Bermuda Industrial Union president Derrick Burgess has revealed that his union is involved in 20 to 30 grievance cases at troubled Bermuda Telephone Company.

The Permanent Arbitration Tribunal last week announced the results of four cases.

The independent body had been forced to step in after the BIU could not reach a settlement with BTC's management.

It found complaints against the phone giant were unfounded in two cases, but in one case BTC had been heavy handed in reprimanding a worker.

And BTC were forced to offer one worker a supervisor's post and restore his pay to that level after they had demoted him when one department was abolished.

Mr. Burgess explained that the employee had his wages reduced and had not been offered one of around eight supervisors positions when they had come following a mass round of voluntary redundancies in August.

The BIU president said there was a problem with management in the company which has also been beset by complaints about slow response times to line repairs.

He said: "There are some problems with one particular manager.

"When more than two people are complaining somebody should say `What's going on?' Nobody there is asking any questions so the problems will continue.

"Those in charge are not doing anything about it. We are trying to do something before it gets to boiling point. Hopefully nobody will boil over.

"We try to deal with grievance claims under the collective bargaining agreement.

"If that fails, they go the Government's Labour Relations Officer and they report it to the Minister who may then send it to arbitration. Even one case going to arbitration is one too many.

"It's pretty sad that it has to go to a third party, but management aren't helping out.'' A BTC spokeswoman said the complaints were being looked at and some had gone to arbitration. But she declined to comment further.