The new collective agreement between PSAC and Parks Canada Agency was signed late last week. The deal was ratified by Parks members on November 4. The new collective agreement gives over 6,000 Parks workers a competitive economic increase, greater parity with the core public service, no concessions, and improved working conditions and job security.
Implementation period begins
The formal signing of the agreement means new contract terms are now in effect, with the exception of monetary provisions which are retroactive. Parks Canada has 180 days to implement wage increases, wage adjustments and allowances.
As explained in the contract ratification kit, in view of this extended implementation timeline, PSAC negotiated a $500 lump sum payment for members into these new contracts. An additional $50 will be added for every subsequent 90-day delay.
Please keep your contact information up to date via the member portal to continue receiving information about implementation of collective agreements and the Phoenix settlement.
Treasury Board has provided PSAC with a letter from CRA setting out its preliminary view that the general damages in the Phoenix settlement agreement are taxable. This letter, which was prepared at Treasury Board’s request and without PSAC’s input, is not a formal tax ruling and PSAC is contesting this conclusion.
PSAC maintains that general damages paid to all employees for “stress, aggravation, and pain and suffering” and for the late implementation of collective agreements are non-taxable, as CRA has acknowledged other specific damages in the settlement should be treated.
We carefully negotiated an agreement that reflects a wide range of impacts suffered by PSAC members, including the significant emotional toll that the implementation of the Phoenix Pay System had on them. The tax treatment of the general damages should reflect the purpose of that compensation. The letter from CRA contains numerous critical factual errors and misapplies the relevant income tax principles on this issue.
We have communicated with both Treasury Board and the CRA about our concerns and will continue to work to resolve these issues. Our goal is to ensure PSAC members receive the full compensation they deserve and that we avoid any time consuming and complex tax disputes for individual members.
The resolution of these issues is of extreme importance to PSAC and we will continue to update members as we work to bring this to a conclusion. We will also update members as soon as we receive a projected timeline from Treasury Board as to when members can expect to receive their payments.
Treasury Board and other agencies changed their guidelines around the use of 699 leave — leave with pay for other reasons — in November, forcing federal public service workers to exhaust all of their paid leave before they can use 699 leave.
The changes disproportionately impact marginalized groups who have been the hardest hit by the pandemic, including women, racialized employees, workers with disabilities and public service workers with family obligations.
Parents who need to pull their sick kids out of school or daycare, or workers caring for elderly loved ones are now expected to use up their vacation and sick leave because of circumstances out of their control. And recent lockdowns in provinces across the country have made the crisis for workers even more difficult.
This violates both our members’ collective agreements and workers’ rights under the Canadian Human Rights Act. PSAC will also be filing a human rights complaint with the Canadian Human Rights Commission.
Workers have a right to use 699 leave because we negotiated it into their collective agreements; it cannot be taken away arbitrarily by managers. Treasury Board’s changes are out of touch with the public health crisis facing Canadians and impacts the well-being of public service workers.
PSAC is committed to ensuring that all our members, and especially women, caregivers, racialized workers and workers with disabilities, continue to have the necessary support and leave with pay they need during the pandemic.
Canadians who have been working from home during the pandemic will be eligible for a new tax deduction of up to $400 to cover their home office expenses in 2020.
Employees who worked from home at least 50 per cent of the time, over a period of at least four consecutive weeks or more due to the pandemic will be eligible for the deduction. Workers can claim $2 for each day they worked from home, up to a maximum of $400, without the need for employers to sign additional paperwork.
Those who still want to make larger claims for home office expenses can still do so with a new simplified process.
The streamlined expense claim will simplify the lives of workers while allowing our members at the Canada Revenue Agency to focus on providing financial relief to other vulnerable Canadians.
What would you like to see in your next collective agreement? Improved arrangements for teleworking? Better work-life balance? More support for mental health? This is your opportunity to share your ideas with us. Your participation is crucial to our strength as a union.
It’s quick and simple. If you don’t have an account on our site, you can create one now.
