2022-12-02
To all CUPE 104 members,
The Employer sent out an email to some of our members this week. To be clear, this email was from them, not us. We had nothing to do with it and we have no idea why they only sent it to some of you and excluded the rest of you.
CUPE, Canada’s largest public sector Union, represents over 715 000 members negotiating for public sector workers across Canada. Prior to the preparations for deeming, there were no groups in the Federal Public Service equivalent to the Telecommunications Operators or Intercept Monitor Analysts. They had to create a new group, the PO Group. We are a unique group of workers, and the Employer keeps trying to lump us into the rest of the Core Public Administration (CPA). There is nothing we can do about being hired into the CPA. However, we will never stop educating the employer about the unique public safety, first-first responder work that we all do.
As you know, we served notice to bargain on May 9, 2018. We have been transparent about all the bargaining dates as well as the work that we have been doing prior to and between those dates. We gathered information from comparator agencies all over Canada. We also searched through the current and historical collective agreements between other bargaining agents and the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat (TBS). From this vast research and experience, we crafted and presented a first collective agreement proposal to the Employer on behalf of our members.
Since May 2021, when we first exchanges initial proposals, we have made a great deal of movement. We will discuss all of this when we either reach an impasse or a tentative agreement so that you will be fully informed before you are asked to vote on accepting or rejecting an agreement. The most recent November 8 offer that the employer referenced in their email is not acceptable.
The Employer, including TBS and the RCMP, Senior Management and Policy Centres have been in regular communications about the collective bargaining process. We believe it would be in their best interest for them to listen to their front-line managers about what they need to ensure their centres remain open. We do not know how much information they are sharing with managers, but we do know that what they recently offered is not what we need to survive.
Obviously, we are all concerned about the lag in salaries. In 2017, the employer refused to give our group the raise we were entitled to for 2015 and 2016 including the economic increases we were supposed to get with the pay package for 1.25%, 1.25% and the 2.3% market adjustment in 2016.
As you know, we were forced to file an unfair labour practice complaint with the Federal Public Sector Labour Relations and Employment Board (FPSLREB). As part of that complaint, we were able to achieve a settlement for the economic increases of 1.25% and 1.25% for 2015 and 2016. The Employer refused to settle the remaining 2.3% market adjustment we are still owed from April 1, 2016. We presented our case to the FPSLREB this past summer and we are still waiting for the decision from that hearing.
If the Employer, including the RCMP, truly recognized the impact of the salaries on morale and retention and presented us with an offer that reflected that, we would have presented you with a tentative agreement to review and ratify.
Throughout the bargaining process, we have consistently pushed back against the concessions that the Employer presented. We worked hard this week on our latest counteroffer, and we presented it back to the employer with our supporting evidence and rationale.
We still have another session planned for December 19-23. We are committed to working with the Employer to achieve a collective agreement at the table. We will continue to fight for all of us to achieve a deal that is fair and reflective of what we are worth.
Thank you for your continued support!
In Solidarity,
Your CUPE 104 executive
Kathleen, Robbin, Myles, Robb, Cyrus, Marc-Étienne, Alex, Brandon, Randy and Ron.
Executive e-mail addresses: https://104.cupe.ca/contacts/
Main page: https://104.cupe.ca/
Membership Form: https://104.cupe.ca/membership/