PSAC Strike 2023

[DTcrawler]

Originally Posted by rocketphish

Strike could be last hurrah for Ottawa's core as public servants fight for telework

Laura Osman, The Canadian Press
Published Apr 25, 2023 • Last updated 10 hours ago • 4 minute read

...

She used to take two buses to get to work every day, but hadn’t returned to work until the strike started because of a medical exemption that allows her to work from home full time.

...

https://ottawacitizen.com/news/local...t-for-telework

Lol...

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by DTcrawler

Lol...

On the picket line Tuesday, Aisha Sow, a public servant for 18 years, said commuting into downtown for the last few days feels a bit like deja vu.

She had a medical exemption to work from home full time but she managed to make it to the picket line.

Wow! This says it all.

[Admiral Nelson]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

She had a medical exemption to work from home full time but she managed to make it to the picket line.

Wow! This says it all.

It says nothing whatsoever except that she may not be in a privileged enough personal circumstance to afford to take an indefinite number of days off work without strike pay.

Any revelation beyond that speaks more to one's own personal biases, I reckon.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by Admiral Nelson

It says nothing whatsoever except that she may not be in a privileged enough personal circumstance to afford to take an indefinite number of days off work without strike pay.

Any revelation beyond that speaks more to one's own personal biases, I reckon.

PSAC has an Accommodated Picket Duty option for those with accommodation requirements under the Canadian Human Rights Act. So that probably means the medical exemption from office work was probably something informally arranged with a manager, rather than something where a proper medical assessment was done.

[YOWflier]

She’s also probably receiving strike pay and her regular salary simultaneously. But yeah tough times.

[J.OT13]

It's quite ironic that the Union is forcing its members to picket in person everyday while they are "fighting" for work from home.

[passwordisnt123]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

It's quite ironic that the Union is forcing its members to picket in person everyday while they are "fighting" for work from home.

I'm not sure I understand why that's ironic? Some things can be done remotely while others can't. My regular office work can be easily done from home (better than an office, in fact). Same isn't true of picketing. Picketing and office work are different types of things.

[acottawa]

Originally Posted by passwordisnt123

I'm not sure I understand why that's ironic? Some things can be done remotely while others can't. My regular office work can be easily done from home (better than an office, in fact). Same isn't true of picketing. Picketing and office work are different types of things.

AFAIK the dispute is whether the workers get to decide whether their work can be done from home or not. PSAC is not giving them that agency.

[passwordisnt123]

Originally Posted by acottawa

AFAIK the dispute is whether the workers get to decide whether their work can be done from home or not. PSAC is not giving them that agency.

That is incorrect. The main dispute is over wages. TBS wants us to take a pay cut of 5% adjusted for inflation. The secondary dispute about telework is about codifying language around telework so that the employer can't unilaterally change the rules again on us like they did in December.

Since the start of the pandemic, the telework that's been in place has always been limited to positions for which telework was appropriate. For tasks that cannot be done remotely, there has never been telework in place even in March 2020.

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by passwordisnt123

That is incorrect. The main dispute is over wages. TBS wants us to take a pay cut of 5% adjusted for inflation. The secondary dispute about telework is about codifying language around telework so that the employer can't unilaterally change the rules again on us like they did in December.

Since the start of the pandemic, the telework that's been in place has always been limited to positions for which telework was appropriate. For tasks that cannot be done remotely, there has never been telework in place even in March 2020.

Yes Cannot be done like Airport security of course but there is a lot of work that was done remotely that is probably done better in person. Passports seems to be the obvious answer unless there is another reason the system collapsed?

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by passwordisnt123

I'm not sure I understand why that's ironic? Some things can be done remotely while others can't. My regular office work can be easily done from home (better than an office, in fact). Same isn't true of picketing. Picketing and office work are different types of things.

Some logic in this statement. But the picketing is the secondary value of a strike isn't it? I assume withdrawing labor would be the central part of it.

[passwordisnt123]

Originally Posted by YOWetal

Some logic in this statement. But the picketing is the secondary value of a strike isn't it? I assume withdrawing labor would be the central part of it.

Striking employees who don't want to picket can simply choose not to show up. Withdrawing labour is a part of it, raising public awareness and ensuring visibility I would think would be also very important tasks. As is monitoring the use of scab workers.

[JayBuoy]

Not surprised by the very conservative takes on this forum lol. Tories on bikes you lot

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by passwordisnt123

Striking employees who don't want to picket can simply choose not to show up. Withdrawing labour is a part of it, raising public awareness and ensuring visibility I would think would be also very important tasks. As is monitoring the use of scab workers.

