Organised labour - the risk of irrelevance

As with every other sector, our labour movement lags dramatically behind in its consideration of the pace of technological change and its dramatic impacts on the world of work. In this, our unions do not stand alone, but it is tragic that they do.

I listen carefully to their leaders and spokespersons for the slightest clues that the concepts of collective bargaining, social protections, and a durable social compact through the concept of multipartism are being critically examined in the face of the changed technological tide. I have heard nothing particularly inspiring regarding such a dynamic.

I have perhaps now overused this space to remark on the sluggish embrace of technological opportunity – from simple digitisation to digitalisation to more advanced employment of artificial intelligence to generate greater efficiencies, improve government capacity, and enhance the quality of life of all citizens.

There are people studying net impacts and there are divided juries. But this is clearly not an advancing evil to be resisted – as we are currently witnessing via appalling public service backwardness. It is not on any political platform in any meaningful way, and few are the civil society organisations realistically engaging the phenomenon.

So, this is not to continue the hammering of trade unions as is the wont of ideologues, politicians, and business leaders. The labour movement actually offers space for creative engagement of these issues, since it intrinsically and by its very nature engages elements of our society often shut out from the national discourse.

Its preoccupation with the achievement of social justice adds an important dimension in the conduct of public policy. For, whatever the challenges and opportunities of different times, the interests of people must be paramount.

Yet, have any of the activists, even as they recognise Labour Day today, looked at the impact of technology on growing informality in the labour market? The fact that, especially post-pandemic, there are growing numbers of people who are exploring options for remote work and for the independent deployment of generative AI and other new tools in enhancing output.

That, despite our own Caribbean lethargy on this question, the modern workplace in many places is being remodelled and retooled to deliver more, at a faster rate, and at lower cost. That the consequences are not all necessarily detrimental when it comes to absolute employment numbers – though there are clear shifts from the formal to the informal. One key question for labour unions is the degree to which the new reality provides safeguards against exploitation and assures a level of social protection.

In the latter regard, state programmes such as our National Insurance Scheme must adapt to be able to capture the growing numbers of “self-employed” and others that escape the net of formality, tax compliance, and the protection of their diverse service providers.

So, it should be expected that our unions would by now be actively studying the actuarial implications of an expanded safety net and the strengthening of measures to secure the interests of participants in a new economy.

All of this means that the declining number of organised workers – now at around 25% of the labour market – must begin pressing for much more from the organisations to which their dues are directed. It also means that the remaining 75% will be able to locate a centre of informed and equipped influence to advance the cause of their social participation and protection.

To whom is the informal sector turning for the assurance that they are not forgotten in the process of national planning? What are the processes to ensure that in the transition from the formal to the informal or from entry into the new, emerging economy, people are not left alone to languish in the event of failure?

There is much work to be done. Our labour unions played key roles in our early history to transform a legacy of exploitation into one in which workers participated meaningfully in national life. As a labour reporter and union member in the 1980s I also recall the transitioning to centres of learning and enlightened discourse on changing workplace circumstances.

Yes, the leaders of those times past are unlikely to survive the current period. The messaging is different. The demands have changed in ways we never imagined. The call now is not to political independence and genuine emancipation, but to master new tools to take us forward to a future in which we are in far more control of our destiny that we ever were. Anything else condemns the forces that be to irrelevance. That’s an actual risk of these times.