Responding to requests from the participants in these courses for even more opportunities for training and education in labour relations, and in an endeavour to put the training arrangements on a firmer footing, the Government of Trinidad and Tobago in 1961 turned its attention to the setting up of a Labour Education Centre. In that year, it appointed a committee to consider the establishment of such a Centre which, it was envisaged, would replace the ad hoc training with regularly scheduled intensive courses within wider programmes of study. The committee did in fact recommend the establishment of a Trade Union Centre and it was proposed that the Centre should be under the administrative umbrella of the University of the West Indies.

During the Prime Minister’s conference with the Trade Union Movement in early 1963 there was further discussion between the Prime Minister, Dr Eric Williams, and representatives of the Trade Union Movement about a Trade Union Centre. The conference adopted a resolution of one of its committees that a Labour College should be established to provide trade union training and worker education, to conduct seminars and courses and other activities in the field of Industrial Relations and to undertake research into problems of Labour. The conference also adopted the recommendation that the College should be named “the Cipriani Labour College” and that one of its Halls should be named after Mr Quintin O’Connor (1908- 1958), a trade unionist who holds a place of honour in the trade union history of Trinidad and Tobago.

Following this conference, many details had to be worked out and steps had to be taken to obtain technical assistance from the International Labour Organisation. The ILO agreed to make available an expert in the field to assist with the establishment of the College. It took some time to find a suitably qualified person to serve for the required period of time.