Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: The best insight, instant feedback, accountability. The all new Talk Radio Freedom 106.5. We have President of the West Indies group of university teachers. That's Dr. Indira Rampasad. Good morning to you. Welcome back to the program.
[00:00:17] Speaker B: Hi. Good morning, Satish. Yes, good morning. Yes, we are back at it. We're protesting again. This time all in black. So this entire week is blackout week.
[00:00:27] Speaker A: All right?
[00:00:27] Speaker B: This is for academic, senior, administrative and professional staff at the University of the West Indies whom we represent.
So in this entire week it's a complete system shut down. We expect all systems, Libraries, HR Department, Deregistry, Marketing and Communication, the bookstore, the student services, the Department of Facilities Management, the office of offices of the Principal and Deputy Principal. Their offices, okay? Spec Graduate studies, exam section, admissions, all the campus departments, centers, all the centers, all the institutes. We don't expect any library activities, no late and relief duty. This is a critical time for the students to use the library. They actually write in exams. But all this is going to shut down this week if we don't hear something urgently from the government. Well, so we've been waiting, we've been waiting patiently since 2019. The proposal was submitted, revised, resubmitted. But we are on 2014 salaries. So we will wait in 11 years for a salary increase in salaries and benefits.
[00:01:37] Speaker A: Well, I was expecting this morning when we spoke for you to start off by saying good news because last week we heard the Prime Minister say to the Minister of Finance that he needed to get more involved to resolve these negotiations. And one would have expected that in the time that the Prime Minister made that announcement to know there'd be some sort of development in that regard. Are you saying that nothing has happened?
[00:02:03] Speaker B: Well, so far we don't have anything concrete. We have nothing in writing. I don't know the Minister is going to engage the principal soon. I'm hoping that he would engage the principal soon because we want this resolved by December because come January there will be no grades for students. And that is going to be a problem. That's going to be a problem for all stakeholders. So we, in order to mitigate that problem, we expect something to come soon. But we don't just expect something. We expect something commensurate with that of the Prime Minister. According to the SRC recommendations, that was accepted easily.
Affordability was not an issue there.
The issue of economy and financial problems and all that was not a problem with that quick acceptance of the SRC report. So we expect something commensurate because we think we are special category of Staff as well. We are university workers. We are indispensable to the region. We are part of a regional institution that deliver education. So we have to be valued, our work have to be valued. It's not only politicians who work and many of us are much more qualified than politicians. Right? So we have had a university lecturers going to become politicians but they would pass the pasta qualification because you know you don't need a PhD nor do you need. Do you have to be a professor to have publications peer reviewed, top notch journals and books to be writing books and all that to you have to have that as a university lecturer. But to be a politician you don't need that kind of qualification. So our people, our my members are much more highly qualified and qualified than some of the. Some of the politicians the Prime Minister identified with that he was a head of department as I am at UE head of department work incessantly day and night with no remuneration or remuneration for that extra worker. In addition to doing your normal work as a lecturer and having to publish.
You know, it's publish or perish. So to get promotion you have to publish.
So it's. It's very, very hard work. We work over time. If you walk around the campus and look at the lecturer's faces, you'll see many of them looking sleepy because they don't sleep. We go around the clock sometimes. We do what we have to do. And we've been doing this on 2014 salaries. But we've been clamoring for better wages and better benefits. And just as the politicians wanted, just as the Prime Minister wanted, accepted it immediately, so too we wanted and we wanted urgently, just as urgently. So we would like this to be settled this December.
[00:04:48] Speaker A: No.
Is there time for it to be settled by December? Because we know that the Finance Minister now going to have to engage the university principal. The university principal going to have to engage Wigart and all these things. Can that be done realistically before the end of December?
[00:05:06] Speaker B: It can be. If you whether is a will. There is a way. It is the 2nd of December December parasite recall have 31 days. Yeah, right. You know, we work through the break. You know, we're busy grading papers when everybody's having punch of creme and sorrel and food cake. So I expect the politicians to be working all the time. If they're going to get FD salaries and hefty increases, they should be working through the holidays too. As we are. We work through the holidays. That's tell you how hard with Electoral. So I don't want to hear about not being realistically possible. Right. Because it's 2019 and going. It's 2019 and going. The proposal been submitted. It was revised since March. Right. So if it was not realistically possible since March, why wouldn't it be realistically possible in December? It has to be realistically possible. Where there's a will, there is a week.
[00:05:55] Speaker A: Yeah.
You've espoused the position that others have since the Prime Minister made the announcement that the government is going to accept the SRC recommendations and the increases as much as 40 something percent in some instances, some unions.
I'm assuming Wicket is of the same opinion that they, they get commensurate.
You've been having. How much increase have you been seeking prior to this announcement by the Prime Minister accepting the src? What. What was bigot asking for?
[00:06:31] Speaker B: Satish, we cannot do that over the media. I'm sorry, that is not information we can divulge. Okay? That is, that is. That is something that the executive has.
[00:06:40] Speaker A: Its protocol, but it was nowhere close to 40 something percent.
[00:06:45] Speaker B: I cannot divulge. I cannot divulge the information because it's not so simple.
[00:06:50] Speaker A: Yeah, I understand that. The point I'm trying to drive, and maybe it might sound unfair is if you couldn't get agreement based on whatever it is you were asking for before, and I'm positive it's not going to be anywhere close to 47%.
How realistic is it for you to get commensurate?
[00:07:10] Speaker B: Well, it was realistic for the Prime Minister to get 47%.
Okay. And don't get me wrong, I believe that if you're working, you should get your just use. Okay? You should get your just use. So you should be prime minister. Got 47. The other ministers didn't get that. The judges did not get that. Okay? Public servants didn't get that. The OWTU workers did not get that. The SWWTU workers didn't get that. I believe parliamentarians deserve an increase. Some of them work very hard. I believe the judges deserve an increase. We see the ps, the Permanent Secretaries are also in that package on the SRC report. Some of them work very, very hard. In fact, some of them carry the ministries on their shoulders. Okay? So while the ministers sometimes have to attend a lot of social functions and whatnot, part of their job, the PS are the technocrats in the ministries and they do very hard work. And they're not given the recognition. The recognition all go to the ministers and the politicians because they are the ones facing the public and they are the ones who the media highlight. Media needs to highlight the work the PS do. I like the work the judges do. You know, a judge can't really come and boast over the media, but sometimes you can interview them and just get an idea of what their day is like and how much work they have to do, how many nights they go without sleep. Just like lecturers, we prepare lectures. We, you know, we have to deliver those lectures, we have to publish, we have to advise students. We have to attend multiple, multiple committee meetings, numerous meetings, you know, on a daily basis. We have to, we have to attend meetings. So it's a, it's not, it's not an easy task for the lecturers and I know it's not an easy task for public officials. I know it's not an easy task for the psst or some of the parliamentarians. I know it's not an easy task for the judges. But if they are getting an increase and a big fat whooping increase, then those of us who are also burning the midnight oil, all right, who are toiling day and night to do our work, okay? So if it's one thing you can say, we do our work, we graduate our students at the end of the day. You had six graduations at St. Augustine here this year. At the end of the day, we aim to ensure they came for which is a solid education and a certificate, you know, so a degree, whatever it is, whether it's a degree, whether it's a certificate, whether it's a master's degree, a bachelor's degree, a PhD degree, a diploma, whatever it is they come to the university for, we try to ensure that we assist them. And you know, it's not just physical satisfied. And in Covid we are, we have even gone blended. So we have to prepare a lot of slides which we, which we share with them. We have to upload those slides. We have to deal with students emails on a regular basis. We have to deal with students queries, you know, so we have to prepare documents all the time to be posted on online for them because we see them most of the times. Our classes are once or twice a week. So you want to be keeping them updated on what is happening when their exams are scheduled, keep reminding them stuff. So it is a tedious, tedious task. And I know many jobs are like that. I mean, if you're getting a big fact salary and you're not working hard, something wrong, okay? Even the business sector, that, the private sector, they, they will, they work around the clock because, because it's them, it's private. You know, every work doesn't get done, they work suffers and their business suffers. So hard work. I believe they deserve just use, equal pay for equal work.
And what we are asking for, Satish, is our just use commensurate with the work that we, that we do. This is what, how the Prime Minister justified his acceptance of the 47%. We can equally justify our reasonable increase. A commensurate increase.
[00:11:09] Speaker A: You've. You've set a timeline or deadline rather for this thing to be wrapped up in December or by the end of December. If that does not happen, what's the next step?