We are accepting input until January 31, 2021.
Your component union and PSAC will then review all your proposals and bring them to the next bargaining conference, to be held this spring, where delegates from locals across the country will prioritize them for negotiations. Talks for the next contracts are expected to begin in the summer of 2021.
The current collective agreements expire on the following dates:
PA: June 20, 2021 TC: June 21, 2021 SV: August 4, 2021 EB: June 30, 2021
Please keep your contact information up to date via the member portal to receive more updates as we prepare to negotiate your next contract.
International Human Rights Day is a day to celebrate and recommit to advancing human rights here at home and globally.
Seventy-two years ago, on December 10, 1948, the United Nations adopted the Declaration of Human Rights. It was a revolutionary document for the times.
The world was just emerging from a brutal war that killed 75 million people. Workers and others around the globe were demanding a better world. They wanted peace. They wanted jobs. And they wanted an end to all forms of discrimination. They knew there can be no peace without equity, no peace without justice. And the powerful nations of the world had no choice but to respond.
For the past nine months we have been going through another global upheaval and Canada’s marginalized communities have been hardest hit by COVID-19 – people with disabilities, Indigenous, racialized and Black communities, seniors, women, LGBTQ2+ communities, as well as low-income, unemployed and homeless people.
The pandemic has shined a light on deep-rooted historical and ongoing inequities like disproportionate police violence towards Black and Indigenous peoples. These same groups, including persons with disabilities have suffered the most, and so have women, because they hold such a high proportion of front-line, low-paid, dangerous jobs. Women, more than men, have ended up doing most of the child care and eldercare and have ended up having to leave their jobs or reducing their work hours.
Now, as we slowly emerge from the global pandemic, we too must demand a better world and we must organize for the change we want. The pandemic exposed the long-standing and deep systemic inequity in this country. We have to uproot that inequity.
In Canada, that means pushing the federal government to:
Follow through on its commitments to build a universal, affordable and high quality child care system across Canada;
Protect seniors and our most vulnerable by taking the profit out of long-term care;
Make concrete progress and properly fund its commitments to increase diversity and inclusion in workplaces and stamp out systemic racism across Canada;
Deliver on the implement the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP)
A just recovery from the pandemic must and will be PSAC’s priority.
The Public Service Alliance of Canada supports the legal action taken on behalf of nearly 30,000 past and present federal public service workers who identify as Black, Caribbean or of African descent. PSAC intends to serve as an intervener in the class action lawsuit filed against the Government of Canada by Black public service workers who have been subjected to discriminatory hiring and promotional practices.
Anti-Black racism is prevalent in Canadian society and the federal public service has not been immune. For far too long, many of our members have experienced the pain of Black employee exclusion; the systemic practice of limiting skilled Black workers from career advancement opportunities and being disproportionally underrepresented in management and high-ranking positions in the federal public service.
The class action, which has been filed with the Federal Court of Canada, argues that Black employee exclusion has led to economic and psychological harm for thousands of public service workers since the 1970s. The claim calls on the federal government to implement a plan to truly diversify the federal public service and provide restitution to tens of thousands of Black public service workers.
PSAC’s support of this class action strongly aligns with the union’s ongoing fight against anti-Black racism.
“Canada’s public service presents itself as a ‘merit-based, representative and non-partisan organization that serves all Canadians,’” said Chris Aylward, PSAC national president. “While laudable as a principle, many Canadians, particularly Black Canadians, have experienced a different reality. The government must do what is necessary to right these wrongs and ensure that these injustices do not continue.”
PSAC echoes the calls of our Black public service members. The federal government must identify and tear down systemic barriers in its human resources practices. It must take action to increase diversity and inclusion within its ranks, especially in positions of leadership. We also expect the government to listen to Black workers and take their lead on how to correct this gross injustice.
This is not the correct form to request PSAC’s Phoenix settlement of up to $2500.
This form is to request the financial equivalent of up to 5 days of leave, which was the settlement signed by all other federal bargaining agents, except PSAC.