The union says they won't get strike pay in that case. Not surprising lots of younger workers aren't striking.

[waterloowarrior]

Tentative deal for Treasury Board workers
https://workerscantwait.ca/tb-agreement/

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by waterloowarrior

Tentative deal for Treasury Board workers
https://workerscantwait.ca/tb-agreement/

So who won?

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by YOWetal

So who won?

The peasant public service workers are not informed. Neither are the tax payers. The Union decided the offer is good enough and sent everyone back to work without actually informing them of what they've accepted (or close to accepting) on their behalf.

I'm generally unhappy with PSAC. The time leading up to the strike was all propaganda ("when" we go on strike, not "if members vote to strike", for example), public servants had to jump through a bunch of hoops to vote, they removed on week of voting with little warning (unless you registered for emails, you would not know). Calling the Federal negotiators and Fortier morons and incompetent was not helpful. And saying the Feds don't know how negotiations work when the Feds submitted at least 3 offers, while the Union only budged this week (apparently, and no one is allowed to know by how much), it really rubs me the wrong way.

The 13.5% original ask was relatively reasonable, many other demands are not. It should be up to the employer to decide the work from home or hybrid arraignments, department by department. The Feds' 9% was relatively reasonable as well. Looking forward to hearing what the final offer was.

CRA's ask is not reasonable by any stretch. Feds' shouldn't even bother to respond or negotiate.

If it were up to me, everyone in the public sector, bureaucrats, lawyers, politicians, police, the army, nurses... would all get inflation, full stop. It's unfair that politicians get to vote on their own salaries, cops always get more than everyone else, while public servants have to fight for inflation.

[J.OT13]

Deal is finally up. 12.6% over 4 years.

https://psacunion.ca/psac-has-reache...t-pa-sv-tc-and

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Deal is finally up. 12.6% over 4 years.

https://psacunion.ca/psac-has-reache...t-pa-sv-tc-and

Plus one time 3.7% making those who went on strike whole and nice bonus for essential workers and scabs.

Sounds like union caved on everything else though allowing appeals and individual circumstances might mean nothing in private sector but be a huge stalling mechanism for public sector workers? I'd guess union had more incentives to make the language stronger than it sounds.

I am surprised PSAC settled the main contract and left CRA. Surely the government can now hunker down and wait them out. They could easily just extend the tax deadline and it seems like people actually "sending out cheques" are deemed essential.

[Richard Eade]

The government’s ‘fair’ offer (that was recommended by the Public Interest Commission) was 1.5% for 2021, 4.5% for 2022, and 3% for 2023. This is what the government and media referred to as 9% over 3 years. If the values were compounded, the total increase over the three years is about 9.25%. There was also a cash ‘signing bonus’ offered to each employee, although I have not seen a value for that.

At that point, the union was asking for 4.5% for each of 2021, 2022, and 2023 for its Treasury Board members. This would total 14.1%, compounded, over the three years.

Apparently, the government increased its wage offer and presented the new numbers as their ‘final’ offer this past week-end. I have not read what the numbers were for the ‘final’ offer, but they would have been a bit better than the ‘fair’ offer.

The final agreement is quite similar to the government’s offer. (Indeed, it might be the ‘final’ offer that was made.) It comes with a 1.5% increase for 2021, 4.75 for 2022, and a 3.5% increase for 2023; for a total compounded increase of 10.1% over those three years. The amount of the ‘signing bonus’ is now given as $2,500, per employee.

Was it worth a 12-day strike to get an additional 0.9% for those three years? I can’t say, but the union, it seems, had to make the number look bigger. Therefore, a fourth year was added in, with a 2.25% increase for 2024. This allowed the union to declare that it negotiated a 12.6% increase.

So, now those Treasury Board employees, whose average salary is $67,300, will receive a cheque for the back-pay up until now, plus their ‘signing bonus’. That will be an average of about $7600 (up to May, 2023) – with about $2,200 going back to the government for income taxes.

Although I feel that it was added just to ‘pad the numbers’, I am glad that an increase for 2024 has been included in the deal. If it had not been, then the negotiations for the next agreement would have had to start right away. This gives a year before things (might) get nasty again. Personally, I think that the government will always prefer to negotiate increases based on PAST inflation numbers, rather than trying to guess what is coming. Based on that, I expect that they will not be truly negotiating the next deal until 2026, when the union gets fed-up again.