February 20, 2009
Negotiations with Canadian Food Inspection Agency
PSAC members ratify new agreement with CFIA
Members of the Public Service Alliance of Canada working for the Canadian Food Inspection Agency have voted in favour of a new collective agreement that contains no concessions.
The union achieved some significant breakthroughs with the new agreement, including:
-
The establishment of a national rate of pay for members who are in the General Labour and Trades (GL) and General Services (GS) classifications. This was a high priority bargaining demand for the union and the victory concludes a 41-year battle to remove regional rates of pay for trades people in the federal public service.
-
The agreement also contains improvements to the Employment Transition Policy which maximizes alternative employment opportunities for permanent CFIA employees facing possible layoffs.
The four-year collective agreement, which expires on December 31, 2011, provides for across-the-board annual wage increases of 2.3 per cent for the first year from January 1, 2008 to December 31, 2008, and 1.5 per cent for each of the remaining three years.
“Our bargaining team and members at CFIA struggled hard to negotiate under the current political and economic climate,” says PSAC National President John Gordon. “Their efforts won them a collective agreement that contains no concessions and some key improvements. A clear majority of our members have voted to accept the tentative agreement, and we see this as a vote of confidence for the bargaining team and the union.”
Date Modified : 2010/01/29
