No easter work

Minister Howard Chin Lee, Minister of Tourism, drove by without a word, as the lifeguards held their protest outside Whitehall, yesterday. The lifeguards were protesting for a better salary, lack of staff and working conditions. The protest started at the NUGFW office, on Henry Street, down St Vincent Street to the CPO office, across Tragarete Road, across the Queen’s Park Savannah to Whitehall. “We held a protest because negotiations with the CPO have broken down,” Augustus Sylvester, branch chairman, told Newsday.

While the lifeguards held their protest outside the Personnel Department on St Vincent Street, workers looked through the windows, but no one came out to greet them. Sylvester said the lifeguards were not recognised as part of the work matrix, and did not fit in with the system. “We have qualified divers, launch captains, and they don’t look at these skills.” The lifeguards are now making a $154-$176 a day salary, and working four days a fortnight. “We are asking for $260, the only other workers we are being compared to are firefighters, who also have CPR skills, lifesaving and ambulance.”

The lifeguards claim that if they don’t reach a proper settlement when discussions are held with the CPO, they won’t be working the Easter weekend. In response to their protest outside Whitehall, President General Robert Guiseppi, Kirt Morton, Curtis Hernandez and Augustus Sylvester, met with Ms Sandra Marchak, Permanent Secretary to the Prime Minister, and Herbert Atwell, Chief Adviser to the Prime Minister. Guiseppi said that the lifeguards would hold negotiations with the CPO today, and claimed that they weren’t interested in their “dotish, and stupid” talk. “If we don’t have an agreement or satisfaction we won’t work Easter or after,” he said. He mentioned that the eight months of negotiating were not fruitful and the lifeguards were confined to the matrix system. He added that lifeguards could not be compared to any other category of workers.