Senator Massiah,
We all know that you are singing for your supper to retain your appointed position in the Senate so that you could earn a full pension.
Your assertion that workers do not have the right of association is a figment of your warped imagination.
How does an increase in the minimum wage becomes an election gimmick ?
You are fully aware that there is a minimum wage committee that invariably consults broadly to determine the amount of the increase, yet you have deliberately sought to mislead workers into thinking that there would be no consultation.
It is obvious that you and the union that you lead, have become irrelevant in promoting and satisfying the empowerment of workers.
As a consequence of the compromised representation of certain senior members of the union, who routinely enjoy gifts of free meals and sometimes cash from hoteliers; hotel workers have not gotten the type of strident and effective representation that they deserve.
Sen Massiah, the hospitality sector contributes 55 percent of GDP, but real wages in that sector have not risen correspondingly in that sector for decades. It is a shame that hospitality workers in 2025 are being paid a pittance above minimum wage.
The narrowing of the gap between minimum wage and the pay of hospitality workers is due primarily to the poor representation by you and the ABWU that represent 95 percent of hospitality workers.
It is evident that you abhor any further increase in the minimum wage, because that will force the ABWU to negotiate better salaries and wages for hospitality workers.
Many hospitality workers are struggling to earn one third of our country’s per capital income of $60,000.
Years ago, hotel workers earned enough to service a home mortgage. Today, as a result of the stagnation in real wages, which has not kept pace with inflation, the majority of hospitality workers cannot afford a home mortgage for a basic low income home.
The union also allowed hoteliers during the period of COVID to sever their higher paid employees and replaced them with lower paid employees.
At one point, the minimum wage in the hotel sector was reduced to $9.00 per hour, mere cents above the minimum wage. One hotel, even recruited a former UPP Minister to shaft workers. Not a word was heard from the ABWU. It took myself, and broader civil society, to include Mr Anderson Carty to bring the madness to an end.
Hoteliers have been allowed to employ workers using shell companies, segregating the pty from any potential claim by workers in the event of liquidation. Even tips have been taken from employees and some have been fired for accepting tips. Again, the ABWU has not advocated for any changes. It is Gaston Browne that is championing the cause to pilot legislation to bring these injustices to an end.
As a result of the abuse of workers in the sector, our nationals are no longer interested in working in the hospitality sector, resulting in an increase in immigrant workers.
All this happened under the uncaring and hopeless representation of the ABWU.
To add insult to injury, I found the recent negotiations and agreement by the ABWU on behalf of hospitality workers, to accept an increase of $5.00 (week)which cannot even buy a bottle of beer) reprehensible.
This is tangible evidence that the ABWU leadership does not care about the workers they represent. Their interests lie exclusively in the status of senatorial appointments and gifts of free meals and others.
I believe that hospitality workers deserve better. They should share equitably in the gains of the sector.
In the absence of effective representation by the ABWU, I am prepared, in the tradition of Sir Walter Citrine to assist hospitality workers in organizing themselves to form their own trade union.
By registering their own hospitality trade union which will be lead exclusive by hospitality workers, they would get better, more effective and focused representation.
Hospitality workers contribute over $2M annually to ABWU in the form of dues. These fees could be better invested in their own union for their own empowerment. The ABWU have also wasted these dues subsiding their loss making cafe up to $500,000 in a single calendar year.
Accordingly, I recommend that hospitality workers create their own bespoke representative union, to be lead exclusively by its members, and not by politicians and their activists.
This Hospitality Workers Union should be complemented with a Hospitality Workers Credit Union, Hospitality Construction and Housing Company and a Hospitality Workers supermarket.
By establishing this comprehensive development infrastructure for hospitality workers, it will help to accelerate home ownership, savings and investment and lower food prices.
In addition, this would eliminate the unnecessary wastage of their dues, ensuring that the funds are utilized exclusively for the development of hospitality workers, compared to wasting up to $500K annually on a lost making cafe.
I urge hospitality workers to organized themselves as recommended above and I am prepared to assist with the seed funding, to cover the initial set-up costs to include any required consultancy.
I have also gotten an agreement in principle from the Cabinet to sell Crown land to this proposed Hospitality Workers Union at a concessional rate and to extend duty free concessions on the importation of building material, fixtures and fittings to construct homes for its members.
As our nation continues to advance, my administration is determined that all employees should share equitably in its gains.
Blessings
Gaston Browne
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Well said. It is about time that this greedy bunch of loosers be thrown in the dust bin of history…. many in the private sector, who this same union represents can atest to the truth in your statement Mr. Prime Minister. Many of us have seen and experienced first hand, the lack of proper representation. Our companies, yes feed them, I know this for a FACT! Then they come try sell us the watered down proposals.
Sick of them…..
