Earl Moxam, Senior Gleaner Writer
THE PRONOUNCEMENTS of Finance Minister Dr. Omar Davies, in his opening presentation in the 2004/05 Budget, have given comfort to one influential public figure - Senator Dwight Nelson, Vice President of the Jamaica Confederation of Trade Unions (JCTU).
Senator Nelson, the lead union spokesman on the Government/JCTU Memorandum of Understanding, has staked much of his credibility on the success of the MoU.
So far, according to him, the Finance Minister has kept faith with the unions in his articulation of the Government's fiscal priorities and programmes.
Dr. Davies, outlining how the $328 billion budget would be financed in Parliament on Thursday, announced that there would be no new taxes during the 2004/05 fiscal year.
IMPORTANT STEP
That, according to Dwight Nelson, was an important step towards fulfilling the Government's commitments to the workers covered by the MoU, which, among other things, calls for a two-year public sector wage freeze.
"One of the apprehensions we had was that, having agreed to make the sacrifices, the public sector workers would have been hard-pressed to maintain these sacrifices if there was any significant increase in taxation which would affect their ability to pay their way. So we are happy that there are no new taxes; this relieves a lot of the fears that the workers had," he told The Sunday Gleaner.
The Finance Minister's subsequent disclosure of impending increases in user fees for some Government services has not alarmed Senator Nelson, so far.
"The bottom line is there is a monitoring and evaluation committee, which did not meet previously because the Minister was preparing his budget. This committee will meet next week and anything that will impact on the MoU will surely be discussed with us and we expect that the Minister will tell us what the probabilities are and how this will affect us," he said.
LOOKING BEYOND THE MOU
Under the MoU, signed after months of negotiations, the JCTU agreed to a two-year wage freeze for public sector workers, representing a $6 billion saving in the public sector wage bill for the Government in this year's budget.
The Government, in turn, promised, among other things, not to cut staff and to return the economy to single-digit inflation (eight per cent to nine per cent in 2004/2005 and six per cent to seven per cent in 2005/2006) during the two-year life of the MoU.
Dr. Davies, describing the 2004/05 Budget as "MoU-friendly", projected a nine per cent inflation rate for the fiscal year.
Describing the Finance Minister's projection as "very positive", Senator Nelson promised that the monitoring committee would monitor the month-by-month movement of inflation "and we will address it if we see that it is not moving in a favorable direction."
Acknowledging that the JCTU and his own leadership will be followed closely in ensuing months, arising from the agreement, the Senator is imploring the public to objectively assess the relevant issues.
"We have to look beyond the signing of the MoU as an event and focus on the process of dialogue and collaboration during the implementation phase. It signals a process, which speaks to continued dialogue and cooperation between the Government and trade unions on a new course in order to achieve the developmental objectives and people should not be myopic. We will be on a process of continuing dialogue in which we will look at economic data and trends," he said.
The state of the fire service, and fears about possible job cuts in the service, recently emerged as the most serious challenge yet to the viability of the MoU. So much so that Dwight Nelson himself sought assurances from the Finance Ministry that there would not be any cuts in the service.
He emerged from those talks reassured that there would be no cut in staff and that the Government would make provisions for equipping the Jamaica Fire Brigade beyond the provisions in the Estimates of Expenditure.
"The fire service is one of the areas that we addressed during the negotiations and is in fact provided for in the agreement. It speaks to the partners accepting that there are certain critical groups in which restrictions on employment would not be enforced. And we accept that the fire service is deserving of special treatment recruitment and training of personnel and properly equipping it. And we are certainly heartened that the Minister recognised that," he said of the discussions.
Dr. Davies disclosed on Friday that steps were being taken to source new fire engines and other equipment, possibly from Europe.
