Public Service Alliance of Canada BC

OTTAWA – The union representing about 10,500 CBSA workers, which includes all of Canada’s Front-Line and Inland Customs & Immigration Officers, is charging the employer of being irresponsible with how it is handling workplace issues, including the implementation of the arming initiative.

The government has given CBSA a mandate for a smooth transition over a 10-year period for the implementation of the arming of Canada’s border officers, but the Public Service Alliance of Canada says the Agency is not following that mandate at the bargaining table.

“Our union has been pushing for a smooth transition that ensures that officers are protected through the arming implementation process,” says PSAC National President John Gordon. “CBSA has responded irresponsibly by implying that officers may be laid off as a result of arming. CBSA has also indicated that there is no long-term plan regarding implementation.”

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OTTAWA – The union representing about 5,000 workers at Parks Canada denounces the employer’s attempt at undermining contract negotiations when the Agency’s negotiators walked away from the table.

The union adds that the employer’s inflexibility on its meagre wage offer, on the elimination of pay zones and on closing the pay gap for Parks trade workers is a strong indication that the Agency is not taking negotiations seriously.

“After we reached impasse last February, the employer contacted us and asked us to return to the table because they said they were ready to respond seriously to our demands,” said the Public Service Alliance of Canada Regional Executive Vice-President for Atlantic, Jeannie Baldwin. “We came back to the table last week. After seven days of talks where they refused to budge from their positions, they walked away from bargaining and are now proposing mediation to which we don’t agree.”

Baldwin says in order for mediation to work, the two parties have to be close to an agreement, but this is not the case given that the employer refuses to deal with the major issues. “We want the employer to come back to the table and negotiate,” Baldwin says.

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On May 1^st, 1886, 80,000 workers took to the streets of Chicago to demand an eight-hour work day. This was at a time when the right to organize and strike did not exist. The peaceful mass meeting at Haymarket Square in Chicago that followed was broken up by armed police, leading to the death of seven police officers, and later, the execution of seven prominent labour leaders. Since then, people all over the world have used May 1st as an opportunity to commemorate the struggle for decent working conditions and to press for social justice and workers’ rights.

• Read more about the Haymarket Affair at wikipedia.org.

In 2008, workers are still fighting to protect their hard-won rights to organize, to bargain collectively and to strike. In the last couple of years alone, we have seen workers’ rights eroded through:

• The defeat of Bill C-257, which would have made it illegal for employers to hire scab labour.
• The Harper government’s dismantling of a hard fought-for universal child care program.
• The removal of the “equality” mandate from Status of Women Canada and the abolishment of the Court Challenges Program, which gave marginalized groups access to the court system to fight for their constitutional rights.
• Continued closed-door negotiations on the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America – a pact between Canada, the U.S. and Mexico, which is being led by some of the world’s richest corporations, with zero input from working people.

In addition to standing up for people’s rights in the workplace, PSAC is building a movement to fight back and defend Canada’s valuable public services. We believe that the needs of people come first – that the role of government is to protect and promote the social, economic and safety needs of the public, rather than promote profits at any cost.

One hundred and twenty two years after the Haymarket Affair, PSAC celebrates our successes but we remain vigilant against attacks on our rights.

On April 22, it is estimated that over 500 million people in more than 180 countries will be celebrating International Earth Day. Around the world these observances will highlight both local and world wide environmental issues. Some 6 million Canadians will participate in Earth Day events which can include the planting of trees and native gardens, neighbourhood cleanups, workshops and seminars, concerts, eco-fairs, parades, cultural events, waste reduction projects, the implementation/expansion of environmental programs, wildlife conservation projects, and much more.

Earth Day is celebrated in schools, community and youth groups, unions, and environmental organizations.

At a time when Canadians are concerned with the continual rise of Greenhouse Gas Emissions in Canada, our Federal Government continues to stall on implementing any effective measures to deal with this threat to our environment.

• The Canadian Labour Congress’ theme for Earth Day 2008 is “Take Responsibility and Action to get some satisfaction” (pdf).

Each of us can attempt to make this statement a reality by reducing the amount of energy we use in our homes, buying food and products that are produced locally and trying to drive less.

Please take the time on April 22 to think about your personal impact on our earth. Make a commitment to reduce your footprint on this day and every day.

Here are a few ways you can make a difference.

