Chamber of Commerce asks for relief from vacations
According to a statement released by the Chamber council Thursday, the organisation is pleased that the government has announced a public referendum on the ‘one man, one vote’ issue. However, it questions whether the 18 July referendum date needs to be made into another day off.
“[This comes] at a time when our Islands are struggling to maintain economic stability,” read the Chamber council statement. “The additional day of ‘no business’ for our local employers, in addition to the 12 days already gazetted as public holidays this year, causes further economic hardship.”
Cayman is already hosting an additional public holiday on 4 June for the celebration of Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II who marks her 60th year on the throne of England this year.
Those two public holidays, combined with Discovery Day on 21 May, the Queen’s birthday observance on 18 June and Constitution Day on 2 July will give Cayman five public holidays within the next two months.
With regard to the referendum on 18 July specifically, the Chamber noted that the particular date did not require a holiday, in its view.
“The objective of allowing everyone to vote could have been accomplished through other legislative means, such as mandating an hour break for the purpose of voting, extending voting hours earlier and later to allow shift workers to vote before or after work,” the statement read.
“The majority of workers for the referendum come from the ranks of the civil service. Consideration could have been given to treating the day as a ‘government holiday’ only to manage the logistics of the referendum.”
The Chamber council noted that there are additional costs associated with a public holiday, including extra pay for workers who attend their jobs during holidays.
“To treat the day as a general public holiday adds little value to the actual task of voting,” the Chamber statement noted. “The Chamber hopes that in the future Government partner with the private sector to help ensure that future referendums are structured in such a way so as to minimize the disruption to business while also allowing all eligible voters to participate freely.”
The Compass sought out the views of the Cayman Islands Small Business Association on the issue.
“The general consensus from the CISBA Board is that, while it certainly doesn’t help business, the issue is of great national importance and having a holiday will be the only sure way for every person to have the opportunity to vote. Being small business owners, we are certain many of our members will still work despite the holiday since many are small family owned businesses with few employees.”
Premier McKeeva Bush initially announced that there would be no public holiday for the 18 July vote, but then changed that position citing logistical issues that would arise with the referendum.
“In order to have sufficient personnel to work in the polling process, people will have to be off from work,” Mr. Bush said earlier this month.
The Royal Cayman Islands Police Service will use special constables – unpaid volunteer officers – to secure polling sites. Both public and private sector workers are being recruited as election officers and overseers, Mr. Bush said.
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No worries, soon demographic changes will be a greater influence:
http://www.thestar.com/news/article/1180196–york-region-grants-mall-a-holiday-exemption?bn=1
And now wea re going to have another one for the vote which could have been done without a public holiday. And you wonder about our economy. Homer Simpson wouldnt have called this holiday.
As a small business owner, all I can say is that they are doing everything in order to kill us and the economy. No where else in the world offers as many bank holidays as this tiny island with costs skyrocketing daily! Thanks for making our lives harder.
12 Holidays in a year is not excessive, but it would be nice to have them spread out more evenly so as to not have such a long dry spell between July and November.
Sorry Mr. Disappointed, but as a former employee/slave in the scuba industry I just have to disagree.
The official work week is what? 44 hours per week? In reality it’s a 6 day work week and in the scuba jobs it comes out closer to 54 hours per week, depending on night dives and such. There is no overtime pay and you don’t dare complain, or you’re gone.
It’s not a wonder Caymanians don’t want those jobs.
I recall one year I was on the island for Christmas, taking advantage of a condo with no tenant. Christmas happened to fall on a Monday that year and I was invited to a small beach party/BBQ with friends. One of the comments going around was, It’s sure nice to be off work for 2 days in a row.
The other comment was, Yeah, it’s sort of like being normal again.
(And dear Mr. Editor, I sure wish we could use quotation marks in this forum…)
@ Worldview…Being an ex-Torontonian, I am not surprised by the article. Toronto will do anything, and I mean ANYTHING in order to appease the Chinese community that lives in that city…and guess what? They OWN Markham (which is York Region)…why do you think Toronto has 11 Chinatowns? Yeah, exempt, exempt, exempt…I forgot where I used to live…
Far too may public holidays, indeed. Time to put small boys up the chimneys again, and stop public education at 12 years of age.(not really, in case someone misses my sarcasm).
In my experience, public holidays never hindered any person actually willing to work and recognising that this is how you get ahead in life…not by counting your holidays.
I agree with the comments made by the Chamber of Commerce. As owners of a small business ourselves, my husband and I find that all the holiday pay is very hard on a fairly small budget. There are just too many holidays per year, perhaps the employees won’t agree, as they are paid, but what if their jobs don’t last because the employers business’ fails due to all the holiday pay they have to pay out. I think we should have just a few mandatory holidays a year, but the Government and banks can have as many holidays as they deem patriotic, so long as the small businesses don’t have to pay double time for more than maybe six or less, holidays per year. The Heroes Day holiday should have never been established; if the Government wants to acknowledge our heroes, combine that day with one of our other holidays such as Discovery Day, or put it in one of the months that don’t have holidays already, and make that one a Government and bank holiday only. Why couldn’t the Queen’s 60th anniversary of her ascension to the throne be combined with her Birthday holiday? I agree the only group of people who would need to be affected by Referendum Day would be the Government workers, so let it be a Government holiday only, the rest of the working voters should be allowed time to vote – as far as I know it is in the law.
I read the blog/comment made by the former diver, who seems to think the only time most divers get a break is when there is a public holiday, but I would urge them to read the Labour Law and they will see their entitlements. If they work over 45 hours then they need to demand the overtime pay if their employers need more employees to meet their business demands, then they need to hire more staff, don’t overwork the good employees that they do have, or they may quit.