In the wake of job losses at the Fairmont Hamilton Princess, Labour and Home Affairs Minister Michael Fahy has vowed to speak with ministerial colleagues with a view to tying employment requirements to hotel concessions.

He is disappointed at how the redundancies have been handled by the hotel with an apparent “lack of collaboration” between it, the Bermuda Industrial Union (BIU) and his Ministry.

Ten hotel employees, including bar porters and in-room dining captains, lost their jobs last Friday.

Senator Fahy said he was “incredibly disappointed” by Fairmont’s decision. He also said the public’s perception of the Hotel Concessions Act in the wake of the job cuts must be addressed.

“It’s something that needs to be considered in regards to what we’ve just seen,” he said.

“I have raised the issue and have undertaken to speak with the relevant Ministers in regards to the concessions issues and tying it to employment. I think that’s fair.”

Sen Fahy feels that in the spirit of the Concessions Act there should “at the very least” have been consultation before layoffs.

“I was incredibly disappointed when I heard the news and I made representations to the manager of the hotel that this was something that we were not happy with,” he said.

“It does not appear that there was collaboration with either the union and certainly not any real notice to the Ministry as to what was coming.”

He shared with the Bermuda Hotel Association and the BIU his, and Government’s, disappointment at the job losses and the manner they were made.

However, the Minister said it was important to keep in mind long-term objectives through the hotel’s current redevelopment.

“With a marina opening up there’ll be jobs attached to that. If they open up a new restaurant there’ll be jobs attached to that, if they’re doing further construction work there are jobs attached to that.”

He added: “That doesn’t take away from the fact that some people were made redundant and what I’m mostly concerned about on that is the lack of collaboration and perhaps opportunities to find these people other opportunities to work.

“The bargaining agreement that’s in place in the hotels is clear that you either have redundancies or you can find employment for someone somewhere else.

“The spirit of these agreements however, is that there should be collaboration between the parties before these decisions are made. From what I can tell it didn’t appear to have happened.”

Looking ahead, he said: “We also have to look at what will the Fairmont do going forward because I don’t want to say that they’re a bad hotel, because they’re not. They are going to be creating opportunities for Bermudians in the construction that they’re doing.

“The big picture is that there will be development and more opportunity. That doesn’t take away from those who have lost their jobs because I sympathise greatly on that.”

Sen Fahy said that should it be necessary it would be within his remit under the Labour Relations Act to submit any dispute between the hotel and the union to arbitration.

“We sympathise and empathise, I don’t want to see people unemployed. I don’t like to see people coming in and saying ‘I can’t feed my family’, that’s terrible. But I can’t fix everything overnight,” he said.

“What I can do is set the stage for future employment because things took time to get to where we are at the bottom.”

He admitted that seeing young men being made redundant “paints a grim picture”, but added: “I see there’s light at the end of the tunnel — I see hope.

“I push my team incredibly hard to see results. I want to see people employed.

“We have new business development initiatives coming out from the Bermuda Economic Development Corporation which will be released soon.

“There’s a lot more initiatives going on than perhaps what meets the eye. And perhaps we need to do better press to get it out there,” he said.

“What we have to do is we have to demonstrate to everyone in Bermuda that every programme we have has an end goal and how they’re tied together. We can do better on that.”