• Turn off unnecessary lights, at home and at work – We’ve asked PSAC Holdings to help with this!
• Print only when necessary and use both sides of the paper
• use email or voice mail instead of paper
• Have a garbage free day
• Bring your lunch in reusable containers and don’t buy bottled water – use your own reusable bottle
• Walk, bicycle, take public transit or car pool to work
• donate the stuff you don’t use anymore instead of throwing it out
• give your newspaper to someone else to read
• recycle glass bottles, plastic bottles, paper, and cardboard

We encourage all our members to make Earth Day a day to celebrate our achievements with regard to the environment. It is also, more importantly, a day to raise the consciousness of every citizen around the world on environmental issues critical to the surviving of our planet.

Important Links

• http://www.earthday.org
• http://www.earthday.ca
• http://www.jourdelaterre.org

It is a privilege to submit the report of the Regional Executive Vice-President to the delegates, observers, and guests of the 2008 BC Regional Triennial Convention and to the membership of the Public Service Alliance of Canada in BC.

While the REVP-BC is required by the BC Region By-Laws to submit this report to Convention, I do so on behalf of, and thanks to, all members and staff who contribute to PSAC BC. Whether it is as a member of the PSAC BC Regional Council, a Local or Branch Executive member, an activist on a regional committee, a Component national or regional officer, a strike captain, a steward, a rank-and-file member, or a PSAC regional staff member, you make a difference in our Region, and you make our Union strong.

This report highlights some of our main accomplishments over the past three years, and perhaps more specifically since I took office as REVP for B.C. in May 2006.

Download this document as a .pdf: Report of the REVP to the 2008 BC Regional Convention or continue reading below

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OTTAWA – The Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) is taking a quarter century-old pay equity complaint to the Federal Court of Appeal. The complaint involves about 6,000 current and former clerical workers at Canada Post. The union is reacting to a lower court decision issued in February that essentially overturned an award made by a Canadian Human Rights Tribunal in October 2005.

PSAC National President John Gordon announced the decision to appeal at a national bargaining conference being held in Ottawa with members of PSAC’s Union of Postal Communications Employees component who are employed by Canada Post.

“We believe the Federal Court’s decision is flawed and there are strong grounds for an appeal,” said Gordon. “Some aspects of the decision are contradictory while others ignore the roles and authority of both the Tribunal and the Canadian Human Rights Commission.”

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Ottawa - StraightGoods.ca is pleased to announce the addition of a new member to its family of websites: www.PublicValues.ca .

The site is an online magazine presenting news about privatization and the fight to preserve public services, resources, spaces and enterprise. It will be updated frequently. Readers are encouraged to submit ideas and articles.

“The site is in Beta format right now,” Straight Goods says.

“We’re still test-driving it, and we have yet to publish all articles in French on its sister site, Valeurspubliques.ca. As we get rolling, we expect to be publishing in both official languages as simultaneously as possible.

“We are thankful for the support of the partners backing PublicValues.ca. In 2008, they include National Union of Public and General Employees (NUPGE) and Ontario Secondary School Teachers (OSSTF). Founding partners include the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC), Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW).”

Visit publicvalues.ca today and add it to your list of bookmarks!

OTTAWA – Conservative ideology has triumphed over the needs of Canadians in the latest federal budget according to the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC).

“This budget is a medley of misguided priorities,” says PSAC National President John Gordon. “The Harper government’s obsession with deficit reduction continues unabated with more than $10 billion going to pay down the debt this year, money that should have been invested in Canadians.”

“Continued debt reduction at a time when Canada may be facing an economic slowdown is not sound economic policy. Conservatives have once again missed an opportunity to use the surplus to invest in the health and well-being of Canadians through a national pharmacare or child care and early learning program or a comprehensive environmental protection plan.”

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OTTAWA – Conservatives are not the good fiscal managers they would like the country to believe and there is plenty of evidence to prove it. According to John Gordon, National President of the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC), Conservative budgets have been contributing to a growing gap between rich and poor Canadians.

“Why is it that, in spite of continued economic growth, poverty is still on the rise in Canada,” says Gordon. “Nearly one in six Canadian children live in poverty; one in four in First Nations communities. Our social safety net is disappearing and economic disparity and social exclusion are deepening.”