Retired or former PSAC members who meet the eligibility criteria will receive financial compensation for Phoenix damages for each fiscal year for which they are eligible.
To receive compensation, retired or former employees will have to file a similar claim through Treasury Board. However, the details and the link to the claim form have not been made available by the federal government yet. We will share the link to the form once it becomes available.
Looking for more information on the Phoenix damages settlement? Check out our most frequently asked questions. Please keep your contact information up to date via the member portal to continue receiving information about the Phoenix settlement.
On National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women, PSAC remembers the fourteen young women who were killed at l’École Polytechnique on December 6, 1989, only because they were women, and today, PSAC also recommits to ending all forms of gender-based violence.
On this day, we remember:
Geneviève Bergeron
Hélène Colgan
Nathalie Croteau
Barbara Daigneault
Anne-Marie Edward
Maud Haviernick
Barbara Klucznik Widajewicz
Maryse Laganière
Maryse Leclair
Anne-Marie Lemay
Sonia Pelletier
Michèle Richard
Annie St-Arneault
Annie Turcotte
In Canada today:
75,000 women and children seek shelter from violence and abuse each year;
Homicide rates are seven times higher for Indigenous women and girls than amongst non-Indigenous women and girls;
Immigrant women are more vulnerable due to economic dependence, language barriers and a lack of knowledge about community resources;
Trans women are almost twice as likely as cisgender women to experience gender-based violence in their lifetime;
Women with physical and cognitive impairments experience violence two to three times more often than women living without impairments.
COVID-19 makes it harder to fight gender-based violence. Job loss, food insecurity or the fear of contracting the virus can trigger domestic violence. Social isolation and quarantines make it harder to access shelters or sexual assault centres. Those living in rural, remote and northern regions, immigrants and refugees and Indigenous women continue to be the most vulnerable populations, and the pandemic is isolating them more than ever before.
The heightened risks caused by the pandemic require immediate action. PSAC calls on all levels of government to:
Provide increased emergency funding to women’s shelters and sexual assault support centres, and identify ways to make services accessible in the context of physical distancing measures;
Work with health facilities and community organizations to quickly identify available local resources;
Include essential services to address violence against women in their response plan for COVID-19.
PSAC’s work to prevent violence against women continues. Our union is proud to have negotiated 10 days of paid domestic violence leave in all new federal government collective agreements to ensure those facing domestic violence begin to get the support they need. We also continue to pressure governments to implement all recommendations from the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls report, and to eliminate barriers to accessing legal and counselling support for women experiencing violence.
Treasury Board and the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) have provided PSAC with a payment schedule for the implementation of monetary provisions now that the PA, EB, TC, SV and PSAC-UTE collective agreements have been signed.
Economic increase and adjustments pay cheque date
Retroactive pay cheque date
$500 lump sum (for late implementation) pay cheque date
$400 lump sum pay cheque date (only for UTE members)
PA
Nov. 25, 2020
Feb. 3, 2021
Apr. 14, 2021
TC
Dec. 23, 2020
Mar. 17, 2021
Apr. 14, 2021
SV
Dec. 23, 2020
Mar. 17, 2021
Apr. 28, 2021
EB
Feb. 17, 2021
Apr. 14, 2021
Apr. 28, 2021
UTE
Dec. 23, 2020
Spring 2021
Spring 2021
Dec. 23, 2020
This schedule is tentative and Treasury Board and CRA may still make changes.
Payment schedules for the Phoenix settlement have still not been finalized by Treasury Board and CRA. Please keep your contact information up to date via the member portal to continue receiving information about the implementation of collective agreements and the Phoenix settlement.
CFIA and Parks Canada units
PSAC is working with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency and Parks Canada to finalize the text and pay grids of the new agreements – ratified in November – and expects to sign both new contracts shortly.
FB bargaining
The Border Services (FB) bargaining unit remains in talks with Treasury Board and the Canada Border Service Agency. Please check PSAC’s website for the latest developments.
