settlement board's award, BIU president Mr. Ottiwell Simmons insisted yesterday.

Grotto Bay has already said it will not recognise the board's decision, which came down squarely in favour of the Bermuda Industrial Union.

The Essential Industries Disputes Settlement Board ordered a return to mandatory gratuities, the old lower pay scale, and other terms and conditions of the expired hotel workers' agreement with the Hotel Employers of Bermuda.

But the legislation that created the disputes board last year left no clear way of enforcing decisions.

On Tuesday, Labour Minister the Hon. Irving Pearman said his Ministry's role in the case was finished. It was up to the parties involved, he said, whether or not the matter should be taken to court.

However, Mr. Simmons said yesterday: "The Ministry's role is not finished.

This legislation belongs to that Ministry, not to anybody else.

" ... What we are saying is this: `The hotel is legally bound and liable to abide by that award.' That's the legal position. I'm saying further that, in my opinion, it's the Department of Labour's responsibility to notify the Grotto Bay of their legal position.'' Mr. Simmons said it was his belief that Government and the hotel managers were "in cahoots.'' "They have conspired,'' he said. "They have set traps, and now they have got tangled in them.'' Mr. Simmons said the BIU hotel division executive committee, and the Grotto Bay workers who testified in the hearings, planned a meeting yesterday evening to discuss the board's award.

After that a meeting would be held with Grotto Bay workers, and then with the general membership of the BIU's hotel division.

"We have not decided to do anything further than to say the award has been handed down. We are willing to abide by it, and we are waiting for Grotto Bay to abide by it.

"And if they insist they aren't going to abide by it, in my opinion it's Government's responsibility to let them know that they must. As far as we possibly can, we the workers will be abiding by the law, as long as it is humanly and socially possible, advisable and feasible.''