Both Sides of The Coin: The Story of The Central Bank of Barbados 1972-2017

Chapter 5: Some Notable Developments 171 occurred when Dr. Blackman was governor and one each during the tenures of Dr. King and Mr. Springer. The wage restraint issue A public debate on wage restraint started during the 1981-82 economic downturn. Early in 1981, in response to Dr. Blackman’s advice that the country should avoid high wage settlements, a letter to the editor entitled “Some questions for Dr. Blackman” appeared in one of the daily newspapers. Among other things the writer said, “Dr. Blackman has again left himself open to charges of ‘union-bashing’ by singling out exceedingly high wage settlements as one of the principal causes of the economic problems...” At a press conference held by the Bank in mid-September 1981, the governor referred to the fact that workers in industrial economies were accepting wage cuts in order to preserve jobs. He warned of “massive lay-offs and hardships if wage increases continued to be in the region of 35 per cent”. This statement elicited sharp responses from the trade union movement. The BWU replied that “the workers must not be made scapegoats of inefficient management policies” and that “the BWU remains committed to bargaining for a decent living wage for the workers of this country. That and not the strictures of a governor of the Central Bank must inform the position to be taken by this Union in any negotiations.” The National Union of Public Workers (NUPW) said that it considered “the statement by Dr. Blackman to be just a distraction”, while the Barbados Union of Teachers described it as “... the kind of prelude to salary-revision negotiations for public workers which the public of Barbados has become accustomed to by now.” Early in the new year, the BWU in its weekly column, “The Union Speaks”, stated: “He (Dr. Blackman) has a fixed anti-trade union outlook which has been reflected in a persistent policy since he assumed the office of governor of the Central Bank.” On another occasion, in the same column, the BWU wrote, inter alia “... if there is disaster in our economy, views emanating from the Central Bank form one of the major planks of that disaster, with a point of view void of fresh ideas...”