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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
20th June 2000
LABOUR DAY 2000 RESOLUTIONS
REMEMBERING that the greatest assault on trade unions by the capitalist state occurred when PNM Governments imposed the anti-worker Industrial Stabilisation Act in 1965 and the Industrial Relations Act in 1972.
NEVERTHELESS, we are aware of our cherished constitutional right of freedom of association to organise trade unions for the purpose of collective bargaining for which workers join trade unions, and, because the Industrial Relations Act requires Trade Unions to be recognised by employers before the commencement of collective bargaining, the excessive period of time before a union obtains recognition is oppressive, for it is during this time that employers victimise their workers who are union organisers and there exists an effective denial of workers' rights to freedom of association, which expresses itself in a union's inability to bargain collectively on their behalf.
CONSCIOUS that the Industrial Relations Act created the Industrial Court and its judges as the expression of the state's intervention in collective bargaining, and knowing Government to be manager of the state, and being aware of compulsory arbitration of trade disputes and other matters by the said judges, who without security of tenure endure a relationship of dependency on the said Government, which could compromise their impartiality and independence; and
FURTHER, RECOGNISING that no law exists to facilitate trade union mergers,
BE IT RESOLVED:
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that the Industrial Relations Act be amended to provide for trade union recognition by ballot within period of not more than three months;
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that Industrial Court Judges be given security of tenure.
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that legislation be enacted to facilitate trade union mergers; and
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that the Health and Safety Bill be immediately reintroduced into the House of Representatives.