BSTU president warns of possible action

The Barbados Secondary Teachers’ Union (BSTU), along with the National Union of Public Workers (NUPW), has issued a warning of action that would be taken if the issue surrounding the “unfair dismissal” of a Clerk-Typist at the St. Leonard’s Boy’s School is not resolved soon.

While not going into detail on the exact action that would be taken, BSTU President Mary Ann Redman told the media yesterday at that union’s headquarters that they would be giving the Board until the end of this business day to respond to the concerns that they would have raised before deciding on the specifics of the action to be taken.

She stated that the matter surrounded the Clerk-Typist, who was employed at that secondary school in that position as a temporary worker for three years until she was “unfairly dismissed” on the 31 of August, 2017.

She would have filled the position that was left by the former Clerk-Typist, who would have left that role to take up a teaching position and she would have performed well in that position, which was demonstrated in the verbal praise and letters of recommendation that was attributed to her by former members of staff and Board members.

During a meeting with the Board on the 11th of September, they had three former Board members who were a part of the BSTU delegation that would have spoken on her behalf.

Redman said that the position remains vacant and there is work that needs to be carried out and the terminated employee is capable of carrying out those duties.

However, what concerns them the most was that no legitimate reason was given for her termination and that the process involved was in itself “illegitimate”.

“Her position was ended, her job was terminated with no reason given to her. She received a letter on the 29th of August by the new Secretary Treasurer. That Secretary Treasurer did not comply with the legal and accepted process in seeking the approval of the full Board to discontinue the contract. So not all of the full Board members were made aware of or gave their consent to terminate the contract. This makes the letter of termination in itself illegitimate because the process used was not correct, it was not legitimate, it was not what forms a custom procedure.”

She also made it clear that they have gone through all of the proper channels to get this matter resolved and to no avail, hence the need for action to be taken by their unions.

“Now we pointed this out to the Board in our meeting, which I referred to on the 11th of September; we told them that the process did not conform with what was legitimate, what was required. When we wrote to the Board on the 13th of September, we pointed that fact out and again in our last letter of the 22nd of September, for the third time we pointed that out to the Board; that the process that they used was incorrect and therefore, it made their letter of termination null and void. At our meeting on the 11th, we also indicated that their action was wrong because it amounted to unfair dismissal and that is in keeping with the definition of unfair dismissal as outlined in the Employment Rights Act.” (PJT)