 |
News ReleaseJanuary 27, 2005 Strike threat removed as PSAC members ratify new agreements with Treasury BoardOTTAWA – The Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) will be signing collective agreements with Treasury Board for over 100,000 of its members, removing the threat of a recurrence of the country-wide strikes that took place last summer and fall. PSAC National President Nycole Turmel announced the vote results today, following an extensive series of membership vote meetings which began last December. According to Turmel, PSAC members in the Operational Services Group (Table 2) have ratified their tentative agreement by 90%, and the members in the Education and Library Science Group (Table 5) have also ratified their agreement by 92%. PSAC members in the Program and Administrative Services Group (Table 1) and in the Technical Services Group (Table 3) were voting on the final offer presented by Treasury Board. Those offers were accepted by 72% at Table 1 and 76% at Table 3. According to Turmel, “this was not an easy round of bargaining, and while some gains were made, employer demands for concessions and relatively low economic increases were on the table.” “The gains we made during this round of bargaining were thanks in large part to the readiness of our members to take strike action,” says Turmel. “Our Table 2 members, for example, knew that a significant wage gap had been identified between their wages and those in the private and public sectors and they took the necessary action to force the government to put adjustments of 2.6% to 19% on the table, in addition to general economic increases.” PSAC represents about 80,000 members in the Program and Administrative Services Group, 10,000 members in each of the Operational Services and Technical Services Groups and 1,000 members in the Education and Library Science Group. The new collective agreements will expire on various dates in June and August, 2007. - 30 - For information: Louise Laporte, PSAC Communications,
03-270105
|