Nov 14 Day One (half day) of Bargaining

Proposals were exchanged. We submitted a full package of proposals with monetary propositions. Queen’s proposal was absent of monetary offers and will be exchanged at a later date.

  • Queen’s denies a common table for all common issues presented by the CUPE locals
  • Queen’s perceives common table not productive and can lead to differences among locals
  • Queen’s asked for the committee to be transparent at the table but confidential with the members outside of the bargaining table
  • Transparency leads to conflicts in membership

 

Conciliation

Your bargaining committee has filed for conciliation. That means it has requested that the Ontario Ministry of Labour appoint a conciliation officer who will try to help the union, and the employer resolve their differences so they can reach a new collective agreement. Your leaders made this decision now, at this early stage of bargaining, because your agreement expired in April (June) and your leaders want your issues addressed as quickly as possible.

 

Estoppel notice

We outlined that our Position Evaluation Timelines as per Article 26.02 are not being met and an Estoppel notice (Deemed breach of Contract) has been given to Queen’s.

 

 No concessions policy

Be aware that CUPE has a policy of not agreeing to concessions in bargaining. The full resources of the national union will be mobilized to prevent concessions from being agreed to by a Local Union.

 

Priority issues

Wages

Real economic hardship due to years of declining purchasing power – most members have more than 10% lower real income than ten years ago: check our CUPE’s inflation calculator.

Animal Care Helpers made $44,695 in June 2014: today’s $51,455 annual wage is 10.13% lower in real dollars once you factor in inflation.

Computer Engineering Technologists made $65,096 in June 2014: today’s $73,516 annual wage is 12.27% lower in real dollars.

It’s no wonder, then, that this Local’s Member Survey revealed real economic hardship among members.

Out of 83 members who completed our survey:

74.7% have had to stop putting money aside from savings or have had to drain savings to make ends meet.

49.4% have struggled to pay monthly bills(rent/mortgage, heat, hydro)

36.1% report suffering from poor health, including mental health

31.3% have had to cut back on food or visit a food bank

28.9% had to take on extra job (or jobs)

25.3% have been late paying bills

Queen’s is not living up to its own stated SDG goals of helping reduce poverty.

Bill 124

Legislation which limited CA increases to 1%/year in last contract has since been declared unconstitutional, but Queen’s refused to re-adjust wages; despite being applied to the highest years of inflation we’ve seen in decades.

We want compensation now.

CUPE is part of a lawsuit with other unions demanding compensation: still in the courts you will see a proposal in our package demanding compensation for those three years of illegally constrained increases.

Job Evaluation

This bargaining unit is very unique and has a unique job evaluation system that has run into difficulties in the last term of their collective agreement.

The union has been in discussions with management about potentially using a different job evaluation tool to streamline and simplify the process.

We want to continue those discussions, but we also want to address some of the reasons we believe the current system has broken down. You will see several proposals aimed at giving the union more of a say in the process, strengthening timelines, and putting in place a dispute resolution system for when we disagree.

 

Summary Queen’s Proposal

  • Discontinue Queen’s payment of medical premium between 55-59 for employees who take early retirement.
  • Essential Animal Care LOU to be imbedded into the agreement.
  • Change the definition of normal working hours to include the possibility of a 40-hour work week.
  • Remove shift premiums for work scheduled on Saturday and Sunday.
  • Reduce overtime premium for Sunday from double time to time and one half.
  • Looking to change recognition of seniority.
  • Looking to add language defining termination.
  • Proposing language to award a market adjustment for hard to fill positions at their discretion.
  • Wants to move up the deadline for the application period for Child Care Plan and Tuition support.

 

Click here to view our proposal

Click here to view the Queen’s proposal

 

We are going to hold a strike vote on Dec 10 at 12pm at our virtual general meeting. Please be sure to attend

We have been waiting months for Queen’s to come to the table, and we know we are going to have serious differences in our bargaining positions. The employer is a long way from recognizing the dramatic increase in cost of living. Showing that you and your coworkers are ready to strike gives you negotiating power. Fair contracts are not won at the bargaining table – they are won in the workplace when workers show unity and collective power by voting YES to strike if necessary.

 

Unity Council

Unity Council continues to meet to discuss bargaining and will be posting updates on the Unity Council website.