Indarsingh Blasts Government’s Failure to Address Port Workers’ Grievances

RUDRANATH INDARSINGH
Member of Parliament for Couva South

Like many stakeholders in the national community, I continue to be very concerned about the ongoing situation at the Port of Port of Spain, and extremely disturbed at the inability of Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley, Minister of Works and Transport Rohan Sinanan, the Cabinet of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, Chairman of the Port Authority Lyle Alexander, the Board and the management of the Port to respectfully and expeditiously rectify ongoing issues held by workers.

The fact that port workers feel compelled to protest in the few weeks leading to the Christmas Season – one of the busiest commercial periods in the country – is a direct reflection of the environment that now threatens the wellbeing of workers and businesses alike.

These issues have been highlighted repeatedly for months. Recent media reports re- iterate that such concerns raised by workers include occupational health and safety breaches, better wages and better working conditions. Port workers, like many other segments of state-paid labour, have been living off 2013 salaries in a 2024 economy.

Worst of all is the undermining of the collective bargaining agreement between the management of the Port Authority and the workers. This undermining has jeopardized the agreement which was arrived at by the management and the workers as it relates to the collective bargaining period 2014-2017, and in which it was agreed that workers receive a twelve per cent (12%) increase. The Minister of Finance, the Minister of
Works and Transport and the Government of Trinidad and Tobago sought to meddle in this process and instructed the Port’s management to abort the agreement made and to instead offer an increase of a meager two per cent (2%).

The undermining of this collective bargaining agreement with the port workers is reminiscent of the Minister of Finance’s undermining of the collective bargaining agreement reached between the management of the National Insurance Board (NIB) and NIB workers. In 2021, the Minister gave a directive to the Board of the National Insurance Board that workers – represented by the Public Service Association (PSA) –

should not be paid an increase of nine per cent (9%) for the 2014-2016 collective bargaining period.

It is clear that the Minister of Finance, the Prime Minister and this administration has a way of interfering and undermining, as the Prime Minister himself admitted to doing in the now infamous merit list fiasco.

It is also clear that everything that falls under the jurisdiction of the Minister of Works and Transport, Rohan Sinanan, has collapsed. There has been a record number of bridges collapsing. Flooding is at an unprecedented level in certain parts of the country. The state of roads has never been more deteriorated than it is today, and we have also seen the failure of the sea and air bridges between Trinidad and Tobago adversely affecting commerce and travel between our islands. Now, we see where the Port of Port of Spain faces an ongoing crisis as a result of the Minister’s inability to lead in a manner that considers the interests and needs of the workers at the Port.

It is time for the Government to stop meddling in the matters of workers, and to stop disrupting the economy through its impotent and indifferent leadership.

The Opposition United National Congress stands in solidarity with the workers at the Port of Port of Spain. While it is regrettable that the PNM administration of Keith Rowley, Colm Imbert and Rohan Sinanan continue to treat the port workers with the scantest of regard and despicable disinterest the United National Congress looks forward to addressing the grievances of the port workers when we form the next Government.