Since their election, Conservative budgets have been designed to provide a few ‘goodies’, such as the GST reduction and the taxable child care allowance, that are of little real benefit to individuals but advance the government’s agenda of undermining publicly funded services and reducing their role in meeting Canadians’ priorities. The money lost by reducing the GST by just 1% could have financed a universal early learning and child care system for three to five-year olds across the country.

At the same time the Harper government has been devoting large surpluses to debt repayment, they’ve been cutting social programs. Debt reduction will be cold comfort to the working families affected by the impending economic slowdown and who are even now living from pay cheque to pay cheque. Nor will it help new immigrants already clustered in low-wage, no benefits, precarious work.

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Ottawa – Former Reform MP Elwin Hermanson who was appointed chief commissioner of the Canadian Grain Commission only weeks ago is advocating in favour of a controversial bill that has never been endorsed by Parliament.

Hermanson authored a strongly worded opinion article in favour of amendments to the Canada Grain Act in Bill C-39 which was published in the February 7th edition of The Western Producer. Mr. Hermanson declares in his opinion article: “As chief commissioner of the CGC, I strongly support this legislation… .”

• Oppose amendments to Canada Grain Act: Fax your MP

The bill would gut or kill several services and regulatory oversight activities of the Canadian Grain Commission, leaving producers newly disadvantaged in their dealings with grain companies and undermining the quality and food safety assurance programs Canada’s international reputation for excellence are built upon.

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OTTAWA - The picture of employment of historically marginalized Canadians in the federal public service is not as rosy as the government would like to have us believe, says the Public Service Alliance of Canada, a union representing more than 100,000 federal public service workers.

“The report submitted by the Canada Public Service Agency to Parliament on Employment Equity support many of our arguments that we presented earlier this week to the Senate Standing Committee on Human Rights,” says Ed Cashman, the PSAC Regional Executive Vice-President for the National Capital Region.

• Read the report submitted to Parliament here (pdf)

For example, the government claims it is meeting its targets with respect to the representation of persons with disabilities relative to their labour market availability. However, the number of persons with disabilities who are hired into the government is below their labour market availability rate.

“In other words,” says Cashman, “the federal government is meeting its legal obligation not through proportional hirings but through injury and illness of workers already on the job. Some workers become persons with disabilities through the course of their careers.”

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Ottawa – Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz should retract a gag order which threatens Canadian Grain Commission employees who speak out against his government’s legislative proposal to gut the Commission, according to the Agriculture Union – PSAC which represents the employees.

On December 21^st, the Canadian Grain Commission issued a memo to employees forbidding them to publicly criticize Bill C-39, the government’s proposal to cripple the Commission.

“We hope the Minister will disassociate himself from the Commission’s intimidation and assure employees they are free to express their opinion,” said Bob Kingston, National Vice-President of the Agriculture Union – PSAC.

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(Ottawa) The federal government should withdraw amendments to the Grain Act in Bill C-39 because it will hurt grain producers and it ignores the unanimous advice from an all-party Commons committee, according to the Agriculture Union – PSAC.

• Fax your MP - Oppose the amendments to the Grain Act!

The Conservative government’s proposed legislation will gut the Canadian Grain Commission (CGC), the independent body that provides essential services to grain producers. Bill C-39 will be debated for the first time in Parliament today.

The legislation ignores the recommendation of an all–party committee by immediately and aggressively cutting the CGC’s regulatory responsibilities and services. After extensive study, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Agriculture recommended that the Commission receive increased funding to ensure that the essential services it offers to grain producers can be sustained.

“Instead of heeding the advice of politicians from all parties, the Conservative government is putting the future of farmers and of all Canadians who benefit from the grain trade at risk. This bill should be withdrawn and fixed before it is debated in Parliament,” said Bob Kingston, Executive Vice President of Agricultural Union - PSAC.

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source: The Ottawa Citizen, Jan 11, pg A1

Fat City is back. And according to a study of federal public service employment trends released yesterday, it’s putting on weight at a rapid rate.

The Statistics Canada study also found that, on average, public servants in this region are younger and more highly trained than those elsewhere in Canada.

The study reported that the number of people who work for the “core public administration” in the national capital region, which includes Ottawa, Gatineau and surrounding areas, grew by a stunning 20 per cent between 1995 and 2006, an additional 12,800 jobs.

By contrast, federal employment in the category fell 5.6 per cent nationally during the same period, shrinking by more than 10,000 to just under 178,000.

