financial predicament.”However, it is hoped that officials from the municipality will be able to collaborate properly before convening a meeting today with officials of the GLU to discuss how the workers will be paid in full.It is expected that the workers will be paid about 50 per cent of the retroactive sum this month end, and the remainder will be paid at a date to be determined. |
