The teachers union has given government 21 days notice of industrial action. The clock on this has been ticking since last week even as the unions are considering government's counter proposal. The teachers union says its membership still has a lot of questions about the counter proposals - and they plan to vote on Thursday after information sessions early this week.
But, tonight the Prime Minister says the proposal his negotiators have made - which is to give the 8.5% increase but to stagger it over three years - is going to cost taxpayers. He says it requires serious reflection:
John Briceno, Prime Minister
"Well we are waiting to hear from them. Officially we have made a proposal we need to take into consideration. It is a proposal that is going to cost the taxpayers tremendously. We made the estimates from the ministry of finance and the estimates are to add another 103 million dollars per year, as it is between all salaries and pensions and gratuities being paid by government to the public officers which includes, teachers, BDF and police. it is approximately about 700 million. With this it is going to go over 800 million dollars - something for us to think and do some serious reflection. With that then, once it is enacted you are looking at probably about 50 cents of every dollar we collect is going to pay to salaries. Now look at this number: there are 15,000 people working in the BPO's and they earn approximately 150 million dollars. There are approximately 16,000 public officers and it's costing today the Belizean public and taxpayers across this country approximately 700 million dollars it is unsustainable and it something we have to sit down and speak seriously with the unions how we can address that misbalance or we are trying to find a way how we can address that issue."
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