Minister of Public Administration and Communication Maxie Cuffie yesterday confirmed that the contracts of 16 employees of the Government Information Services Ltd (GISL) which recently came to an end, were not renewed.
“The fact of the matter is that they had contracts which ended. The reason why they were not re-employed is because the jobs they had to do no longer exists. It became redundant,” Cuffie said in an interview yesterday.
The latest batch of GISL production workers and cameramen whose contracts were not renewed at the end June comprised those involved in the preparation and broadcast of daily newscasts on Channel 4.
Cuffie said the contracts expired “all around this time. Some would have expired last month; some would be this month.” For the year, Cuffie said approximately 16 GISL employees, who were not re-employed by the State, got their full entitlements.
“That is the total figure as far as I understand.”
Channel 4 was established to provide information relevant to T&T’s society and culture. GISL is the State’s primary media and information company. Cuffie said the media environment was a fluid one and was positive that some of those employees who were sent home would move on to other media houses.
“I am pretty sure some will be absorbed elsewhere.”
In thanking the employees who worked hard to develop GISL, Cuffie wished them the best. Cuffie said Channel 4 employees were hired to bring out a daily news programme. But this was not done.
Instead, Cuffie said the television station had been feeding off state-run Caribbean New Media Group (CNMG) nightly newscast through CTV and other broadcasts, rather than come up with its own news.
“The employees who were not rehired were working on producing a news programme. When I was there, Channel 4 did not produce a news programme. All it did was carry other materials such as government programmes and news programmes,” Cuffie explained.
“We also think it was not important that Channel 4, GISL and CNMG have a news programme. So CNMG (CTV) is the news outlet and they work with GISL. They (Channel 4 and CNMG) were both producing the same news programme and we felt that was a duplication. But we did not want to retrench anybody so we allowed everybody to work to the end of their contract.”
Questioned whether the Government would close the doors of Channel 4, Cuffie said all of that would be determined when the Government makes an ultimate decision on GISL and CNMG. GISL and CNMG are both heavily debt-ridden.
“Remember that the board of CNMG and GISL held a consultation and we produced a report, making four recommendations. Those recommendations were sent to the committee on state enterprises which will make a recommendation to Cabinet as to how we proceed. We will make an ultimate decision based on that.”
Cuffie was unable to say when this decision would be made, but stated that the committee has met with both companies and the matter was under active consideration.