While our government seems intent on scrapping our sick leave, the federal government south of the border is trying to extend sick leave provisions to all Americans. That’s right: in yesterday’s State of the Union Address, President Barack Obama made the case for paid sick leave.

“Forty-three million workers have no paid sick leave,” declared the President, last night. “Forty-three million. Think about that.”

“That forces too many parents to make the gut-wrenching choice between a paycheck and a sick kid at home,” he added.

President Obama implored Congress to send him a bill that would give every American the opportunity to earn seven days of paid sick leave per year.

“It’s the right thing to do.”

The move is being applauded by many, including the National Partnership for Women and Families.

“As a large and growing body of research, and the experiences of millions of workers and businesses, show policies that enable workers to care for themselves and their families without risking their jobs or economic security are good for workers, families, businesses and our economy,” said the organization in a press release, last week.

Unfortunately, the proposal is sure to face an uphill battle; both houses of Congress are currently controlled by Republicans.

Meanwhile, other battles for paid sick leave are being fought at the state level. In Massachusetts, voters passed a ballot initiative last November that requires employers with more than eleven employees to provide one paid hour of sick leave for every 30 hours worked, up to 40 hours per year.

The new law also allows employees to carry over up to 40 hours into the following year. It takes effect on July 1, 2015.

In California, the state legislature passed a similar law in 2014. It also grants one hour per 30 hours worked. It, too, takes effect in July of this year.

Of course, these laws don’t apply to employees covered by a collective agreement that already provides sick leave – but they do offer some much-needed stability to full-time, part-time and temporary workers who had previously been working without guaranteed paid sick leave.

Meanwhile, in Canada

This side of the border, the PSAC continues to fight the government’s proposal to scrap their members’ existing sick-leave plan and replace it with a short-term disability plan.

The government’s proposal would see paid sick days scaled down from 15 to just 6, which will likely lead to employees coming to work when they’re sick.

Related content: Find out the consequences of presenteeism in The Truth Behind Harper’s Go-To-Work-Sick Plan

In Canada, only one province mandates paid sick leave for non-unionized workers. Employees in Prince Edward Island are entitled to one paid sick day per year… only after working five consecutive years for the same employer.

Perhaps instead of taking away our hard-earned sick leave, our government ought to focus on making sure every Canadian has a strong safety net when they or a member of their family are ill.

You can help support the fight for paid sick leave for all Canadians by signing the PSAC’s pledge.

This year, Winterlude is sure to be even more exciting than usual! On Sunday February 1, at Ottawa’s Landsdowne Park, an outrageous amount of snowpeople will be built in an effort to break the Guinness World Record for the most snowmen built in one hour – it’s also an opportunity to raise money for mental health charities in the capital.

Our members who work at Amethyst Women’s Addiction Centre will be among the people feverishly building snowpeople; they are raising money to help women struggling with addictions. Best of all: they’ve invited UNE members and their families to join the fun!

“We’re starting to get people to sign up; everyone’s very excited for the event,” said Geneviève Charest, community relations coordinator at Amethyst. “It’s a great family activity. It’s free and you get to raise money for your favourite organization. Hopefully a lot of people will be able to come out and enjoy that with us.”

Amethyst has been an important part of Ottawa’s community since 1979 – a time when addiction services and theories were very much informed by the experience of middle-class white men. Back then, few services took into account the distinct realities of women and how these relate to substance abuse.

“What’s different about Amethyst is that we really talk to the whole person,” explained Charest. “We don’t just treat the addiction directly; we talk about what’s happening in the person’s life, what’s happening at school, at work, with their friends, their partner, their family. We get into the everyday issues that are causing them to turn to alcohol or other substances.”

“That holistic approach is a really important part of recovery, here at Amethyst.”

At different times of the year, the organization also holds workshops that go beyond substance abuse and focus on developing healthy self-esteem. There are workshops on dealing with anger, surviving sexual abuse, and self-assertiveness, among others.

Amethyst’s all-women environment is also an important part of having its participants open up and share – and ultimately heal.

