The government’s recent announcement of unilateral pay hikes for public servants for a third straight year has cast its campaign trail commitment to collective bargaining in doubt and veteran trade unionist Lincoln Lewis is urging unions to fight the necessary fight to keep the administration accountable.
President of the Guyana Public Service Union (GPSU) Patrick Yard on Friday declared that what the David Granger-led government has engaged in since taking office can in no way be referred to as collective bargaining.
“The entrenched official disregard for the principle of collective bargaining remains a reality, and the take-it-or-leave-it underpinning that has customarily informed wages and salaries negotiations remain in vogue,” he told reporters at a press conference. He added that the reality is “the same deliberate non-negotiable imposition and a blatant refusal to conduct negotiations in accordance with an agreed agenda.”