This Must End

The impasse between the Government of St. Maarten and the ambulance and fire departments has dragged on for nearly a year, without resolution. That is serious in any season, in high season it becomes a liability. Cooperation and understanding with the union is of course vital, but ultimately the onus sits with government, if only because the personnel has been waiting years. Residents and visitors must have reliable emergency response, full stop. Negotiations can continue, but a way must be found to restore normal operations now. Something has to give.

There is another side to the story, one that is harder to talk about because it lives in the people who carry these services. Firefighters and ambulance personnel are trained to run toward need, not away from it. They know callers by the sound of fear on a phone line, they know what minutes mean when a heart is failing, when smoke is rising, when a child has fallen. This is a small community. They know people personally, family, friends, pastors. They do not wake up every day to make a point, they wake up to keep someone alive.

Yet they have rights, and limits, and bodies that can only do so much. If their pay systems are unclear, if staffing is thin, if equipment lags, if promises pile up without action, they cannot function. If they cannot function, they are no good to anyone. That is the knot, and it explains why they must feel torn even as they tighten their stance. This cannot be easy for them.

Most of these workers still answered calls through months of a go slow, they kept duty and expectation in view while pressing for change. On Thursday the ambulance personnel heightened their go slow, the fire personnel stand in solidarity.

Government, despite its negotiating positions in the matter, has a responsibility to prove that it hears both the risk to the island and the reality of the people who carry that risk on their backs. Together with the union representation of the fire and ambulance personnel, fair solutions must be found, even if it is done in stages, with the first stage being an agreement on the issues that, if solved, would return the departments to normal operational levels. But getting up from around the table with no solution or forward progress at all, is irresponsible.  

We cannot walk into high season, when residents and visitors are at the peak of their activities, with uncertainty. St. Maarten depends on these services for safety and for confidence, and confidence is part of the product we sell. Visitors expect it, families require it, and workers deserve it.

This must end.

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