A leaderless crowd of trade unionists march through Hamilton. The Premier of the Country claims not to have known that people are frustrated until they confront her on the steps of the House of Assembly. Thousands of people are inconvenienced throughout the day.

Yesterday's march around Hamilton by members of the Bermuda Industrial Union puts the lie to the idea that a labour party government will automatically bring better labour relations.

Instead, Bermuda has a labour bargaining system that no longer seems to work.

And what system there is seems to be leaderless and rudderless.

Yesterday's march and the meetings that have preceded it show that workers are increasingly angry and frustrated, although they do not seem to be able to focus on a single point of contention or a single resolution to the problems.

Nor do they have a leader who is capable of enunciating the concerns, since the Bermuda Industrial Union's president, Derrick Burgess, abrogated his responsibilities and could not say what his members were protesting about or how they wanted the issues resolved.

What is clear is that employees in a wide range of industries and trades are clearly angry about a wide range of issues, some relatively serious and others relatively frivolous.

As a show of strength and a way of bringing attention to the issues, it must have had some effect.

But there must be concern about a work stoppage taking place without notice, inconveniencing thousands of people, over disputes that should by rights be settled via mediation or arbitration.

It should be noted that some of these disputes have been simmering for some time. Government mediators need to anticipate problems before they occur rather than react to them when they explode.

Yesterday, the Premier claimed to be unaware that union members were so unhappy and said they should have visited her at the Cabinet Office, where she says she has an open door policy, before marching.

It is hard to believe that the Premier has missed the innumerable news stories about disputes at CableVision, BTC and elsewhere, and as for her open door policy, the media has found it to be rarely so.

The worker's leadership claimed to have sent several letters to the Home Affairs ministry outlining their concerns and had received no response.

This is not the first time that there have been outstanding grievances between the union and employers. Government's job is to get the sides together.

Under the labour legislation enacted in the last 30 years, there is no reason in any of these cases for workers to strike, yet that is what occurred yesterday.

Mr. Burgess knows this, and it may be that that knowledge, combined with his membership in the Government against whom the workers were marching, made him decide to abrogate his responsibilities.

Mr. Burgess needs to reassert his leadership and bring his members back to the bargaining table.

Government needs to bring all sides together to settle these matters and needs to do so as quickly as possible.