SECURITY guards at Secure St. Lucia Ltd who for two years have been fighting to secure sums amounting to about $700,000 owed to them by their employer will finally be rewarded.
The National Workers Union (NWU), the bargaining agent for the security guards this week said that the impasse “has been amicably resolved.”
The NWU and the management of Secure St. Lucia agreed that $652,440.19 will be paid out to the guards as overtime compensation due for 2012.
According to the NWU the security guards will be paid in small groups in keeping with the company’s cash flow position.
“The company and the union also agreed to conclude the current negotiations expeditiously and use whatever funds that remain to fund the cost of the new industrial agreement between the security services company and the National Workers Union. A memorandum of Understanding to that effect will be signed shortly at the Department of Labour,” the NWU noted Thursday.
It has been a rocky two years for the security guards who have had to undertake several initiatives to get the company to cough up the dough.
At one time last year employees of WASCO Inc. (Water and Sewerage Company Incorporated) and WINERA Ltd (Windward Islands Packaging Company Ltd) had to throw their support behind the security guards in the fight for their overtime payments.
They wrote to the Labour Department calling on Ray Narcisse, who was deputy Labour Commissioner at the time, to stand firm and resolve the matter peacefully warning him that should he fail to maintain industrial justice they would join the security guards in full solidarity.
And for the past 24 months the guards and their bargaining agent and the management of the company have had to attend several meetings at a conciliatory level under the Chairmanship of Narcisse, now Labour Commissioner, in an attempt to resolve the impasse.
