CTUSAB says qualifications or not, outstanding civil servants should be promoted

By Emmanuel Joseph

The island’s umbrella trade union body believes lack of academic qualifications should not prevent deserving public servants from getting promotions.

General Secretary of the Congress of Trade Unions and Staff Associations (CTUSAB) Dennis de Peiza took that position as he also agreed with Chief Justice Sir Patterson Cheltenham’s recent contention that promotion in the public service should be based on performance and not just tenure.

He told Barbados TODAY that public sector workers who do outstanding work should not be held back from promotions because they do not have paper qualifications.

“As far as I am aware, merit is supposed to be a consideration for promotion and has always been the direction by the unions that it should not just be on qualifications. But if a person has done outstanding work and shown the right aptitude, has the knowledge base . . . knows the job and performed exceptionally . . . that person should not be disadvantaged as a consequence of any type of arrangements that are exclusive,” de Peiza contended.

“Because then what would be the sense of working, giving of your best and then be overlooked just because of a requirement that says you must have A, or B, or C in terms of qualifications? Yet that person with the qualification does not have the situational knowledge, the functional knowledge. and is not able to discharge what is required in an efficient and appropriate manner because they may not have the skill sets that are actually required for the job, but they have a degree and that’s where it starts and ends.”

The trade unionist cited, as an example, a case which is currently engaging the attention of CTUSAB. He said a public service officer who has been acting in a senior management position for seven years, never had a complaint against them and whose performance has been acknowledged, had been overlooked because of a lack of academic qualifications.

“All of a sudden, we are hearing the job is now to be finalised as no longer acting but to be filled and that person is to be thrown out of the position on the grounds that the person does not have the requisite qualifications. That is contemptuous and utter nonsense,” de Peiza asserted.

He contended that this flaw in the system needs to be corrected “by virtue of people applying common sense and reasoning rather than sticking to some piece of documentation to keep people [down] who want to excel in the service and improve its efficiency”.

Speaking at the Ministry of the Public Service’s Human Resource Conference last week, Sir Patterson was critical of the public service which is governed by “ill-suited” legislation that hampers excellence, innovation and leadership.

“There are people who came into a system and saw something being done one way and have somehow persuaded themselves, without difficulty, that this is the only way they can achieve anything,” he had said. 

“It’s convenient; it allows you to turn up to work which starts at 8:30 and you get there for 8:30 when really and truly you should get there for 8:15. So when work ends at 4:30, you don’t start putting on makeup at four o’clock, because you are cheating your employer. Or when everybody seems to think that once there is a funeral, they can go and ask for half-day.”

The CTUSAB general secretary supported the position that workers must give a fair day’s work.

“I don’t think that any union or any organisation which represents workers would pull him down for making a comment like that. We believe that when people come to work, they are supposed to come to work; they have working hours and people should put in their work hours,” de Peiza said.

“And if people are found wanting in that respect, I think it is appropriate to say to people ‘you can do better than this’. But we certainly would not be supportive of people using the time on the job for purposes other than what it is supposed to be used for and taking advantage of situations. 

“So, I don’t think the comment is something we would want to beat up on him for because if it is happening. It is worth speaking to in the interest of getting people to understand there is a better way of doing things,” declared the trade union leader. 

emmanueljoseph@barbadostoday.bb