Chief Labour Officer [CLO] Dhaneshwar Deonarine yesterday declined to comment on scathing criticism from Justice Sandil Kissoon for not discharging his functions in relation to the four-week-long strike by teachers.
Deonarine when contacted by Stabroek News yesterday said that he prefers to not comment on the subject since he is an officer of the court and the decision was handed down by a judge.
In a comprehensive win for the Guyana Teachers’ Union (GTU), Justice Kissoon last week Friday ruled that the strike launched by the union for collective bargaining was legal and justified and therefore deductions cannot be made by the state from the salaries of striking teachers.
He also castigated testimony before the court by the Chief Education Officer (CEO) Saddam Hussain as not credible and criticized Deonarine for not taking steps to bring the four-week-long strike to an end.
The judge said that Deonarine’s failure to intervene contributed to the strike action. Justice Kissoon noted that there was no evidence that Deonarine conducted a single inquiry to ascertain what was in the correspondence sent to him by the GTU before deciding that the strike was illegal.
“It highlights a grave (omission) for which the children of this nation suffered,” the judge said.
Due to the government’s failure to respond to the union’s proposal, the GTU wrote to Deonarine in a bid to request conciliation. In this letter, dated September 21, 2023, the union referenced the Memorandum of Agreement between the Ministry of Education (MoE) and the GTU on April 10, 1990 on the “Avoidance and Settlement of Disputes”, and express-ed the desire to activate Stage Three of the Conciliation process.
This desire and appeal, the correspondence noted, is “based on unsatisfactory settlement on the level of Ministry of Education”.
According to a letter, penned by Deonarine and dated January 25, 2024, a response was made by him to the GTU regarding this request for conciliation.
“I replied to your letter dated September 21, 2023, on September 29, 2023, indicating that based on the letter dated September 26, 2023, from the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Education, there was no need to activate conciliation/stage 4 of the grievance procedure, by either party, at the time,” Deonarine’s letter stated.
On October 12, 2023, the GTU sent another letter to the CLO, this time with a request for arbitration. Referencing a letter from Deonarine, dated September 29, 2023 on the request for “conciliation”, the GTU correspondence said it wished to bring to his attention that all matters relating to teachers’ welfare discussed between GTU and the Ministry of Education were “non-financial” in nature.
“The Minister of Education, Hon. Priya Manickchand on numerous occasions stated clearly ‘that financial matters are dealt with by the Office of the President and not by the Ministry of Education.’ The Guyana Teachers Union wishes to state in no uncertain terms that to date it has not engaged the Office of the President on matters specific to finance (salary increase). Hence, the union demands that Stage 4 on the ‘Avoidance and Settlement of Dis-putes’ signed on April 10, 1990, be activated since the fourteen days allowed by Stage 3 have expired,” the letter said.
The union therefore urged that an arbitrator, who is mutually agreed upon by both GTU and the Government, be identified so that the process can commence. Noting that they would be available to participate in the identification and selection process for an arbitrator, GTU said it was looking forward to a prompt response.
A response to this correspondence was, however, not forthcoming from the CLO, and he explained in his January 25, 2024 letter the reason for not responding, contending that the grievance procedure between the two parties in question had not been fully exhausted.
“This was because the grievance procedure agreed upon between the GTU and the MoE had not been fully exhausted and as per the said agreement, activation of arbitration must be (by) mutual consent”.
Deonarine, further explained that “I reasoned that I could not have acted on your request to activate arbitration at the time as there was an attempt by the GTU to breach or not observe the grievance procedure agreed to by the GTU and the Ministry”.
Additionally, he reasoned that there were public pronouncements of President Irfaan Ali intervening and meeting with teachers across the country, “including union representatives” to address their concerns.
Subsequently, having received no response to their letter of request for arbitration from the CLO, the GTU then took things a step further by penning a letter to Minister of Labour Joseph Hamilton. It was in response to this letter that the CLO wrote his January 25th letter.
In their final letter, titled “Urgent Pending Industrial Action” and dated January 23, 2024, the union declared the full-fledged industrial action, due to the government’s failure to address their Multi-Year Agreement, imposed salary increases and non-salary benefits, lack of response from the Chief Labour Officer, and unresolved matters impacting educational stability.
Stating that this was the last resort, GTU therefore requested an urgent meeting with the ministry to discuss these matters and avoid disruption in the educational system. In response to this last correspondence, Deonarine advised the union to refrain from taking any industrial action.
“It is important that the grievance procedure be followed in the interest of good faith industrial relations practice, your union, the Ministry of Education, and the teachers. Additionally, you should refrain from taking any industrial action that would breach or violate the Memorandum of Agreement between the GTU and the Ministry,” he urged.
Minister of Labour Hamilton when contacted yesterday for a comment regarding the court’s ruling on the matter said “I stand with the government on its position of appealing the matter”.
The Ministry of Labour may soon have another chance to address the matter as the GTU plans to re-engage with the Ministry of Education on collective bargaining for the period 2019 to 2023.
Attorney General (AG) Anil Nandlall SC, who represented the state in the matter, on Friday revealed that the state will be appealing the judge’s decision.
The AG expressed concerns that the ruling from Justice Kissoon could potentially set a precedent that would require employers to pay striking workers. He argued that this decision could lead to workers being compensated for work they did not perform, which he viewed as a violation of property rights. Further, he pointed out that the deduction and remittance of union dues were voluntary, and disagreed that the government’s actions infringed upon the constitutional rights to associate and form a trade union.
GTU President Mark Lyte on Sunday emphasized that the union’s leadership always followed the correct process and pursued amicable resolution of matters. Highlighting the victory for education and teachers that the ruling represented, he stated that the administration must abide by the court’s decision.
Lyte told viewers that the GTU still had the options that had been earlier decided at its General Council open to it. Those options, which he had previously outlined, were arbitration, to return to industrial action and legal action, only this time it would be against the Ministry of Labour.
Nevertheless, he said, to decide on the next steps, the voices of the union members across Guyana need to be heard.
