March 18, 2008
PSAC Bargaining Units with Treasury Board (PA, SV, TC, EB, FB)
EB negotiations: more frustrations
The EB bargaining team had another long and frustrating negotiating session with its Treasury Board counterpart the week of March 3rd.
Your team returned, as the lead table, to the issue of adding “gender identity” and “gender expression” to the no discrimination language in all Treasury Board agreements. The Employer has previously denied this proposal because a small number of cases that have been adjudicated suggest that “gender identity” is already covered by the word “sex.” We have made the point to Treasury Board that if discrimination on these grounds is already prohibited, we should write it into the Collective Agreement for all to see. The team was assisted by PSAC legal counsel Shannon Blatt and a Treasury Board employee, both of whom are members of the trans community. Despite a major and incredibly moving presentation by the two women, the Treasury Board negotiating team took the position that it has to “conduct more research” into our proposal. We are hoping this will result in a positive response when we bargain the week of April 28.
Your bargaining committee also made major presentations on our demands for early retirement for teachers in high stress situations and with respect to hours of work for teachers in the federal prison system. We also exposed the unacceptable level of contracting out of teaching jobs at the Correctional Service of Canada to support our demand to end the contracting out of quality public service jobs and to bring contracted-out jobs back into the bargaining unit. Again, the Employer was unable to respond within the same week.
Among the large number of operational demands at the EB Table is one for a year of sabbatical partly funded by the Employer, a not uncommon consideration for a bargaining unit consisting of teachers and librarians. The Employer responded with a flat rejection, pointing to Treasury Board policies that allow for a variety of leaves without pay.
At the same time, Treasury Board is seeking to delete a clause in the Collective Agreement (Article 43.02) that requires them to reimburse employees for correspondence courses and other training that takes place outside normal working hours, because they have unilaterally discontinued the policy to which that obligation is attached. The irony, however, seems to be lost on the Employer's bargaining team.
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Date Modified : 2008/11/18
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