Gov’t unhappy about LIME situation; meets with affected staff
Minister for Communications and Works Hon. Mark H. Vanterpool, a guest on the Speak Your Mind TV show on September 28, 2013 said, “I have met with the LIME General Manager [Sean Auguste] last week or the week before.”
While his role during the encounter was not disclosed, the Minister revealed that government was ‘not happy’ about the current situation and also expressed that the Labour Minister, Dr The Hon. Kedrick D. Pickering, was also involved in talks with affected workers.
“From the Ministry of Communication and Works’ point of view and being informed as to what is happening we have been grateful to the Minister responsible for Labour who met with the group on Thursday [September 26, 2013],” Hon. Vanterpool added.
He continued, “We are not happy for what we are hearing in terms of how they have been treated differently from other countries and what is happening there so I believe the Minister of Labour is looking closely at it and he will be liaising with the Premier and others in going forward.”
Hon. Vanterpool said government is very concerned about the situation and noted that he would be awaiting the position of the Labour Minister before making any further comment on the way forward for the affected workers.
“We are concerned about it not just with LIME but what is happening generally,” he said.
According to Hon. Vanterpool, “We know that companies try to organise and be more efficient but we want to make sure that when they are doing so that they consider our people and treat them in the right way that they should be treated.”
LIME’s Managing Director, Mr Sean Auguste recently stated in a press release that LIME is looking to redefine the way it does business by incorporating a managed services business model that is expected to come into effect later this year.
“The redefined operational model will see LIME becoming more focused on services, products, sales, and while the managed services provider will focus specifically on the infrastructure that keeps telecommunications in the Virgin Islands working well,” Mr Auguste stated in the press release.
LIME did not give any details of what agreement will be worked out with the affected employees. “At this stage, we cannot issue any further details until any agreement is definite and official. We will make a further public statement at the appropriate time,” the release quoted Mr Auguste as saying.
The aggrieved workers likely to be laid off by LIME BVI have expressed concerns that their severance pay is meagre, they are working in a tense environment since they allegedly have not been told how much longer they have with the company, and that management has allegedly not given them any assurance that they would be rehired by the company identified to manage its technical operations.
More than a dozen workers of LIME BVI had spoken to Virgin Islands News Online on September 23, 2013 following yet another meeting with LIME management.
“We feel as if we are being taken advantage of and victimised because we have a government that is weak and not bargaining for us. We are out in the wilderness on our own but we will continue to plea our cause because this is injustice,” said a worker of the Service Support and Delivery (SSD) Department of LIME BVI.
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18 Responses to “Gov’t unhappy about LIME situation; meets with affected staff”
Given the size of our country the large increase of unemployment - the labor code needs to be improved.
What are the unemployment benefits BVI offers?
Labor needs to be taken to task because as these type of cases rise Labor is even worse than they have ever been. There is no Union, You can't go to court because they will say you have to go to Labor, you can only Talk to the Minister cause he can't do anything until Labor does ... and Labor don't do NOTHING ... so who really looks out for the employees when the BIG fancy companies with their BIG fancy legal team go to LABOR and the MINISTER in advance of these announcements and give their talk ...
They got government in a choke cause when last government really move strongly for the people?????
Let me tell YOU what I am not happy with, I am not happy with the cronyism, conflict of interest, nepotism and blatant corruption exhibited by your government. But...in all fairness I have no one to blame but myself as i voted for you fools. Fool me once.....
WOW, so you wanna get on LIME, but you said nothing to CCT because it is your br****s company. That is some shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiid!