OPSEU crashes Premier Wynnes new years levee

Premier Kathleen Wynnes SUV had to punch through a throng of Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU) members to get.

Premier Wynne enters the Noor Community Centre.|OPSEU demonstrators block the gates.|Gord Longhi

Premier Kathleen Wynnes SUV had to punch through a throng of Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU) members to get to her levee at the Noor Cultural Centre Sunday (January 11).

Union members were demonstrating on behalf of 35,000 OPSEU employees whore threatening to go on strike in the face of a government proposal to freeze wages for two years and reduce wages of new government employees by 5 per cent.

The government is also proposing that the cost of any salary adjustments for the remainder of a new collective agreements term be offset by savings elsewhere, namely, cuts to drug benefits. For seasonal employees, health benefits would no longer be covered unless they pay premiums directly to the insurance carrier. Read the Ontario government’s proposals to amend the collective agreement here.

The union says the governments proposed cuts get surgical in the details over seniority, job description reviews, probationary periods, compensation for injured workers and eliminating certain overtime provisions.

The Premier invited a small delegation of OPSEU representatives inside for a quick chat. Wynnes chief of staff Tom Teahen explained that it was intended as a private meeting and it would be wrong to give the impression that the premier was bargaining or negotiating with the union.

Along with bargaining team members Roxanne Barnes and Gord Longhi, OPSEU president Smokey Thomas emerged from the meeting to say they delivered a stern message to the premier: You either try to get us a fair deal or youre going to have a real nasty strike, said Thomas.

Among the unions demands: that the province not contract out any public service work without public consultation and evidence of improved services and cost savings. Ontario Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk reported recently that infrastructure contracts cost taxpayers an extra $8 billion than they would have cost if the government kept the projects in-house.

We raised several real-life examples where privatization is hurting the public, said Thomas.

OPSEU members sported buttons and signs at the demo reading We can do it better, faster, fairer.

Rick Weaver, a health and safety enforcement officer with the Ministry of Labour, says a hiring freeze on enforcement officers has already reduced the number of inspectors in his unit from 17 to 7, which means they no longer conduct proactive safety inspections and are instead overburdened with investigating critical accidents. Im literally going from someone whos lost their fingers, to workplace fatalities. Its really horrible what we see on a day to day basis.

Michel Bisaillon, a corrections officer from North Bay, also complains of short-staffing. Youre working in an environment that is constantly filled with conflict and chaos, he says. When you have inmates three or four to a cell on lockdown for as long as a week because you dont have enough staff to cover the floor, thats really bad news.

Under the Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act, before either party can be in a legal position to strike, or the government lock out, what essential services need to be maintained must be negotiated. If a tentative agreement isnt reached by January 19 either side can trigger essential services bargaining, which will move the process one step closer to a strike.

OPSEUs objective is to bargain a fair collective agreement that protects public services and our members jobs without a strike. But for that happen the government will have to withdraw its concession demands, says OPSEU vice-president Myles Magner.

Inside the Noor, Premier Wynne acknowledged the protest by saying, People are free to say to their politicians We dont like what youre doing.

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