Raising minimal wage and not addressing inflation will not benefit workers! Look what the US did and you saw what that did in the economy! People lost their jobs because their employers couldn’t keep up with buying the same goods at a higher price point and not receiving any profits because their employees were being paid higher for the same out put of work! Job loses skyrocketed and the economy went into a recession! It was just a political stunt to make the government look good but obviously it backfired! It’s better to lower taxes and create more spending so that the employers can feel more comfortable adding more employment or raising staffs wages or giving them stipend so that they can afford to live comfortable not just getting by! My two cents if it was worth that much!
This alternative cannot be better explained and advised. I urge and support this initiative to become part of the urgent national discussion for the upliftment of the workers in this sector especially during this period tremendous growth. Let the rising tide lift all boats. Let it rip PM.
Mr. PM. You are wasting your efforts to encourage the Garots to establish their own Trade Union. Antiguans will NOT take up this or any other offer for that matter. They are just too damn Lazy and prefer a handout. They will only complain about the government not doing this or that to further their wanton causes. I guess that they feel the should have a sense of entitlement in regards to any matters, Antiguan.
So while the Garots complain, we will continue to take up the offers afforded by the policies of the present government.
It takes a real man, a brave and caring man to unmask the monstrous “leaders” who parade themselves as champions of the underclass. The Hon Gaston Browne is not revealing anything about the ABWU leadership that ALL Antiguans don’t already know. What is really instructive though, is that the likes of Massiah and the rest of his gang, is that they never go beyond inflaming the public by making all sorts of defamatory statements, usually focused on the man they fear the most, the Hon. Gaston Browne. Never do they offer to sit with the government to share their concerns, and MORE IMPORTANTLY, offer sensible solutions. Massiah and his gang have been through this before. They had their rehearsal with the LIAT 74 Ltd., aiding and abetting them in their self-destructive actions that eventually forced the closure of the Airlines and put the whole LIAT gang out of work. Even now, with eggs still on their ugly faces, they continue to deceive the ex-employees by encouraging them to try to get blood from stones. If the hotel workers think that their union puppeteer has their interests at heart, they’d better wise up and consider alternative solutions. The ABWU, like their co-conspirators, the UPP, are concerned only their own selfish and greedy ambitions. Hotel workers, it is time rise from your slumber! Shake off the backwardness that threatens to continue to keep you in perpetual mental enslavement. This is 2025 for God’s sake!
ROUND 1 ……TOP DAWG 1- 0 SENATOR MASSIAH
ROUND 2……?
Facts. I AM A HOSPITALITY WORKER AND IMAGINE WE GO ALLLLLLLLLLL OUT FOR OUR GUESTS AND MANAGEMENT , SUPERVISORS , CONT. TO FILL THEIR POCKETS WITH SERVICE CHARGE AND SPEND THE SHAREHOLDERS MONEY RECKLESSLY, OVER WORKING US TAKING OUR UNION DUES AND NO REPRESENTATION WHATSOEVER! FAILURE TO ADDRESS AND RECTIFY OUR CONCERNS THE ABWU IS A TOTAL INCOMPETENT FAILURE WE HAVE TO EVEN PAY FOR CONSULTATION ALTHOUGH WE PAY DUES THAT ARE AUTOMATICALLY DEDUCTED OUT OF OUR SALARIES. I THINK ITS TIME WE AS A COUNTRY, AS A PEOPLE HAVE TO INDIVIDUALLY CHOOSE WHICH UNION WE WOULD LIKE TO REPRESENT AND NOT GO WITH COMPANY’S TIES CAUSE WE ARE PAYING FOR OUR OWN NON-JUSTIFICATION!!!! WAKE UP HOTELIERS ⏰
YOU SEE WHY SHAREHOLDERS HAVE TO DO THEIR OWN INVESTIGATION WHEN THEY VISIT .. THEY ASK WHY WHEN THEY COME THEY SEE DIFFERENT STAFF THESE ARE THE THINGS OUR GUESTS/CLIENT LOOK FORWARD TO. CHEAP LABOUR NEED TO STOP, TOURISM IS OUR BUSINESS IN ANTIGUA AND I AGREE WITH THE PM WE NEED A HOTEL UNION , IF YOU FIND ANTIGUANS WORKING IN A HOTEL THESE DAYS ITS BECAUSE: A) THEY JUST GOT OUT OF SCHOOL B) SIDE HUSSLE, C) WE JUST LOVE THE SECTOR! DEM TREAT US LIKE DAWG AND ITS TIME WE TAKE THAT STAND……
PM. It is not only free meals amd rooms for visiting concubines that they receive, a senior union official also owns the buses that transport hotel workers. Do the hotel workers really and actually believe he would put their interest before their own?
Correct! ABWU is in bed with the hoteliers. That union doesn’t give 2 sheets about workers!