With the race on to complete the Sam Lord’s Castle, Wyndham Grand Resort by March next year, close to 200 Chinese labourers were brought in by COMPLANT (China National Complete Plant Import & Export Corp. Ltd).
COMPLANT is the Chinese company in charge of the project and the workers arrived in Barbados about a month ago.
However, local contractors are not happy, pointing out that Barbadian companies were being pushed out in favour of the much cheaper Chinese labourers.
A local contractor said COMPLANT was constantly trying to get them to reduce their rates to levels which were not sustainable. He also complained about a shortage of bathroom facilities on the job site, for both the local and Chinese workers.
When contacted by this newspaper Stuart Layne, chief executive officer of the Barbados Tourism Investment Inc. (BTII), which is overseeing the project, said they were still maintaining the 60/40 agreement ratio, with local contractors getting 40 percent of the work at the St Philip site. (MB)