THE ANNOUNCEMENT by the Barbados Workers’ Union (BWU) that it had pulled all Barbados Water Authority workers (BWA) workers off the job yesterday over a pay dispute sent water-starved rural residents into caution mode.
It also led Minister of Water Resource Management Dr David Estwick to disclose that it would take the BWA $36 million to meet the union’s demand – money it did not have.
The minister warned that industrial action at this time of a water crisis would only worsen the situation and if Government were to meet the demands, it would bankrupt the BWA for the next 25 years.
“We have inherited a complex situation that will defy any specialist in logic or any mathematician to solve,” he said. However, BWU general secretary Toni Moore remain adamant that yesterday’s action was just the “first step”, adding the workers would remain off the job until “positive word” was received from the BWA. (YB)
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