The Bermuda Industrial Union and Stevedoring Services exchanged a public war of words yesterday after the company was accused of failing to abide by an arbitration award in a Royal Gazette advert.

Late last year the two sides hammered out a settlement over a number of issues including pay but the union has accused the company of not honouring a promise to advertise jobs to workers before advertising a managerial post outside the company.

The company claimed that the agreed form of wording on the issue, which had been chosen by the union, had been ambiguous and that the union had then referred the matter back to arbitration.

A company spokesman said: "Management feels it is abided by the strict wording of the award.

"The union now realises that the wording proposed by them is open to interpretation and does not necessarily mean what they thought it did, hence this being referred back to the panel by the union."

He said both sides had referred certain matters to the arbitration panel for clarification but the union seemed to be getting frustrated about the slow progress, even though the union had been given a 3.5 percent pay award when three percent was the norm.

The spokesman said: "Stevedoring Services has no control over the timing of the clarification in this case and neither does the union. It is entirely in the hands of the Labour Relations Officer and subject to the availability of the panel."

BIU president Derrick Burgess said: "They appointed someone who didn't have the experience but they have people more senior and experienced already there. I don't know why they are continuing to be difficult.

"There was nothing ambiguous about it. They are trying to circumvent it.

"They know they must advertise internally first to give employees the opportunity to apply for it, there are people there qualified for that managerial post."

Stevedoring Services chided the BIU for publishing their concerns.

The spokesman said: "When a matter in dispute is referred to an Arbitration Tribunal both parties normally do not comment to the press.

"However considering the inaccurate statements made about the management of Stevedoring Services, the company is left with no other recourse but to put the facts of the matter in an accurate perspective."