This afternoon, we received global offers from Canada Post for both the Urban Operations and RSMC bargaining units. Canada Post was clear that these are not to be taken as final offers, but proposals to get discussions moving towards a settlement.
This is a critical stage in our bargaining process. As in the past, we will do everything possible to achieve an agreement without a strike. Over the decades, we’ve seen time and again that when bargaining is tough, the only thing that gets Canada Post Corporation (CPC) moving is a powerful strike mandate – it’s where our bargaining power really comes from. Still, if we have not reached agreements by September 26, 2018, we will have to be ready for some type of job action. In striking down the back-to-work legislation of 2012, Justice Firestone found that our right to strike is protected by the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Therefore, management will have to negotiate. This time, they can’t sit back and wait for back-to-work legislation to impose their rollbacks.
More than ever, we have momentum on our campaigns, and a window of opportunity to translate this momentum in to bargaining support, which may become critical in weeks to come. Summer brings opportunities for Locals to get involved in events and spread our campaign messages: participating in community fairs, movie nights, parades and barbecues are just a few examples of positive and energetic places for actions – and to have a little fun with our neighbours while drumming up support.
Group 1 staffing has been a major concern for many years. In fact, the ratio of full-time hours is even lower now than when we first negotiated Appendix “P” in 1999.
Media Release - OTTAWA – Door-to-door protected for millions, but fight to restore the cuts carries on. This morning, after a year of review and another year of delays, the federal government finally made public its vision for a renewed Canada Post. Some four million households can now rest easy that their door-to-door service will not be cut, but more than 800,000 are still out in the cold.
This week, the Canadian Union of Postal Workers issued notice to bargain to Canada Post for both of our major bargaining units. After years of raucous labour-relations, attacks from government and violations of our constitutional right to free collective bargaining, there are many issues that must be resolved. The Urban Operations unit and the Rural and Suburban Mail Carriers unit will again meet the employer as one committee. Rural-Urban solidarity is key to achieving our demands.
Our National Executive Board has prepared this paper to facilitate a discussion with members – a discussion that will develop collective bargaining demands for the 2017-2018 negotiations. Currently the Urban Postal Operations unit (UPO) and the Rural and Suburban Mail Carriers (RSMCs) are under two distinct Collective Agreements (CAs). CUPW will eventually unify these units. Some sections below will lead to demands that either affect one CA or the other (should we not to gain unity in this round), or else create classification-specific language in a unified CA.
Our allies are working with us across the country to put postal services front and centre. Over the past few months, they’ve put out leaflets and petitions, and even gone on a cross-country tour to put pressure on Canada Post and the government. With their help, we’ve been able to gain some of the strongest public support in years on key issues like pay equity, postal banking and pensions.
The draft versions of both agreements will go to the printer shortly and in the meantime we will continue to issue bulletins on the various changes to the two collective agreements. Today’s bulletin will provide details on the changes to parcel delivery and unaddressed admail for Urban letter carriers.
Canada Post isn’t taking some of our key negotiations issues seriously. We want the Liberal government to use its considerable influence to ensure that a government institution like Canada Post is onside with its objectives of improving pensions, pay equity and public postal service. Please bring your friends and family and join us in Montreal.
Support Postal Banking - Download and Sign the Petition
Canada needs a postal bank. Thousands of rural towns and villages in our country do not have a bank, but many of them have a post office that could provide financial services. As well, nearly two million Canadians desperately need an alternative to payday lenders. A postal bank could be that alternative. Download and sign the petition urging the Government of Canada to instruct Canada Post to add postal banking, with a mandate for financial inclusion.
Tomorrow, August 20, your Negotiating Committee will return to the bargaining table to present new global offers for both postal bargaining units to Canada Post.
Unfortunately, our scheduled meetings for Friday, August 15th and Monday, August 18th, have been postponed. The Federal mediators will not be able to assist CUPW and CPC due to their current involvement in the Air Canada negotiations.
This September, CUPW joins its Malayali brothers and sisters with joy and pride to observe Onam celebrations in Canada. Onam is one of the most significant regional festivals celebrated in Kerala, the southernmost state of India.
After pressing the Employer to come back to the bargaining table early last week, we received a response from Canada Post CEO Doug Ettinger on Friday evening, just hours after we posted Bulletin 128, “CUPW is Waiting for Canada Post.” In his letter, Mr. Ettinger stuck to the lines we’ve heard from Canada Post for many months now.
A week ago, CUPW members spoke loudly and rejected what Canada Post called its “best and final” offers. The goal of the Canadian Union of Postal Workers remains negotiating ratifiable collective agreements which meet postal workers’ needs, help grow the current services provided by a public post office and to better serve Canadians with new services.
Last week, postal workers decisively rejected Canada Post’s “best and final offers” in the government-forced vote. With a turnout of over 80%, nearly 70% of our members told Canada Post, “No, these offers won’t do it!”
Every employer in the Federal and Provincial sector has been watching us. Rejecting these offers was a victory not only for our Union, but for the labour movement as a whole.
To all CUPW members,
Thank you for showing up, for standing together, and for participating in the government forced vote. Regardless of how you voted, your participation was an act of solidarity and strength. And for those who voted to reject the final offers, your decision sent a powerful message: “We know our worth, and we deserve better”.
After almost two weeks of voting, the results are now in: CUPW members in both bargaining units have spoken, and they have rejected Canada Post’s global offers.
We’ve now entered the second and final week of the government-imposed forced vote on Canada Post’s “final” offers. As of July 28, 69 % of Urban members and 71.4 % of RSMC members have already casted their vote. Voting continues until 5 pm EST on August 1.
On March 24, 2021, the House of Commons voted to designate August 1st as Emancipation Day to commemorate the slavery abolition act of 1833, which took effect in 1834 and paved the way for the liberation of over 800,000 enslaved Black people across the “British Empire”, including parts of the Caribbean, Africa, South America and Canada.