“Women can come here and really feel comfortable talking about issues that they may not feel comfortable talking about in front of men,” said Charest. “A lot of women come to us with a past that includes trauma, sexual abuse or violence – that can be very hard to talk about if there’s a man around. Women can really feel safe talking about issues that affect women.”

“We’re all sisters here; we get to delve into those issues together.”

If you’d like to support the important work of Amethyst – and don’t mind helping to build over 1,500 snowpeople in the process – you can join team Amethyst by getting your free ticket on Eventbrite by clicking this link. You can also get tickets on-site, at 10 a.m. on February 1 (the event starts at 11 a.m.).

If you can’t attend, but would still like to help, you can send a donation via Eventbrite or through Paypal, on Amethyst’s website. 

On behalf of everyone at the Union of National Employees, I’d like to wish you all a bright and joyous holiday season. Whether you’re taking some vacation or just enjoying a few days off, I hope you take the time to relax and spend quality time with friends and family.

I also want to thank you for the important work you do on behalf of Canadians. If there’s one thing I know, it’s just how hard our members work. The Harper government would like to portray us in a different light, but I know all too well that everyone is being asked to do more with less – and I know how difficult that makes it for you to perform work that lives up to what Canadians deserve.

It’s a message that we’ve been putting out there for some time; we want the public to know how our national treasures are hurting – how the institutions responsible for our heritage just can’t preserve and maintain important pieces of our history – how decisions are being base on ideology over science and facts.

And the list goes on.

And unfortunately, the attacks aren’t stopping. There’s now a very public attack on our paid sick leave. And as we speak, we’re getting ready for some tough negotiations at the bargaining table. If you haven’t already, please take a moment to go to the PSAC’s website and sign the pledge in support of paid sick leave for all Canadians.

Every voice counts right now.

That said, it’s not all doom and gloom. As you may know, 2015 is soon upon us. And with the New Year comes the promise of federal elections. Trust me: all I want for 2015 is a government that respects public services and the people who provide them on behalf of Canadians.

But that won’t happen without some hard work. It’s important for everyone to talk about the work they do with their friends and family. It’s up to all of us to tell them how we’ve seen our national treasures and public services deteriorate over the horrible Harper years. We’re certainly going to blast that message from the rooftops; but we need everyone to organize and mobilize.

So please stay in touch. We want to keep the lines of communication open. We want to hear your concerns and we want to make sure you have a way of knowing what we’re doing on your behalf. You can stay in touch by liking us on Facebook, following us on Twitter or signing up for our e-newsletter.

And finally, I’d just like to take a moment to extend a sincere thank you to everyone who plays an instrumental role in our union. The work we do simply wouldn’t be possible without the hard work and dedication of countless volunteers. I’m proud to call these champions of fairness and justice my union brothers and sisters.

Once again, I wish you the most joyous holiday season and a happy New Year.

Doug Marshall
National President
Union of National Employees

Reminder: To allow our staff to spend some quality time with their families this holiday season, our office will be closed from December 25 to January 4.

When we last reported on the Canada Science and Technology Museum, it was slated to re-open in January 2015. That date was recently pushed to 2017 as evidence surfaced that the roof is in a much more dire condition.

A recent article by Ottawa Citizen’s Tom Spears revealed that engineers feared the roof could collapse this winter under a little less than a foot of snow.

“Cracks in the buckled ceiling revealed lumps of what appeared to be asbestos ready to fall into the lobby and exhibit areas. White powder settling inside the building looked like asbestos too.

Plastic sheets draped over displays kept the water off, but dampness was everywhere.”

We knew it was bad, but not this bad.

“Retrofitting this kind of building to suit the environmental standards of museum conservation has provided salutary lessons in trying to make silk purses out of sow’s ears,” opined Robert Barclay, columnist at the Ottawa Citizen. “It is enormously expensive and rarely successful.”

But retrofitting is what the Conservative government intends to do. An $80 million band-aid solution was unveiled late last month; a plan to fix a crumbling museum that has been housed in an old warehouse since 1967. It’s a cheaper solution than building a new museum – plus, it has the added benefit of adding one more ribbon cutting in 2017 during Confederation’s 150^th anniversary.

