BTL Faces $15M Hit After CCJ Severance Ruling

Here’s something you might have missed from BTL’s press conference on Friday, a big revelation about what it will cost to settle with former employees who sued for severance pay. Chairman Markhelm Lizarraga says the landmark Caribbean Court of Justice ruling, which changes how severance is handled in Belize, will hit the company hard, somewhere between eleven and fifteen million dollars. After years of legal battles, the CCJ ruled that pension benefits don’t replace an employee’s right to severance, meaning BTL must now pay hundreds of former workers. One of them, Bernard Pitts Jr., says this fight was never just about money, it was about fixing a long-standing misinterpretation of the law. Meanwhile, Lizarraga confirms the company is complying with the judgment, despite the unexpected multi-million-dollar blow.

 

Bernard Pitts Jr., Former BTL Employee

“We have initiated action through our attorneys, and that’s Courtenay and Coye, and so far it has yielded positive results. The issue is that for years, while being at BTL the issue was about severance, and BTL was of the opinion that because there’s a pension scheme in place, they don’t need to pay severance. And the interpretation of the law was not correct on BTL’s part. And so they made it very clear and I would quote by Justice Jamara, ‘It’s a social legislation,’ and therefore you cannot say that pension and severance are the same. Also, if you did not account for paying it when those persons left, then you cannot say that you have paid it. And so the issue really stem from when the CBA was amended to have that the severance is subsumed by the pension. That is not correct. And that was one of the things we were fighting for. It’s very necessary that the workers of Belize, not just those of BTL, understand where their rights are. And you cannot sleep on your rights because imagine you’re working for 30, 35 years at a company like BTL, the amount of severance that you would’ve foregone sleeping on your rights. I mean, it’s a pretty penny.”

 

Mark Lizarraga, Chairman, BTL

“We’ve had to make an adjustment for what you call it, yeah an unforeseen event, which is a, somewhere between eleven and fifteen million dollars hit this year as a consequence of the CCJ’s ruling, which we will honor. We are honoring and we are honoring – we’ve already started this for the two hundred plus. Sorry, for the two hundred plus people seeking it. Yes. For those that we have been informed are legally qualified to receive it, we will be dispersing, we’re going to be following the law.”