Employer seeks to eliminate scheduling rights, attacks Care and Nurturing Leave.
On January 7-10, the PSAC/CIU’s Border Services (FB) bargaining team kicked off a new round of bargaining, meeting with Treasury Board and Canada Border Services Agency (TB/CBSA) negotiators and exchanging proposals.
The team made it clear to the TB/CBSA that the union’s goals for this round of bargaining are to further close the gap with the broader law enforcement community, fix problems in the workplace and ensure new rights and protections.
Below are some key proposals from PSAC/CIU:
New protections
- New protections in the context of discipline, and protections against abuse of authority and harassment.
- Elimination of name tags for uniformed officers, replacing them with badge numbers.
- New protections in the context of firearm and control defence tactics re-certification.
- Whistleblowing protections so that union members can expose wrongdoing.
Appropriate pay for recruits and new officers
- Immediate transition to the FB-3 pay rate upon graduation from Rigaud.
Work-life balance
- Improvements to various leave provisions.
- Fixes to on-going scheduling and overtime problems.
- Telework options for Trade Compliance and other non-uniformed members.
- Protections that would ensure improved access to Leave with Income Averaging.
Retirement Reform
- Seeking a commitment from Treasury Board and CBSA in bargaining for an early retirement regime comparable to other federal law enforcement agencies.
The bargaining team will be making proposals concerning wages once it has had the opportunity to analyze payroll and demographic data provided by the TB/CBSA. PSAC/CIU will also be conducting a survey on compensation in the broader law enforcement community in Canada.
Management tabled a number of significant concessions, from the elimination of scheduling rights to draconian changes to the Care and Nurturing Leave. While the union told management it is committed to bargaining in good faith, the union also made it clear it will not accept concessions.
The next bargaining session is scheduled for February 26.
A version of this article was first posted on the PSAC website.
