Union Update

March 27 to April 14, 2006

Acrobat format

In this issue:

• Learning to do better: PSAC works to improve approach to negotiations
• PSAC strikes at EKATI diamond mine
• The CRAPO is moving full speed ahead with its political action work
• Quality public services key issue at PSAC convention
• Student employment no excuse for exploitation
• Human Rights Forum: Linking labour rights and human rights

Learning to do better: PSAC works to improve approach to negotiations

After the last round of collective bargaining with Treasury Board (TB) and the major separate agencies (CRA, Parks and CFIA), the PSAC commissioned an evaluation of our negotiations process for these seven units. With the help of Dale Clark, a former president of CUPW and the PSAC nominee on the last Table 3 Conciliation Board, a questionnaire was developed and distributed to all of the bargaining team members, as well as a cross selection of regional activists and staff involved in the negotiation and mobilization process. There were more than 80 responses, from which we were able to develop several recommendations.

With the TB and Agency agreements all expiring next year, we're now working to improve our process, including:

• developing a new collective bargaining course to be delivered across the country that trains potential team members ;

• continuing to improve our communications and research work for bargaining;

• clarifying the roles and responsibilities of team members, the Alliance Executive Committee, and the National President in collective bargaining, in part through resolutions to be debated at the May 2006 PSAC Convention;

• starting to plan for regional and national bargaining conferences earlier, with the goal of getting to the table before the expiry of these collective agreements;

• designing the input call and bargaining conferences to encourage membership debate on demands and priorities for the union; and

• developing a membership poll to complement the input call process and help negotiating teams and elected leaders in determining bargaining priorities.

We'll publish more details on the timelines and plans in the Union Update as further decisions are made.

PSAC strikes at EKATI diamond mine

PSAC members at the Ekati diamond mine in the Northwest Territories went on strike Friday, April 7, after BHP Billiton refused to negotiate a fair first collective agreement. The main issues at the bargaining table for the 400 workers are wages, job security, seniority and vacations.

The negotiations between the PSAC and BHP Billiton – a multi-national corporation started 14 months ago, and the company has yet to make an offer that is acceptable to the workers.

“BHP Billiton enjoyed a worldwide profit of $7.5 billion last year,” said Jean-François Des Lauriers, Regional Executive Vice-President for PSAC-North. “We expect BHP Billiton to put a reasonable wage increase and settlement offer on the table so our members get the respect they deserve.”

Des Lauriers also warned BHP Billiton against the use of replacement workers, saying such tactics are unacceptable to the PSAC and the majority of Canadians. “If BHP Billiton adds insult to injury by using scabs to operate the mine, the Canadian labour movement will react strongly against the employer's actions,” he said.

Federally mediated talks failed after the company offered a salary increase of one per cent. It also offered a one-day floating holiday in exchange for members giving up three days of paid sick leave.

“BHP Billiton is showing contempt for the very workers who are making millions of dollars in profits for them,'' said Todd Parsons, the president of the Union of Northern Workers, a PSAC Component. “Ekati workers are now saying, ‘No deal, no diamonds,' and we will not go back until there is a fair contract.”

Ekati is Canada 's first diamond mine and produces six per cent of the world's diamond supply by value, or four per cent by weight, and yields three to five million carats annually.

The CRAPO is moving full speed ahead with its political action work

Building on the significant impact the Conseil régional d'action politique de l'Outaouais had during the last federal election campaign, members of the Executive are continuing their representation work with the newly elected MPs.

After meeting with Bloc MPs Mario Laframboise ( Argenteuil ) and Richard Nadeau ( Gatineau ), members of CRAPO met the MP for Hull-Aylmer, Liberal Marcel Proulx in early April. They discussed with the three newly elected members collective bargaining issues, the sharing of federal employment between both sides of the Ottawa River , pay equity in Canada Post, privatization, and Service Canada, among other issues, to obtain the MPs' support to defend PSAC's positions. CRAPO is also attempting to organize a meeting with the MP for Pontiac and Minister of Transport, Conservative Lawrence Cannon. However, it seems that he is not nearly as available since being elected as he was during the election campaign.

