BWU’s Labour College renamed for Sir Frank Walcott
Pauline Lady Walcott adoringly touches the wooden sculpture of her late husband Sir Frank Walcott while Prime Minister the Rt Hon Freundel Stuart looks on.
By:
Janelle Husbands
THE name of National Hero the late Right Excellent Sir Frank Leslie Walcott has once again been immortalised in Barbados.
Yesterday, the Barbados Workers’ Union Labour College in Mangrove, St. Philip, which was opened in 1974, was renamed the Frank Walcott Labour College during a ceremony that honoured Sir Frank’s contribution to trade unionism, labour education and social development in Barbados.
The ceremony focused on the life and principles of Sir Frank and brought together past and present members of the trade union movement in Barbados. It was held under the patronage of Prime Minister the Rt Hon Freundel Stuart and Sir Frank’s widow Pauline Lady Walcott.
Prime Minister Stuart, while delivering the featured addressed, acknowledged the significance of the renaming, which comes during the 75th anniversary of the BWU, in a year that Sir Frank would’ve been celebrating his 100th birthday and also the 50th anniversary of Barbados’ independence.
The Prime Minister told those in attendance that the country could not have gotten through the last 75 years “had it not been for the solid, informed, wise and substantial contribution of the labour movement in general, but the BWU in particular”.
“Anybody who tries to divorce current day Barbados, whether your social, economic or political achievements, from the contribution of the labour movement and the BWU, is being unfaithful to the facts and being traitors of history,” he stated.
The Prime Minister noted that this was done within the context of a volunteeristic approach to industrial relations, and lauded the maturity of Frank Walcott at that time as well his successor Sir Roy Trotman.
“We have been able to steer clear of legislating industrial relations in Barbados to the point where we deposit the interest of workers in the laps of people who may not always understand what is required for the fulfilment of the workers aspirations.”
He stressed that in the past the leadership of the BWU looked back at their predecessors and distilled from the examples set. “We have to look back. And I say this with all conviction I can muster, and determine what we regard as a beginning and determine if we want to be a continuation of that beginning.”
He noted that Sir Frank had a number of “Everests” to climb including, according to George Lamming, the shift from the planter class whose power was derived from what they owned, to the power of the new black class which derived power from what they know.
“Nowadays if somebody goes to a post-secondary or even a secondary one and they can brandish two pieces of paper in your face. You have a big problem on your hands. Their attitudes are not significantly different from how those planter class behaved.
“Lamming went on to say that the biggest task facing organised labour, and Frank Walcott understood this very well, was how to explode the mystique of educated people while at the same time retaining a creative respect for learning.”
Prime Minister Stuart said Sir Frank practised a level of trade unionism that did not limit itself to working conditions or levels of remuneration, but a global perspective on the role of organised labour in the liberation of humanity. “At the global level he made his voice heard … He had catalytic intellectual tastes.”
The Prime Minister told those gathered that as a politician he always stated that the rich persons in society do not need his advocacy.
“They have got rich and done well without any assistance from me. My role in politics, and this is the remit of the trade union movement, the role is not to confirm the mighty in their seats, but to exalt the humble and meek.”
Prime Minister Stuart added that he looks forward to the continuation of a constructive and creative relationship with the trade union movement. (JH)
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