12142018 BUSINESS

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business@tribunemedia.net

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 14, 2018

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DARRIN WOODS

Union withdraws Atlantis strike vote NOW TARGETING SECTOR WIDE INDUSTRIAL DEAL By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net THE hotel union’s threatened Atlantis strike vote has been withdrawn, its president confirmed yesterday, adding that he was now focusing on securing a new industry-wide industrial deal. Darrin Woods, the Bahamas Hotel, Catering and Allied Workers (BHCAWU) union’s leader, told Tribune Business that securing a new agreement with members of the Bahamas Hotel and Restaurant Employers Association (BHREA) would ease “a lot of the challenges we are facing now”. He added that “life would be much easier” for the union’s 4,0005,000 members with a recognised industrial agreement, as its terms will be incorporated into their individual employment contracts, and Mr Woods

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By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

THE Grand Lucayan’s managerial union has been accused of “feasting on an economic tragedy” by demanding an extra $650,000 payout after the hotel had already upped its offer by $500,000. Michael Scott, the Government-owned property’s chairman, warned Bahamas Hotel Managerial Association (BHMA) president, Obie Ferguson, in a December 6 e-mail that the union’s position was “straining the board’s goodwill to the point of exhaustion” because it was failing to grasp the resort’s limited financial realities as a government-owned hotel. He argued that the association was “feigning reasonableness” by suggesting it had reduced its voluntary separation (VSEP) payout demands by $1m when its opening $5.4m offer was “absurd from inception”. The e-mail, which has been obtained by Tribune Business, exposes the gulf between the two parties over the VSEPs total worth and conditions, with Mr Scott describing Mr

By NATARIO MCKENZIE

Tribune Business Reporter

nmckenzie@tribunemedia.net

NASSAU cruise port. a local merchant bank on a bid to take over Prince George Wharf’s management, were not necessarily interested in running the port’s operations. He added that their main interest was in ensuring essential infrastructural

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Minister: Come see me when you have a deal By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net A CABINET Minister yesterday told Tribune Business he had informed investors pitching a $500m Long Island project to “come back and see me when you have a Heads of Agreement”. Desmond Bannister, minister of works, told Tribune Business he knew nothing about efforts to revive the Port St George development, which has been stalled for almost a decade, and did not discuss with

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Lucayan union ‘feasts on economic tragedy’

Cruise lines’ port bid: ‘This is what we do’ ROYAL Caribbean’s top executive yesterday said the cruise lines’ expertise and understanding of their industry meant they were ideal candidates to oversee Nassau’s port transformation. Michael Bayley, the company’s president and chief executive, speaking after its job fair at the National Training Agency (NTA), said the cruise line group that has partnered with Bahamian investors and

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the investors/developers whether they had started the process of applying for the necessary investment and planning approvals. He confirmed that he met with senior executives from Star Resort Group, the US-based developer, marketer and vendor of resort-based real estate that is leading the project, but said it was more a “courtesy call” that was also attended by Long Island MP, Adrian Gibson. “I don’t know anything about the development,”

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By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

the stretched financial circumstances of the board, has strained the goodwill and patience of the board to the point of exhaustion.” Suggesting that the managerial union was not being as generous as it suggested in reducing its collective payout demand by $1m, Mr Scott added: “The board’s initial proposal, $2.7m, was carefully and scientifically calibrated using the termination provisions in the Employment Act as a barometer or guide, because the V in

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THE GROUNDS AT THE GRAND LUCAYAN

MICHAEL SCOTT, left, argues that the Bahamas Hotel Managerial Association’s position, led by Obie Ferguson, right, is “straining the [Grand Lucayan] board’s goodwill to the point of exhaustion”. In an exchange revealing he was rapidly running out of patience with Mr Ferguson, the Trades Union Congress (TUC) leader who is negotiating on the BHMA’s behalf, Mr Scott wrote: “I am normally disinclined to be shrill and tart in professional exchanges with colleagues, but if you detect a tone of frustration in my manner at your apparent inability to grasp certain fundamental and inevitable truths, you would be spot on and accurate. “Your continuing refuge in this air of unreality and illogical posturing, despite

GB resort loses out on under-insurance A GRAND Bahama resort has lost out in its dispute over a Hurricane Matthew insurance claim because it failed to realise what would happen if the property was under-insured. The Court of Appeal, in upholding a verdict by Justice Indra Charles, found that Summit Insurance Company and its co-underwriter, Heritage Insurance Company, had complied with the Insurance Act’s section 214 by informing Taino Beach Resort in writing about the effects of the “conditional average clause” in its catastrophic coverage policy. This clause is triggered when a claim is made and, at the time loss/damage is incurred, a property’s value - be it residential or commercial - is greater than the sum insured under the insurance policy. This means, for example, that if a $200,000 house burns down but is only insured for $100,000, the latter figure is what the homeowner will receive from the insurer. In Taino Beach’s case, given that it is a resort, it may have been faced with covering multi-million dollar or six-figure damages from its own pockets, as Bahamas-based Summit and Heritage will not have paid out the full value of its claim due to the under-insurance.

* Hotel chair rails at extra $650k demand * Just after he got further $500k from Cabinet * Union ‘feigns reasonableness’ with $1m reduction

Ferguson’s argument for the packages to be based on similar payouts at Bahamas Power & Light (BPL) and the Bahamas Telecommunications Company (BTC) as akin to “comparing apples and oranges”. The Grand Lucayan chairman also added that the annuity retirement fund was a liability owed by the resort’s previous owner, Hutchison Whampoa, not the Government, but pledged to “stand shoulder to shoulder” with the union should it elect to pursue the Hong Kong-based conglomerate.

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