Minister of Labour Shane Gibson indicated yesterday that there could be a few changes to the Employment and Industrial Relations Acts as early as next week.

Mr. Gibson made the revelation in the House of Assembly, when he revealed a meeting was held among Chamber of Commerce executives and the members of the National Congress of Trade Union, and the Trade Union of Congress heads.

According to Minister Gibson, the Chamber of Commerce and both unions asked for additional time for the government to have a more thorough revision of the amendments.

“The intention is to come back next week to complete the debate and the passage of that legislation, we just want to look and have full consultation again.

“Even though they looked at them at the Tripartite Council, we want to give them an additional opportunity to have their concerns addressed,” Mr. Gibson said.

Mr. Gibson said they had a complete overview of the bills in their discussion yesterday.

“We discussed them in detail yesterday, so once we have them in writing today or tomorrow the latest we will go through them again and we will be back early next week for the passage of those legislations,” Mr. Gibson said.

Both bills were indicated to serve a benefit to employees.

The Industrial Relations Amendment Bill is said to legislate employers having a time frame of 45 days to meet with trade union officials after receiving an industrial agreement proposal.

The Employment Amendment Bill would provide the option of employees having a new contract with a new employer while in lieu of redundancy pay.

While Minister Gibson acknowledged the purpose of the bills served that of the employees, Chairman of the Chamber of Commerce Edison Sumner expressed the bills are not congruent to the benefit of business owners as he noted that businesses are still in a “strained” economy.