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Union Accuses BAHA of Breaking Labor Rules After Two Firings Two terminations at the Belize Agricultural Health Authority have raised serious questions about due process. One employee was dismissed in August, another just last week, and now the Public Service Union is accusing BAHA of violating its own Collective Bargaining Agreement. As a statutory body, BAHA’s staff falls under union protection for fair treatment. PSU President Dean Flowers says the administration ignored procedures spelled out in the agreement. So, what really happened behind closed doors? And what steps will the union and the former employees take to challenge these dismissals? We dig deeper into the controversy. Dean Flowers, President, Public Service Union “The disciplinary process is carefully outlined and it’s in line with the Belize constitution, that there must be due process and natural justice before you decide to terminate somebody services, especially if you’re going to do that summarily. These people’s work, these individuals were sent home without a penny putting fifteen years of their life into the garbage, and I am not here to pronounce on whether or not had the disciplinary processes been followed, whether it would’ve resulted in what ultimately she did. That is not my place. That’s for a proper disciplinary committee to determine and for then those for that committee to then make recommendations to authority to determine how they want to treat those employees, but she has breached, in our view, the procedures as outlined and as set out in the CBA. We will be taking those cases to the Labor Commissioner, and it is for the Labor Commissioner then to determine whether she wants to refer those cases to the Labor Complaints Tribunal. So we will be taking that route, given that the collective bargaining agreement had a provision in there for the Belize Advisory Council. But the Belize Advisory Council is restricted by section one-eleven of the Belize Constitution to hear cases of statutory bodies. So our only other avenue until we replace that provision, is to now go to the Labor Commissioner to file an appeal and to make a case for and on behalf of these officers. And thereafter, these officers are not satisfied with the Labor Commissioner or the Labor Complaints tribunal decision. These officers and the union also have the right to take the matter to the Supreme Court.”
