Union’s retirement age under scrutiny

The National Union of Public Workers (NUPW) says that its retirement age is 65 but several members of staff have left their employment well past that age.

This was the argument presented by attorney-at-law Duana Peterson on the behalf of former General Secretary of the NUPW Roslyn Smith during Monday’s virtual Employment Rights Tribunal hearing into Smith’s claims that she was unfairly dismissed from her job at the union.

Smith was retired by the NUPW on March 31, 2019, at age 65   following months of hospitalization at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

Questioning current General Secretary Richard Green regarding the union’s retirement age, Peterson asserted that some employees, including past General Secretaries Dennis Clarke and Delcia Burke, had been exempt from the 65 years mandated in the early 1990s.

“I am suggesting to you that Dennis Clarke resigned at 67. Are you aware of that?…Percy Elcock retired at 82; Clyde Sealy retired at age 72; George Jordan retired at age 70; Fitzgerald Walcott retired at 67; George Hill retired at age 67; even your immediate predecessor Delcia Burke, did she not retire at 69?

“Mr Green, I am suggesting to you that contrary to your evidence, the retirement dates for the employees that I referred to directly contradict your evidence that the NUPW retirement age was always 65,” she stressed.

Peterson contended that prior to 1994, the union had no set retirement age for its employees, and claimed that the NUPW’s Manual for Personnel and General Office Procedures, which came on stream in 1994 before being revised in October 2017, did not apply to those employed before 1994.

Green, who has spent 28 years with the union, nevertheless insisted that both prior and after 1994, the retirement age for the union was 65.

Peterson is expected to continue her questioning of Green on Friday, February 10, when the tribunal resumes at 10 a.m. Former General Secretary Delcia Burke is also expected to be a witness. (JB)