Estate unions demand wage increase

by P. Krishnaswamy

Three major plantation trade unions - the Ceylon Workers’ Congress (CWC), the Lanka Jathika Estate Workers’ Union (LJEWU) and the Joint Plantation Trade Union Centre (JPTUC) - are to meet the Ceylon Employers’ Federation (CEF), representing 22 Regional Plantation Companies, tomorrow (Monday) for negotiations on a wage increase for the plantation workers and signing of a fresh Collective Agreement. The last agreement expired on March 31 and the workers are entitled to a wage increase with retrospective effect, TU sources said.

These trade unions met last Tuesday at Kotagala with CWC leader and Minister S. Arumugam Thondaman in the chair and unanimously decided to reiterate their demand for a wage increase of Rs. 500 which the plantation companies had rejected at previous discussions, the sources said.

The LJEWU and other pro-UNP trade unions also had discussions with Opposition Leader Ranil Wickremesinghe last week seeking his intervention on a reasonable wage increase to the workers.

Other minor unions which are not signatories to the Collective Agreement had also started agitating on the issue.

Commenting on this, CWC President and Deputy Minister of Nation Building and Estate Infrastructure, Muthu Sivalingam, told the Sunday Observer that discussions with Ranil Wickremesinghe and making media statements were only efforts at a ‘membership drive’ by these unions.

The last wage increase of Rs.290 to the workers was agreed upon after the intervention of President Mahinda Rajapaksa following agitations and TU action led by the CWC, he said.

The Unions decided to reiterate their demand for Rs. 500 wage increase after carefully considering the current financial straits of the workers, the Cost of Living and also the sustainability of the tea industry, the Deputy Minister said.

CEF Director General Ravi Pieris said that although global tea prices and the demand are sound at the moment, there was a shortfall both in tea production and prices during the first half of this year.

The global economic recession also contributed to the instability in the previous years, he said.