EARLY RETIREMENT and deals for people with health problems as well as for some workers “who need to be saved from themselves” may spare many of the Barbados Transport Board’s estimated 900 employees from the sweeping job cuts Government has called for across statutory corporations.
This is the view of Barbados Workers’ Union (BWU) general secretary Sir Roy Trotman, who said yesterday that the Transport Board might well follow the Barbados Water Authority (BWA) in supporting BWU counterproposals aimed at retaining most of the bus company’s employees.
Sir Roy told BWU’s mid-term conference that the union would be meeting Friday with the management of the Transport Board to “explore more fully” the alternatives put on the table.
These included early retirement for some employees, “lump sum” payments for people with health challenges who preferred to leave, and “a piece of change” for some people with questionable working habits who opted to go rather than end up facing the risk of being fired eventually, he reported.
Referring to the latter category, he told the meeting at the BWU’s Solidarity House headquarters in Harmony Hall, St Michael, that it was a case of “saving people from themselves”.
