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The National Trade Union Centre (NATUC) has issued a rebuke to former finance minister Brian Manning, after he publicly suggested that the President of the Public Services Association (PSA) should resign if public officers do not receive a 10 per cent wage increase by Christmas.

In its media release on Tuesday, NATUC described Manning’s comments as “misplaced, inappropriate, and disrespectful,” arguing that trade union leaders should not be blamed for nearly a decade of stalled wage negotiations.

According to NATUC, public officers, government daily-rated workers, dockworkers, and employees of state enterprises have endured frozen wages and rising living costs for close to ten years, not because of any failure of union leadership, but due to “deliberate postponement of negotiations under the PNM-led Rowley administration.”