BIU was announced yesterday by Labour and Home Affairs Minister the Hon. J.

Irving Pearman.

The two parties asked the Minister to postpone a planned hearing before the Essential Industries Disputes Settlement Board, set to get underway next Tuesday.

They felt they could reach a settlement on their own with the help of Labour Relations Officer Mr. Edwin Wilson, Mr. Pearman said.

"I feel this is a very positive step, and the basis of the voluntary system of industrial relations,'' Mr. Pearman commented.

"It is always preferable for the parties to reach an understanding together and the use of boards should only be in the last extreme.'' The two parties have been feuding over a new worker-management contract. Two days of industrial action -- which turned nasty with fights in the kitchen and workers being locked out of the hotel -- were sparked last month when the hotel resigned the Hotel Employers of Bermuda union and threw out the BIU-HEB collective bargaining agreement in favour of its own contract and wage hike.

The labour disruption was ended though when management agreed to reinstate the deduction of union dues, one of the union's main sources of contention. But BIU president Mr. Ottiwell Simmons, remaining tight-lipped on the decision to postpone the board hearing, said there were still a number of issues to be resolved.

Managing director of the Elbow Beach Development Company Mr. John Jefferis agreed with him.

He said it was a mutual decision between the two parties to try and reach a settlement on their own.