JOINT Trade Union Movement president Ancel Roget predicts former prime minister Dr Keith Rowley may not be able to peacefully enjoy his increased pension in retirement because it came at the expense of the working class.

Speaking at May Day celebrations outside the Oilfields Workers' Trade Union's (OWTU's) Royal Road office in San Fernando, Roget said the previous PNM government adopted a "trickle-down" economic model of governance which focused on letting the rich get richer in the hopes that it would also eventually benefit the lower socioeconomic classes.

"That policy position has failed in the United Kingdom with Margaret Thatcher when she fired all the coalmine workers (and) in the USA when (president Ronald) Reagan, when he fired all the airline pilots, all because they stood in the way of letting the rich get richer and the poor will somehow benefit. That's what they practised here."