00:00Three days after Port and Maritime Service workers at the Port of Spain says station were temporarily suspended and rehired the following day,
00:09former workers attached to the Point Lisa says station reached out to TV6 News for help,
00:15having received temporary layoff letters due to the collapse of the roof of the station.
00:20Contacted for comment, Port and Maritime Services Chairman Michael Anneset says,
00:25while he empathises with the workers, the situation is out of the company's control.
00:31The customs themselves would have shut down the operations, not the company, let me make it clear.
00:37OK, and we have written to the Point Lisa's management, who we are contracted to to supply the labour for the station.
00:49And like the workers and like the company and like Point Lisa's, they are not aware when they're going to repair the roof to reopen this station.
01:03And therefore, there is nothing that we can do in those circumstances.
01:10The incident occurred on January 22nd, and PMSL Point Lisa's workers say it's been 24 weeks since they were last paid.
01:19We are hoping to raise that issue with the new Minister of Finance to see if he can use his office to get the thing up and running.
01:29And because, I mean, and I understand what the workers are saying, but look how long that roof would have collapsed.
01:38All right, there's some steel beam on something, and we can't fix that yet.
01:44Because of bureaucracy, with the coming into being with the new Minister of Finance,
01:50I am hoping to have the conversation with him to bring it to his attention,
01:55to see how soon they could fix the shed so it could be up and running.
02:02I understand that the tender went out and they selected a contractor to do the work.
02:07The workers further lament that they work for mere $23 an hour and have not had increments in over a decade.
02:15On Friday, workers attached to the Port of Spain's cessation took action in protest of their terms and conditions,
02:21which resulted in them being promptly suspended.
02:25They resumed the duties on Tuesday.
02:27Just like the people in Point Lisa who say that they can get wage increases,
02:31which is a fact for an extended period of time,
02:34because we operate at the same rates that we would have gotten in 1995, which is 30 years ago.
02:43The promise was, ma'am, that we will try to find a creative way.
02:47We will engage the Minister because, just like them, we are going through the financial and economic ringer
02:56because we haven't received any increases for 30 years.
03:00Brunessa Cutting, TV6 News.
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