Trade union strike to go ahead as talks fail

A planned island-wide strike by a collective of government, semi-government and private sector trade unions is expected to go ahead on Tuesday (Dec 15) after talks with the government failed. 

Representatives of the trade unions held a discussion with Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe and government officials today regarding theirs objection to certain proposals made in the 2016 budget. 

Speaking at a press briefing following the meeting, co-convenor of the trade union collective Saman Rathnapriya said that they did not receive an effective solution from discussions. 

He stated that especially the Prime Minister and state officials present at the discussion had no clear idea with regard to removing the proposal to cut back on pensions from 2016. 

With regard to increasing wages in the private sector, answers such as ‘we will try to’ were given by them, he said. 

Therefore the strike action will commence from 7.00am on Tuesday in the health sector and from midnight on Monday (14) in sectors such as railways, Rathnapriya said.

However, the government has two more days to retract the harmful proposals in this budget, he added.