Civil servants take strike action, cripple government services

CASTRIES, St. Lucia, CMC – Civil servants stayed away from their jobs on Monday disrupting several government services and ignoring appeals from Prime Minister Dr. Kenny Anthony and the main private sector organisation to end their industrial dispute over increased salaries.
The workers, represented by the Civil Service Association (CSA) had voted over the weekend to stay away from their jobs after rejecting the latest offer of four per cent and a package of other benefits that had been accepted by police, teachers, firemen and nurses, all of whom are members of the Trade Union Federation (TUF) that groups the public service unions.
The civil servants, chanting the union’s solidarity song, are insisting on a 9.5 per cent wage hike for the 2010-13 period that the government said it cannot meet.