dispute with the company over wages.

The 242 members of the telephone division of the Bermuda Industrial Union should receive wage increases of 3.6 percent in each year of a contract covering 1994 and 1995, the tribunal ruled yesterday.

The tribunal -- made up of Canon Rev. James Francis, Senate President the Hon.

Albert Jackson, and Mr. William Hobgood -- accepted the final offer of the BIU. It rejected the final offer from the Bermuda Telephone Co. Ltd. of wage increases of three percent for each of the two years.

"This matter will be put before the general membership of the telephone division at a meeting on Monday at 5.15 p.m.,'' BIU president Mr. Ottiwell Simmons MP told The Royal Gazette .

Telco lawyer Mr. Mark Diel said his client was "obviously disappointed'' at the award. "We anticipate being able to make a full and proper statement on Monday,'' he said.

The tribunal was appointed by Labour and Home Affairs Minister the Hon. Irving Pearman on September 2. Originally, the tribunal was to resolve a dispute between Telco and the BIU involving wages, redundancy, and hours of work.

But the latter two issues were resolved at a closed-door hearing that ran from Tuesday to Thursday, leaving only wages for the arbitration tribunal to settle.

"Final offer arbitration requires the tribunal to select one of the party's final offers and prohibits the tribunal from fashioning an award other than one advanced by one of the parties,'' the Labour Ministry said in a news release.

The tribunal gave five reasons for choosing the BIU's final wage offer over Telco's.

With the Consumer Price Index at about 2.3 percent, the settlement was 1.3 percentage points above the CPI "and thus not out of line with the pattern of the previous four years'', it said.

The Telco workers received pay hikes of 4.9 percent in each of 1992 and 1993, 7.5 percent in 1991, and eight percent in 1990.

Productivity, measured in terms of the number of lines installed the last two years, "increased dramatically'' to 2,282 from 797, the tribunal noted.