Membership to Vote on Collective Agreement (Urban Unit)

The National Executive Board (NEB) has endorsed a tentative agreement with CPC for a new collective agreement to cover the 46,000 members of the urban operations unit at Canada Post. The NEB’s recommendation will be put to a vote by secret ballot that will take place from November 13 to December 19, 2012.

We are Facing an Unjust Back-to-Work Legislation

The NEB is putting the employer’s offer to a vote because we believe that it is the membership of the Union that must decide between the two options that are before us. We can either choose to accept the new agreement or we can place our destiny in the hands of a government-appointed arbitrator who will very likely impose a collective agreement which includes many more serious negative changes that will impact upon our pensions, benefits and job security.

This choice is being imposed upon us due to the Harper government’s anti-worker legislation, which denied us our basic right to negotiate and to strike over unresolved differences. We would never have agreed to these changes if we had the right to strike.

Both Protections and Negative Changes

The collective agreement being proposed by the NEB includes negative changes which we fought against during the strike and lockout of 2011. However, we have been able to protect the membership from some of the rollbacks proposed by CPC in their July 2012 offer.

The employer’s demand to reduce the early retirement provisions in the pension entitlements of current employees is now gone. Likewise, future employees will be entitled to a defined benefit pension plan with full indexing with early retirement at 60 years of age and 30 years of service. They will also be entitled to the same hours of work and vacation leave as current employees. Current employees who are under the 55/30 defined benefit plan would remain under the same unchanged plan.

We were able to protect the half-hour paid lunch for our future employees. The Employer’s proposals to eliminate our protections concerning the closure of retail outlets and to replace our retiree benefits with a health care spending account are also now off the table.

The major points of the tentative agreement are as follows:

1. Job Security: The effective date for job security has been updated to the date of signing.

2. Expiry Date: The agreement extends the current expiry date by one year to January 31, 2016. Due to the terms of the back-to-work legislation, it is necessary to negotiate a separate one-year agreement for the period of February 1, 2015 to January 31, 2016.

3. Pension: There is no change to any aspect of the pension of current employees. Future employees will be entitled to a defined benefit pension plan with full indexing and early retirement at 60 years of age and 30 years of service.

4. Wages and Cost of Living Allowance: The wage increases provided for in the legislation (2% on February 1, 2013 and 2% on February 1, 2014) are maintained. There will be no wage increase for the final year (February 1, 2015-January 31, 2016). The starting rate for new employees hired on or after February 1, 2013 in Groups 1 and 2 will be as follows:

5. Mail Handler: $19.00;

   Postal Clerk: $19.00;

   Mail Despatcher: $19.14;

   Letter Carrier: $19.00;

   Relief Letter Carrier: $19.51;

   Mail Service Courier: $19.00;

   Relief Mail Service Courier: $19.51

   Once an employee becomes indeterminate, he/she shall receive a yearly increase based on a 7-step scale until they reach the maximum rate of pay, which will be the same as current employees.

   The Cost of Living Allowance (COLA) will be the same formula as exists in the current collective agreement. For 2016, the COLA will trigger if inflation reaches 2.67%.

5. Sick Leave: The current sick leave plan will be replaced by a short-term disability plan (STD). The STD has some improvements over the offer made by CPC in June 2011, but it is largely the same with respect to levels of pay (70%), number of personal days, the waiting period and the ability to use existing sick leave credits to “top up” STD payments to 100% of wages. The STD would take effect January 1, 2013. A payment of $200.00 (full-time) and $100.00 (part-time) for regular employees who are on strength will be issued on or before March 31, 2013.

6. Retiree Health Benefits: The current Extended Health Care Plan (EHCP) for retirees will be maintained. However, if an employee retires on or after April 1, 2013, the employee premiums will increase to 35% (from 25%) and CPC’s contribution will be 65%.

7. Dental Plan: Effective on the date of signing, the 2011 Dental Fee Schedule will apply. On April 1, 2013, the 2012 Schedule will apply, and the 2013 Schedule will apply effective April 1, 2014. On April 1, 2015, the 2014 schedule will apply.

8. Video Encoding System (VES): The protection from contracting out VES work is maintained, but the restriction contained in Appendix EE concerning the creation of a separate section is eliminated.

9. Injury-on-Duty Pay: The rate of pay from Canada Post for employees on Workers Compensation shall be 75% (currently 100%). Since WCB payments are not taxable the effective salary during injury-on-duty leave will be approximately 100% after income tax return.

10. Wash-Up Period: The 5 minute wash-up period at the end of shift is eliminated.

11. Birth or Adoption Leave: Increased to 2 days (currently 1 day).

12. Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing Employees: Improved provisions for interpretation.

13. Discrimination: Gender expression added to the prohibited grounds of discrimination.

14. Driver’s Licence: In cases where a unit has a majority of motorized letter carrier routes CPC would have the right to require an employee wishing to obtain a letter carrier assignment to have an appropriate driver’s licence. Upon request employees must provide a driver’s licence abstract or consent to CPC obtaining one.

15. Compensatory Time Off for Groups 1 and 2: Employees in Group 1 to be permitted to convert overtime hours into compensatory time off. For both groups, only five (5) days can be carried over to the next year.  Employees will be able to have some or all of the compensatory time paid out at four times during the year.

16. Corporate Retail Outlets: There will be no change in the protections for Corporate Retail Outlets. CPC will continue to be required to maintain 493 Corporate Retail Counters employing CUPW members.

17. Pregnant Employees: Protections for the precautionary cessation of work for pregnant employees to be included in Article 33.

18. Uniforms: Employees who have notified the employer that they are retiring or resigning will not be able to order uniforms during the 90 days prior to their expected date of termination of employment.

19. Renewal of Agreements (Appendix C): All written agreements reached regarding implementation of Postal Transformation shall remain in effect until January 31, 2016.

20. No Contracting Out: Maintenance work on small parcel bundle sorter included and protections extended until January 31, 2016.

21. Appendix V: New provisions which provide for greater time certainty included.

22. Appendixes CC and DD: Provisions extended to January 31, 2016.

23. Appendixes C-1, EE, FF, GG, JJ and KK, PP, QQ, RR: Deletion of these Appendixes.

24. Appendix HH: New provisions to promote the hiring of aboriginal employees.

25. Appendix T: Service Expansion: Inclusion of new projects on the environment, retail sales training, delivery of medication.

26. Seniority: Improvements in Article 11 and Appendix MM.

 

These are the main points of the tentative agreement that was reached with Canada Post. The Union is now preparing all the necessary documents, including a complete draft of all the changes to the current agreement, to help you make an informed decision.

This decision will be yours to make. Please participate in this decision by voting at your local ratification meetings.