Last April 1, CRAPO representatives also met with the caucus of the New Democratic Party. It was yet one more opportunity to inform NDP MPs of the major issues that could surface during the next Parliament and on which the PSAC would like to know the party's position. According to Daniel Charron, the President of CRAPO, “It is vitally important that all political parties sitting in the House of Commons be well informed of PSAC's demands. The meetings we are organizing with the MPs and grassroots members living in the Outaouais support the work by the national levels of PSAC.”

The Conseil régional d'action politique de l'Outaouais represents close to 15,000 PSAC members living in the Outaouais. About one voter in 10 in the Gatineau riding is a PSAC member, which gives PSAC certain political influence in the region.

Quality public services key issue at PSAC convention

After 20 years of pro-privatization policies, neither Canada nor the world is a better or fairer place to live. The gap between rich and poor has widened.

Privatization does not always take the form of high-profile sell-offs of government-owned assets or of its services. It can take many different forms, such as public-private partnerships, contracting-out of services, or shifting regulatory responsibility to private firms.

Privatization eliminates authentic public services by reducing public accountability and increasing foreign ownership and control of important Canadian services and infrastructure. It also creates unstable and uncertain employment relationships and undermines employment security.

More and more of our members' employers who provide services to the public are relying on contracting out. Federal spending on contracted out professional and special services has ballooned over the years. From Service Canada to Parks Canada, contractors are increasingly delivering public programs for private profit.

The PSAC is committed to long-term and comprehensive actions to ensure that quality public services are preserved and remain publicly delivered. We are committed to protecting public services and stopping privatization, contracting-out and public-private partnerships.

At the upcoming national convention, delegates will have an opportunity to discuss a comprehensive policy on quality public services and the actions the union plans to take on a number of fronts, including collective bargaining, research, communications, organizing, political action and fightback campaigns.

Student employment no excuse for exploitation

A significant number of employers, including many where our members work, routinely hire students. How the union can protect the rights of both students and our members will be a subject for debate at the national convention.

PSAC believes that employers, including the union itself, have an obligation to future generations of workers, and that this obligation can be partially met by hiring students.

The union is equally clear that students should be hired into carefully crafted and monitored programs that are designed to assist them in advancing their academic skills and acquiring social and workplace knowledge and skills – including an understanding of the role of unions in workplaces and society.

From the PSAC's perspective, it is not student employment or the students themselves who are the problem, but public and private employers who may exploit students as a cheap workforce.

Employers often use students as a lower cost alternative to the regular workforce. They're given the complete range of job functions without being paid according to the collective agreement. They're forced to work in environments without adequate training, putting themselves, PSAC members and the public at risk.

Human Rights Forum:
Linking labour rights and human rights

The labour solidarity adage, “an injury to one is an injury to all,” has had a broad scope within the PSAC that extends beyond the shop floor or the picket line. That's one reason the union has a strong human rights record, not only for our members, but for all Canadians and oppressed and exploited peoples around the world. The PSAC firmly believes that labour rights cannot be addressed in a substantial way without recognizing human rights.

At Convention, a human rights forum will look specifically at how globalization, racism, violence and the impact of climate change on cultures and peoples affect the rights of workers, Aboriginal peoples, peoples of colour, people with disabilities and the gay, lesbian, bi-sexual and transgender communities.

Both labour and civil society activists will make up the forum panelists, reflecting the PSAC's history and conviction that it is not only important, but crucial, to work with labour and community partners. The forum will be moderated by Oxfam Canada Executive Director Robert Fox. On top of his 30-year's work with Oxfam, Fox also worked as Director of Communications for the Canadian Union of Public Employees and served as chair of the board of a community health centre, a community legal clinic and a group that advocates for people with disabilities.

Among the panel of speakers is Sandra Carnegie-Douglas of the Canadian Race Relations Foundation. She is also the president of the Jamaican Canadian Association, was one of the Canadian NGO leaders who attended the Durban UN Conference on Racism and is a former executive director of the National Action Committee on the Status of Women. She will be discussing poverty, racism and violence with a special focus in the African-Canadian communities.

Terry Fenge will also be on the panel to talk about the impact of environmental change on people and cultures. He is the Strategic Counsel to the Chair of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, specializing in Aboriginal rights and interests, environmental affairs, and international public policy in the Arctic and the world.

Maria Eva Villate will discuss globalization and its effects on workers in the Global South. Villate is the president of the Colombian-based Union of Public Employees of the People's Defenders Office. She has vast experience and analysis on the fight against privatization and its impact, including the persecution of trade unionists.