DPSU to take stock

Stock-taking is going to be a priority for the Dominica Public Service Union, when the DPSU observes a week of activities from Sunday 29th April to Monday 7th May 2012.

Its officials say the week is aimed at celebrating the achievements of that trade union organization.

The union’s general secretary, Thomas Letang, says there is a lot to celebrate, with “quite a lot achieved during the past two years”.

That includes, he says, the union having its own pre-school, after school care programme, and other related projects.

“We are about to open our gymnasium, we have already invested in two conference rooms that brings a lot of revenue to the institution,” Letang told DNO.

He indicated that the DPSU was also giving loans to its members to further their tertiary education.

“We now have the revolving fund where a number of people have applied to the union for loans and they have been able to get that assistance to further their education,” he said.

So what about good salaries, proper working conditions, the primary things that unions are supposed to do for their members – how successful has the DPSU been in getting positive results there, DNO asked the union leader.

“We have achieved quite a lot, when you take into account the state of the economy,” Letang said.

He points to a membership growth of about 300 over the past two years as evidence of this.

The DPSU has some 2,400 members at the moment.

“We may not have gotten very high salary increases, say five, six percent salary increases for our members.  But in terms of non-salary benefits we have done very very well,” he told DNO.

“When you look at the government service for example, we were able to get a lot of allowances for people from the health profession: doctors, nurses and so on.
Travelling officers for the first time they are getting duty free concession for their vehicle, something that we have been struggling to get for them for a number of years”.

It’s also a feather in the union’s cap, Letang says, that the DPSU is now representing the workers of telecommunications company LIME.

At the helm for the past 15 years, Letang says it’s not for lack of trying that the union has not been able to get its members high salary increases.

“I think we have very good negotiating skills but as I said (the problem is) the state of the economy and the whole global situation,” the union leader explained.
“So what we are doing, we are saying look, whatever we can’t get in terms of salary increase, we have to get it as other benefits”.

He cited “long term gratuity benefits” as one example.

“When I came in gratuity was something that had been taken away.  As I speak to you now about 99 per cent of every collective agreement that we have, we have some form of terminal benefits in place, whether it’s a straight gratuity,(or)  whether it is some providend fund that we have been able to negotiate on behalf of our members,” Letang told DNO.

The DPSU is scheduled to hold its 6th Biennial delegates conference next week Wednesday and Thursday.