Representatives from the Bauxite Company of Guyana Incorporated (BCGI), the local RUSAL subsidiary, yesterday failed to show up at the first arbitration meeting with the Guyana Bauxite and General Workers Union (GB&GWU)—a move the union is calling “contemptuous.”
A letter, from the company’s attorney, Andrew Pollard, in which he indicated he would not be able to attend any meetings before April 1st since he was out of the country, was delivered some ten minutes before the start of the meeting.
RUSAL’s (Guyana) Personnel Manager Elena Gorshkova had on March 8th told the Secretary to the Arbitrator that both she and the General Manager would be overseas and as a result would not be attending the meeting scheduled yesterday.
However, Arbitrator Francis Carryl went ahead with the proceedings, which were held briefly at the Ministry of Labour’s Boardroom.
President of GBGWU Lincoln Lewis, armed with a sheaf of documents, led the union’s six-member team.
He asked that the arbitrator seek to have the BCGI produce specified financial statements, production records for 2009 to 2011, the company’s safety code and a record of supposedly defective equipment.
Documents, Lewis explained, would assist a great deal in substantiating the union’s claim of violations of industrial relations rules by BCGI as they petitioned for higher wages and salaries of the workers.
“We came prepared to work on the modalities as it relates to assisting us …we are going to be talking about wage increases and we need to really analyze that(the financial records) to make our case,” Lewis explained.
In a letter, dated February 29th, 2012, the union received a letter from the Ministry of Labour informing that they move to arbitration because of the unresolved negotiations that date back three years.
Carryl was chosen by Minister of Labour Nanda Gopaul to enquire into the dispute over wages, working conditions, the firing of 62 workers who had engaged in protests and threats to protesting workers by General Manager of BCGI Ruslan Volokhov in May, last year.
Carryl has fixed Tuesday April 3rd, 2011 for the next meeting and correspondence detailing same would be sent to the BCGI.
