The most recent accounts filed by the Bermuda Industrial Union show wages rose by more than $200,000 for its employees.

President Derrick Burgess defended the rise and said his employees were paid "less than anywhere else".

He said staff rises were in line with those given to BIU workers elsewhere. Mr. Burgess said: "If they get three percent outside that's what we get here."

The figures, showing the year ending September 30, 1999 and filed more than a year late, reveal salaries rose from $993,298 to $1,190,397.

But Mr. Burgess said the money was split between more than 30 full time workers and around 20 or so part-time workers covering the union's HQ and commercial operations including the cinema and gas station.

The cinema converted a $27,541 profit into a $131,008 loss. Mr. Burgess said: "We are doing something to reorganise the cinema, no business can continue to lose funds. We are looking at how we manage it." And he said the accounts, which were due in June 2000 but arrived the following summer, were late because the union had changed the auditor.

He said the accounts for the year ending September 2000 and September 2001 would be ready in the next three months.

He said the union had turned a profit of $3,000 in 1996 into a profit of more than half a million in three years and had upped sickness and unemployment pay by 44 percent while keeping union dues at the same rate of $10 per worker, per week.

The figures show the union had an income of $2,754,054 and had outgoings of $2,228,311.

The latest accounts show that sickness pay to members rose, although from a very low level. In 1998 just $320 dollars was paid out but in 1999 this rose to $1,152.

Superannuation pay fell slightly from $7,145 in 1998 to $6,920 in 1999 while unemployment pay fell markedly from $23,000 to $14,948.

Mr. Burgess explained that benefits could only be paid out when there was a need so if the economy was booming help from the union would not be needed. He said the union was conscious of its social obligations and had rented out a building in Union Street to the Bermuda Housing Corporation for single women down on their luck.