00:00The PSA negotiations are dealing with more than just wages and conditions for the period 2014, 2016, and 2017-2019.
00:10That's according to former PSA President Clyde Weatherhead.
00:14He says the talks are unique because they are addressing agreements that are long overdue, as well as outstanding arrares
00:20owed to public servants.
00:22These negotiations are unique in the sense of one, they're two periods behind.
00:30We delimit history rather than delimit current.
00:33Weatherhead, who served as PSA President until 1997, says the situation is a significant departure from what existed during his
00:43tenure.
00:43He says at that time, collective agreements were generally current, with only a few small bargaining units outstanding.
00:51Now, he says, negotiators are being asked to resolve issues dating back years, and that includes the question of arrares.
00:59It is also unique in the sense that we are negotiating the payment of arrares of a collective agreement.
01:06Some people will say, well, we had payment by various methods back in the 90s coming up the road, arising
01:14out of the pay cut, the 10% pay cut,
01:17and the freeze on increments by the NAR in 1986-87.
01:23Weatherhead points to previous instances in which public servants received payments through other arrangements.
01:30But he says those situations cannot be directly compared to the current negotiations,
01:36because court rulings found certain pay cuts imposed in the 1980s to be illegal.
01:42In other words, what we were dealing with was a debt owed to every public employee, which amounted to about
01:50$2 billion.
01:52We weren't dealing with a collective agreement and back pay.
01:55The former PSA President says the way public sector negotiations are conducted has changed significantly since the 1980s and early
02:0490s.
02:05At that time, he says unions negotiated collectively through what was known as a joint negotiating team.
02:12He says that system reflected a time when public servants were covered by a single pay plan.
02:18But that approach has since changed.
02:21Since then, the negotiations in the public service have become separate negotiations.
02:27And the CPO, as in this case, now has been dealing with negotiations with separate unions
02:34and arriving at settlements that have disrupted those relationships in pay between the different services.
02:42PSA and the government are trying to resolve outstanding matters
02:46while also dealing with the consequences of years of separate bargaining across the public service.
02:52Charlotte Kisto, TV6 News
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