The core public administration represents nearly half of all federal employment and includes almost the entire public service other than the Canada Revenue Agency and the Canada Border Services Agency.

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Source: The Ottawa CitizenThe federal government has been discriminating against a group of federal nurses on the basis of their gender for more than three decades, the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal has ruled.

The ruling could potentially expose the government to hundreds of millions of dollars of liability for back wages and compensation, according to the lawyer for most of the nurses.

And the principles it endorses could apply to other employee groups as well, said Philippe Dufresne, senior counsel for the Canadian Human Rights Commission.

The human rights tribunal found that the nurses, who determine the eligibility of applicants for CPP disability benefits, perform essentially the same core functions as government doctors who are paid about twice as much.

The group of nurses, called medical adjudicators, is 95-percent female, while the doctors’ group, known as medical advisers, is 80-per-cent male.

Under the Canadian Human Rights Act, it is illegal to treat a female-dominated group differently from a male-dominated group when both perform the same or substantially similar work.

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Only Colombia is riskier for union organizers.

The Philippines provide a steady stream of hard working immigrants seeking a better life in British Columbia. For most of these newcomers, the pay may not stretch far, given the high cost of living here and, often, a chunk of the paycheque sent to help family back home.

• Send a message to the Philippine Government: stop the political killings! 

But at least in B.C., standing up for your rights on the job won’t get you killed.

Under the Arroyo government in the Philippines there has been a higher incidence of murders and assaults against union activists than during the notorious Marcos regime, according to a Philippine labour leader who recently toured Canada.

And an international study that reported a 25 per cent increase in murders of trade unionists around the world in 2006 says that the Philippines is the second most lethal environment for union activists globally, only topped for murder of union leaders by the blood stained record of Colombia.

Continue reading at thetyee.ca.

BC’s labour movement backs up support for locked-out Sears workers with $20,000 contribution to strike fund

BC’s unions are contributing $20,000 to locked-out Sears Canada workers today, says B.C. Federation of Labour Jim Sinclair, to underline labour’s determination to help them win a fair collective agreement.

“This contribution is intended to underline our call to consumers to refrain from shopping at Sears until this company negotiates a fair collective agreement with these members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 213,” Sinclair said. “Seventy-seven (77) workers who repair appliances for Sears have been locked out since October 1st, ordered to take pay cuts and face concessions on overtime and time off.”

Sinclair and other representatives of the Federation made the contribution during a lunchtime leafleting blitz outside the Vancouver store at Robson and Howe.

Sinclair said Sears, which had profits of $150 million last year, is taking a hard line with its workers that amounts to union-busting.  “This is unacceptable in this province and our boycott indicates labour’s rejection of this approach.”

Sinclair said the $20,000, collected from Federation affiliates in the last week, will help the union support its members during the Christmas season. During the past few days, IBEW has distributed flyers about the boycott to hundreds of thousands of homes in the province.

The labour movement in BC says shoppers have a choice to make during this busy holiday season.

“They’ve told them if they want to come back to work, they have to take less money in real terms than what they had before.” He says the company also took away their right to two days off in a row, and eliminated overtime when it imposed a contract.  “It’s completely unfair, and it’s just a question of deciding if you support these workers and their families, or Sears, which made $150 million last year in Canada.”

Sinclair claims Sears has a notoriously anti-union attitude, and believes the lock-out is an effort to break this union local.
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For more information, please call Geoff Meggs 604 220-3095.

Locked out workers take boycott of Sears to holiday shoppers

Vancouver – Locked out service technicians employed by Sears Canada, will be taking their boycott of Sears straight to holiday shoppers this weekend.

The 77 workers, members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) 213, have been locked out since October 1, 2007, when Sears Canada imposed a collective agreement, with no negotiated wage increases, cuts to holiday time, and a longer work week with no overtime.

The workers will be joined by Jim Sinclair, President, B.C. Federation of Labour, and Rick Dowling, International Executive Council Member, Business-Manager, IBEW 213.

WHAT: SEARS CANADA BOYCOTT
WHEN: 10:30 am, SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15, 2007
WHERE: OUTSIDE METROTOWN SEARS (4750 Kingsway, Burnaby, B.C.)