[00:11:21] Speaker B: Well, their marks are due in the 7th of January. So that's why I'm hoping that it will be completed by the end of December so that we can, so that we can, we can get something reasonable that we can sign off on even if we have to sign off in January. Okay, that's fine. What I'm saying is Satish, at least we need to see. The deadline I'm setting is that we need to see progress. We need to see something coming off it. We need to see something concrete. A concrete offer in December. That's what I'm there, there's paperwork to do. I'm aware of that. There will be meetings to be held. Minister, principal, principal, us, we know all that part of the process and procedure. But we need to have something to work with. Right now we have nothing. What we have, we have rejected what was offered before outright. And we rejected it in writing. That was brought to us in writing by the CPO that that remit was brought to us in writing and we had to clamor to get a remit satisfaction. Can you believe? First time in the history and I've been in the union business nearly two decades now I've been in this union and this is the first time in the history of the union that we had to clamor for a remit. You know, we clamored for a remit. They didn't even want to tell us, give us an offer. So we had to fight for that. You know, we had a spade of protests in 2023 that was to get the remit when we get it was totally unacceptable. 002002 we had to reject it. We rejected it. They asked us to do a revised proposal. We did that. We sent it to the minister. The principal did actually send it to the minister. She's the one who released things to the minutes. And then from March until now, nothing.
Something's Drastically wrong. And look how fast they accept the DSRC report. And you don't even need to go to cabin parliament to have that legislated. You know, that's accepted by government, by the cabinet, that's just accepted like that. So we would like a kind of arrangement like that. Satish, I think the whole country wants an arrangement like that where you know, you have a committee, a so called independent committee I'm recommending. And then we just left off the left after us to accept or reject. We love that arrangement. And it could be done, it could be done in very short notice because the SRC come one week with your combinations and the next week it accepted. So why can't we got, we got negotiations we settled in such a short space of time too. Yeah, I, I, Is it that one group is entitled and another group is not? Is it that one group is elitist and another group is not?
Is it that do as I say but don't do, you know, do do as I, I say but don't do as I do? What is it? Is it that all animals are equal but some are more equal than others? What is it? What we are seeing here is a sort of gap, a gap between government and workers and even workers who perform high level tasks. High level tasks. As university lecturers do we consider this a very high level task. You cannot value what we do. We are educating the UTR leaders of tomorrow. Not just the leaders, the professionals, the doctors, the lawyers, the teachers, the, you know, the consultants, whatever they may come out to be in the future.
We are educating them. So our work should not be undervalued in any way to be considered less than that of a politician. By no means, because you can see what we are doing. We graduate in the students. But sometimes you look out there and you see the potholes in the roads, right? You see, you see, you see the drains in a, in, in a terrible state. You see the economy in a mess, okay?
Crime escalating out of proportion. So you want to, you want to wonder, you want to question what the politicians are doing. All right, so you can actually see what we are doing. We graduate our students. We have the statistics to prove. We always work with statistics, we academics.
[00:15:15] Speaker A: Well, I guess time will tell whether everybody equal or whether some are more equal than others.
Because December is going to the end of December will roll around and we'll find out whether or not there is the kind of action that you are saying is required.
And it's not bigger alone. I expect that there are others who are going to make the same appeal based on the same developments.
We wait to see how the government treats with those. Because they put themselves there, nobody put them there.
And these issues, they've gotten very controversial for obvious reasons, the time delays, the lack of attention to some of these matters over the years and all those kinds of things. So we'll have to wait and see how it transpires. I want to thank you for the update on what's going on and I guess we'll have a further conversation as time goes by. Thank you for being with us this morning.
[00:16:19] Speaker B: Just want to remind our members, and we have done so internally as well, that it's black week. Total blackout, system shutdown, system of all, shutdown of all operations until we get a concrete return, improved and reasonable offer from the government through the principal. Thank you very much, Satish, for having me this morning.
[00:16:40] Speaker A: Yeah, it was my pleasure having you as always. And I guess we'll speak again on these matters as we move forward. Thank you once again for being with us here this morning.
[00:16:49] Speaker B: You're most welcome.
[00:16:50] Speaker A: And that's how we end our interview here this morning with Uyghur President Dr. Indeed. Rampasad the best insight, instant feedback accountability the all new Talk Radio Freedom 106.5.
