A recommendation contained in the 9th Actuarial Review of the National Insurance Board to increase the retirement age from 60 to 65 is not sitting well with the trade union movement with a suggestion that it be put to a national referendum.
President of the National Trade Union Centre (NATUC) Watson Duke said the umbrella organisation represented thousands of employees and was of the view that “age movement is something for the collective agreement.” He made the comment before Parliament’s Joint Select Committee on Finance and Legal Affairs last Friday.
Duke said in the Public Service “people want to retire at 55 with full benefits.” He said the suggestion contained in the 9th Actuarial Review will have to be put “before individual units in NATUC and because of the national effect of the issue we would want to suggest and place on record this may require a national referendum.”
Trevor Johnson, of the Banking, Insurance and General Workers Union and assistant general secretary of the Joint Trade Union Movement, said the body “would have a serious problem with movement from 60 to 65.”
He said he got the impression that “we have a financial issue with National Insurance so 65 will solve that. If you take it to the logical conclusion if the financial situation worsens what will you do put the retirement age to 71? It cannot be that you go to increase the retirement age because of financials,” he said.
Johnson said the union had collective agreements where workers retire at 60. “We cannot see that changing without significant consultation and with all employers through the collective agreement.”
While the report recommended that the change to 65 be done over a period of 36 years, ECA president Keston Nancoo felt it had to be “much faster.” He said Barbados had made the change in 12 years and St Lucia had changed its retirement age to 65 over 15 years.