For more information, please contact Jessie Uppal at 604-220-0739

OTTAWA – Canadian workers have finally won new legal protection for their wages and their pension contributions when their employer goes bankrupt. Bill C-12, a series of amendments to existing insolvency and wage protection laws, was approved by the Senate last night and received Royal Assent today. This was accomplished after an intensive three-year campaign by the Canadian Labour Congress and its affiliated unions to change bankruptcy laws that unfairly put workers last line to get paid.

To print the English PDF version, please click here.

By JENNIFER LASH and BILL WAREHAM

Jennifer Lash is the Executive Director of Living Oceans Society and Bill Wareham is Senior Conservation Specialist, Marine Conservation Program, at David Suzuki Foundation.

VANCOUVER, B.C. - The ocean touches the lives of all Canadians every day.
It produces close to half of the oxygen in the world’s atmosphere. Canadians eat six kilograms of Canadian-caught seafood per capita each year. And our oceans’ resources contribute $23-billion annually to Canada’s economy.
Canadians from Calgary to Toronto benefit from a healthy ocean as much as the residents of Sointula, B.C., and Petty Harbour, Nfld./Lab.
So why, at a time of record surpluses, is the federal government letting the health of our oceans slip away?

Destructive fishing practices such as bottom trawling continue to destroy critical habitat, overfishing threatens the future of our fish stocks, and less than 0.1 per cent of our coastal and ocean environments are protected.

Canada took a progressive step towards caring for our coasts in 1997 when the Oceans Act was passed, enabling the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to manage not just the fish we harvest, but the ocean ecosystem as a whole. Further action in 2002 established the Oceans Strategy, a blueprint for sustainable use of the ocean.
And when Canada’s Oceans Action Plan was ratified in 2005, funds began to flow to Canada’s marine regions, empowering progressive changes in ocean management in the Maritimes, the Arctic, and the Pacific Coast of Canada.

However, this wave of change has slowed to a trickle. The federal government’s approach has significantly slowed progress on realizing an action plan that will ensure conservation of our marine resources.
The federal government’s proposal to establish nine marine protected areas across our three oceans is a good start.
However, the federal government failed to make a commitment to marine management planning processes that could lead to integrated oceans management and ensure all ocean-related activities are conducted in a manner that does not compromise the health of our ocean ecosystems. In short, their approach is the equivalent of setting up nine parks in Canada’s vast forest landscape and allowing the rest to be clear-cut.

Our oceans need a network of marine protected areas designed to conserve the full range and function of Canada’s marine ecosystems. Their choice and location should be based on the knowledge and needs of the people who work and live on our coasts. Our oceans need an ecosystem-based management approach—one that will allow us to harvest resources and realize the benefits provided by our oceans for generations to come. Canada has an Oceans Strategy that could make all this happen if it is actually implemented.

Right now, Canada’s oceans need some leadeship. The federal government failed to show leadership in the 2007 budget when it allocated a meagre $19-million over five years towards ocean conservation and clean water, and surveillance.
Additional funding provided this year gave priority to other issues. Funding for the Oceans Strategy was reduced to a trickle. Without sufficient funding, our oceans cannot be effectively managed. Canadians on every coast have voiced grave concern that the 2007 budget failed our oceans and along with them some of the most abundant and diverse webs of marine life on earth. It also failed the millions of Canadians whose livelihoods depend on healthy oceans.

Over the next few months, the federal government will set its fiscal priorities for the 2008 budget. This is a golden opportunity to invest the necessary funds initiatives that improve the management of our oceans.
To start, a $300 million investment over five years would ensure that Canada’s Oceans Strategy planning initiatives, management reforms and conservation goals can be achieved. The strategy is a good one, but it has languished because of a serious lack of funding and prioritization by government.
In 1997 Canada built an international reputation as a world leader in oceans management. Unfortunately, our reputation is quickly being tarnished as other countries such as Australia, New Zealand and the United States surpass us in implementing their own ocean legislation, policies and management reforms.
A healthy Canada includes healthy oceans. Let’s hope the Prime Minister and his government take corrective action soon. The federal government failed to show leadership in the 2007 budget when it allocated a meagre $19-million over five years towards ocean conservation and clean water, and surveillance. Additional funding provided this year gave priority to other issues. Funding for the Oceans Strategy was reduced to a trickle.

The Minister of Fisheries and many of his colleagues support the Oceans Strategy.
With a record federal surplus of $9-billion in the first six months of 2007, the government has the capacity to do the right thing. All that is lacking is the political will.

The Hill Times