THIS DAY IN OUR PAST

The following events took place on May 13 in the years identified:

1957:Government

Printing Office workers go on strike for the second time this week. The workers call the strike without the consent of their union, the National Workers Union (NWU), claiming they are dissatisfied with their “small wages and unfulfilled promises regarding pay increases”. NWU officers, Thossy Kelly, V. Bancroft Edwards, and the union delegates hold discussions with Ministry of Labour officials as well as with a representative of the Establishments Branch of the Government Service. Afterwards Kelly addresses the workers on the Printing Office premises. The strike is continuing. A spokesman for the strikers declare that they will remain on strike “until we hear something definite about our pay increases and improved working conditions.” 1989:effort The Government’s

to introduce compulsory primary school education in some parishes has, to date, met with limited success. The failure is attributed to the inability of the Government to put in place the necessary support structure; the school uniform and school lunch programme, for example. The lack of effective monitoring of the system by liaison officers is also cited. “You can’t compel students to go to school without clothes and food to eat. The uniform programme has not been in existence for three or four years. Uniforms were stopped even before Minister of Education Mavis Gilmour left office,” Pat Robinson of the Jamaica Teachers’ Association tells The Gleaner. The programme started with two parishes, Trelawny and St Thomas in 1982, and was expanded to six others in 1984, Manchester, Clarendon, St Elizabeth, Westmoreland, Hanover and St James. The major aim was to achieve full attendance in the schools in the programme; that is, attendance should equal enrolment.

–The Gleaner Archives

Today’s Gem

“Impossible is a word to be found only in the dictionary of fools.” – Napoleon Bonaparte