Trade unions and business groups who met with Minister of Finance Colm Imbert yesterday have described the meeting as a positive one.
They welcomed the tripartisan method of dealing with labour issues and are now leaving room for Imbert to retract his statements made at an International Monetary Fund (IMF) event this week.
This was the word from Gabriel Faria, chief executive of the T&T Chamber of Industry and Commerce, who said the general tone of the meeting was that “everyone is looking toward dealing with the current situation and looking at solving this and moving forward.”
AMCHAM CEO Nirad Tewarie said the process of tripartism was “useful” and the groups which were present at the meeting recommitted to that.
The meeting was called to address the concerns of trade unions and the business community following Imbert’s statement that there would be wage constraint for collective bargaining period between 2017 and 2020 and the offer on the table would start at 0-0-0.
This sparked debate among the trade unions and the business community although Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley had to clarify that there was no 0-0-0 policy.
Energy Chamber president, Thackwray Driver, who also attended, did not want to comment and preferred to wait until a joint statement was released.
Communication Workers’ Union (CWU) president, Joseph Remy, described the meeting as interesting.
He said the CWU raised its concern about Imbert’s statement and “we await the minister to do what is the right thing, which is exercise some level of humility and accept the fact that he mis-spoke and he made a mess out of what the situation is.”