Employers have rights too

Wednesday, May 3, 2006

We have commented extensively in recent days on the issue of the rollover policy and the negative impact it has on the lives of those employees subject to the rule and thus the willingness of qualified and experienced individuals to come here in the first place if they know they are going to be expelled after seven years.

We have also pointed out the detrimental effect on employers, notwithstanding those in the business community who apparently perceive such employees as property and the rollover requirement as an opportunity to trade in an old model for a new and improved version.

But there is another side to the employer/employee relationship when it comes to work permits, namely, job hopping (actual or attempted) by skilled people once they have been here a short time.

This hopping from job to job by skilled people also creates extra costs for employers, not only in dollars and cents to process them through the Immigration requirements here, but also in the time it takes to recruit such employees.

Caymanians are also affected because there is inadequate time to train Caymanians, in that qualified replacements must be found almost immediately, thereby pushing Caymanians further away from being able to learn on the job.

What is taken for granted – job hopping – within the indigenous labour pool does not work for the expatriate labour force in the Cayman Islands.

Indeed, it does not work in other countries either and the rules in this respect would appear to be much more rigorously enforced than in the Cayman Islands.  British football clubs have found to their cost that replacement work permits for foreign players transferring between clubs cannot by any means be taken for granted.

There is (or at least there should be) a tripartite agreement or contract between the employer, employee and the government that the work permit holder will continue working for the specific employer, not for the highest bidder.

Indeed, one has to question whether the employee willing to break such an agreement, whether it is a formal or informal contract, just because it suits them, regardless of the commitment they have made to their employer, is the type of person we should be encouraging to live and work here in the Cayman Islands.

Many foreign workers, some of them joining their ‘significant others’ here, in so many cases will take any job – waiting on tables, boat attendants, among others – merely to get entry as a means to stay in the Cayman Islands.  Once settled in, they then move on to take jobs and opportunities away from Caymanians.

When an employee on a work permit wants to move out of their category for which they were initially hired or, for that matter, if they want to get any other job, they should be rolled out and made to leave the Islands and start the application process all over again.

There should also be an appeal process whereby employers should be able to have a say when he/she objects to any employee job-hopping.

If the employee wishes to move because of problems in the workplace that may be relevant to the Labour Law, then there should be a hearing. An appeal process will also tell job-hoppers that they, too, are subject to scrutiny.

There are hundreds of cases where the employers’ rights are not even addressed in the current system. 
Whilst it is not fair for employees to be at the mercy of employers, it is equally unfair for employers to be at the mercy of employees.

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