The alternative to striking

Mr Roget, this is not true. In your procrastination, I am hearing compassion for TT in your voice.

Mr Imbert is not the only one who is bringing hardship on TT .

Zero,zero,zero, if this is so, it shows a different understanding of the economics of the day. But does he have the balls to advise, negotiate with or even to blame the entity he suspects that is causing the hardship? If he stands up he could be writing his political epitaph.

Personally Mr Imbert is a scapegoat representing all our past and present governments.

These bodies are the architecs of economic slavery for in addition to siding with the business sector, they lack innovative ways to create revenue and therefore add burden through taxes to the plight of labour. People at ground level do not have a choice and don’t mind paying taxes if they can access the services promised by the tax collectors. Are the roads smooth? Are medical services readily available in quantity and quality? Is education free to all.

Think it over Mr Roget.

Another party that is ensuring that hardship is endemic in TT is the business community.

There is this unbridled greed for increased profits. These movers and shakers of prices are able to give labour any increased wages it requests and simply offsets it with a disproportionate price increase. It is sometimes so subtle that labour is unaware that it has moved closer to the poverty line with the wage increase.

You and your union Mr Roget cannot escape blame for national hardship. To whom much is given much is expected. You are in control of the most powerful trade union in the Caribbean.

When you say jump workers don’t even ask how high or for how long. The comrades follow your dictates blindly. They too think that all they have is there “cheap labour”. Well sir, ask yourself can goods or services be provided if there is no labour? Your answer cannot fathom the depths of the power of labour and so you would not see to indulge in the cheap behaviour of a strike. But rather saw to lofty negotiations with the government and the business community.

My understanding of economic shows the following formulae: Prices = material cost + labour cost + overhead cost + profit.

Take labour out of the equation and there is no conversion of raw materials and therefore nothing to price. Overhead is a convenient classification of cost relevant to the system of costing used. Is the formulae affected by the exclusion of profits? The removal of profit impacts positively on the society by lowering prices.

Create history Mr Roget. From time immemorial negotiations were centered around controlling wages. From today onwards if the system is to persevere as a controller of wages then some restraint must also be placed on profit hearing.

Note carefully how even the acquisition of material has hidden cost of labour in it.

Attention Mr Roget and the intelligentsia of the OWTU, the price of oil has gone down. What in the formulae must change? The cost of raw materials cannot be reversed. Overhead can be reviewed, revised and decreased.

Is labour willing to settle for a smaller slice of the pie? And by now the providers of capital would have either recovered their investment or enjoyed other benefits from the redistribution of oil revenue or both and so are able to sacrifice part of the profit margin.

Comrades we are neither asking that you continue in the combative foot path of deceased Mr George Weekes nor would we like to see the union adopt the compromising position of the inept Mr Errol McLeod, the union must now congregate with eagles taking the successive governments and the business sector to new heights where power and hording of dollars and cents become subservient to caring for our fellowmen, nationalism and sharing the national wealth.

Long live the OWTU to create a shift in the paradigm, to show the pathway for more equitable distribution of the national income; to negotiate with all stakeholders in mind and to shorten the lifespan of ignorance of economics and persistent poverty.

Your tenure as a bargaining unit is long-term and one national strike will neither level the playing field nor bring any semblance of balance to the system. Change the role of the union from “Protector of Labour” to the “Rel Opposition of Economic Deprivation”.

Lennox Francis Couva