‘Worker welfare must be at the heart of development’

10.AUG.07

EDITOR: The ULP Administration has brought a vision to education that has left its critics in the dust. Universal Secondary Education is a gateway to the opportunities and benefits of economic and social development and we must therefore be careful as to how we debate this issue: For instance to criticize the success of the students at the common entrance is foolishness. We must never lose sight of the fact that the education debate strikes at the heart of the young and innocent in our society.{{more}} The reality is that we must never forget that for many years parents were walking from school to school begging principals to give their children a second chance; the success of Sister Pat is an indication that a single examination cannot be the only factor that determines the entire future of a child.

Therefore the only conclusion that right thinking persons can arrive at, is that a backward element of our political elite will like to preside over a large uneducated population and if that is the case it is likely to result in corruption, underemployment and poverty.

Unquestionably, it should be in the collective wisdom of all Vincentians to support an educated population, as there are direct and indirect societal benefits for doing so. How can one explain the fact that these same people are doing all that is possible to ensure their own sons and daughters receive free university education compliments the state, but at the same time insisting that poor people’s children be denied a free secondary education.

The truth is that they recognize the importance of education for their children, but their philosophy is that poor people’s children must remain ignorant and stupid, because once they remain at that level the debate will always be about trivial issues. This is not to say that the implementation process is perfect, but can anyone name a country where universal secondary education has been implemented without problems.

Over four hundred teachers have either graduated or are at present attending a university programme locally, regionally or internationally. Never before in the history of this country has this happened. This training is challenging the long held erroneous cultural belief by teachers that some children cannot learn. If the trend continues and all of our teachers and parents accept the fact that all children can learn, and that poor teachers’ instructions and poor parental skill are the main contributing factors to high failure rate in the system, then the education revolution will succeed beyond our wildest dreams. If our teachers in training implement just fifty percent of what they learn, St. Vincent and the Grenadines will be able to compete globally with a knowledge based economy.

It is from this background I want to address the issue of reclassification. The ULP Government has invested a lot in education and present and future generations will benefit from this investment. However, worker welfare must be at the heart of development and from my vantage point at the SVGTU, it is only the mature leadership of the Union which is averting industrial action at this point, because we have the commitment of the prime Minister that the reclassification will be implemented on a phased basis retroactive from January 2007.

The harsh truth is that all government’s employees are grumbling about the slow pace of the reclassification. It may not be what you want to hear but it is factual. For the Deputy Prime Minister to describe the issue as “union utterances” can provoke a response that may take him by surprise. We as union leaders are elected to carry out the dictates of our membership and we will never falter from that mandate.

I can never blame PS Francis solely for the problem with the reclassification. She may not have treated it with the high priority it deserves, but the problem was there before she became PS. For example who accepted a draft final report from the consultant? Why were not all the necessary benchmark jobs evaluated? Why were the unions not given a copy of the recommendations until nearly two years after the submission of the report? What actually took place since the recommendations were tabled in August 2004 and were deemed incomplete? Do we really have the administrative capacity and competency in the country to complete the process?

I am a firm believer that all problems can be resolved once all parties are committed to the resolve the issue. I am not yet convinced that the political directorate has taken all the administrative and politically decisions necessary for the process to be resolved speedily. The ball is in your court sir, and you will have to decide whether it is merely utterances or?

Deniston Douglas
Industrial Relations Officer SVGTU