Former resort workers still in limbo over severance

More than a decade after Grand Barbados Resort closed its doors, dozens of former employees say they remain trapped in “limbo” – still waiting for severance and other entitlements, still facing postponed hearings and still watching colleagues die without seeing a cent.

That frustration spilled out at Queen’s Park, The City, recently where disaffected workers of the former hotel at Aquatic Gap, Bay Street, St Michael, gathered to publicly recount what they described as a long-running failure of the system meant to protect them.

The dispute dates back to the hotel’s closure in early 2012, following extended periods of short-time work and repeated layoffs. Former employees claimed that they were kept off the job well beyond the statutory period that should have triggered severance payments, only to be intermittently recalled and sent home again.

The former workers maintained that the matter – understood to involve about 26 former employees – has moved through the Employment Rights Tribunal, but has been repeatedly deferred and delayed, leaving them without clarity or closure.

Among those speaking was Winifred Burnham, who said she devoted 41 years to the resort and was due to retire around the time it closed.

“I was supposed to retire in the same month and instead of retiring they call me back to work,” she said. 

“I went back and worked, helped clean up and prepare for when the hotel was supposed to open back.
I worked there 41 years and I haven’t got a cent yet. From then till now, nothing. 

“This is hard times. About three or four of the workers dead and gone already. We worked real hard – holidays and all them times – and right now we would really like to get we money,” Burnham complained.

Former porter Cecil Francis, who put in more than 40 years, said many workers were pushed into early retirement, leaving them on reduced pensions.

“I sitting here in 2026 and we still waiting. They tell us there was supposed to be a hearing in December, and up to now nothing happen.

Still waiting like everybody else.

“We had to take early pension, so we still short. We still at the bottom of the scale right now,” Francis said.

Rodney Waithe, a former banquet porter with 19 years’ service, said the financial pain began long before the final closure.

“There was a time I was laid off for 12 whole weeks straight. My water and my lights would turn off. I had to eat rice and sardines on Saturdays and Sundays. It was unfair,” he said.  

Former pastry chef Victor Ford, who worked 21 years at Grand Barbados, charged that staff were laid off beyond the legal threshold without compensation.

“After you work a certain amount of time and you go over the weeks, you supposed to be compensated,” he said. “That didn’t happen. We were told lawyers say they didn’t have to pay us, and now we here 14 years later still waiting.” 

Several workers said the repeated postponements at the tribunal had been the most demoralising.

“We just in limbo,” one said.

“Every time we think something will come, they . . . put it back.” 

The former employees said gathering at Queen’s Park and speaking publicly again was a last resort after years of waiting.

“We feel putting it in the public is the only way we might get help,” one said. “If we don’t talk, nothing happen.” 

The MIDWEEK NATION tried to get an update on the workers’ case from the Barbados Workers’ Union, but up to press time deputy general secretary Dwaine Paul could not be reached. (CLM)

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