But that’s precisely the kind of short-sightedness that got this museum its substandard home in the first place. Eager for just-one-more-ribbon-cutting, the federal government got its hands on a struggling bakery’s warehouse in the middle of an industrial park – and boom: a national science museum just in time for the centennial celebration. From the Ottawa Sun’s Ron Corbett:

It was cheap politics and the federal government kept on being cheap. In its first full year of operation, the budget of Canada’s newest museum was $333,000. In comparison, the National Gallery had a budget of $2.1 million that year.

The numbers never improved. The museum had to wait 10 years before it had money to start a school education program. It is still waiting for money to house 90 per cent of its permanent collection.

Fast-forward to May 2001, the Chrétien government was already looking into other options for the museum due to its aging infrastructure. A year later, a Canadian firm was selected to look into the cost of creating a new facility in a more central location. By 2006, Conservative cabinet minister Lawrence Cannon was getting himself in hot water over the “new” museum’s location – he wanted it in his riding, of course.

At the time, consultants were proposing a 1.2 million-square-foot museum that would do justice to our collective science and technology achievements. The increased space would have given a home to a great deal of the collection now housed in warehouses – the current building only allows for 2% of the museum’s collection to be displayed.

But by summer 2012, the government was clear that it wasn’t interested in building a new museum.

So instead of building a museum with an eye to the future – a museum that would instill pride in the hearts of all Canadians – the Conservatives are more interested in long-term pain for short-term gain.

In the end, our members at the Science and Technology Museum will continue to deliver an enriching and stimulating experience to all the bright minds, young and old, that step foot in the building – no matter the building. But we hold hope that one day, the little museum that made a bakery its quarters, will have a home that truly lives up to its importance.

Wanna dream a little? Check out these breathtaking pics from architects Provencher_Roy of what a NEW Canada Science and Technology museum could look like. 

There’s been great improvement in the work climate at the Office of the Auditor General, thanks to the hard work of the Local and the UNE. For the diligent Local executive there, a special meeting held last week provided an opportunity to showcase the progress that they have cultivated over the last two years.

“We recognized early on that there were a number of concerns at this particular workplace,” explained National President Doug Marshall. “I personally met with the Auditor General in January 2012 to talk about the workplace.”

“That’s what started the ball rolling.”

The UNE and the Local kept management’s feet to the fire; eventually management agreed to implement a number of changes to our members’ benefit.

These days, the Local is finding it easier to approach management and is often reaching solutions without having to resort to the formal grievance process.

“Management is now listening,” explained Local president Viviane Dugas Patry. “We also have noticed that members and employees feel safe to approach the Local and feel confident that the Local represents them.”

That’s a trend that also extended to health and safety, according to Franco Picciano, coordinator of member representation at the UNE, who also spoke during the meeting.

“There’s been a massive transformation,” declared Picciano. “We now get calls from people in the workplace who want to move health and safety issues forward because they feel comfortable going to the UNE. So, they are coming to us because (a) it gets dealt with and (b) they recognize that it gets dealt with in a professional manner.”

Viviane Patry Dugas, the Local president, has been assigned to a health and safety project aimed at bringing the OAG up to code. The Policy Health and Safety Committee has already conducted a comprehensive hazard assessment. There’s also a greater appreciation on the part of management of off-site risks, regional office issues and risks facing employees who work outside regular business hours.

There have also been some significant successes with regard to labour relations issues. Labour Relations Officer Leslie Sanderson informed the members that there is a greater deal of transparency when it comes to human resources processes. The resurgence of Union Management Consultation Committee meetings with senior management at the OAG has provided a valuable forum in which to engage the employer in discussions that concern our members. Also, the employer will be conducting its first classification review in 15 years and has started to apply the staffing policy more consistently.

“This just goes to show that when the union and the employer work together, everyone benefits,” concluded UNE National President Doug Marshall. “When labour-management consultation committees work well, both parties can come to solutions informally – can come to solutions faster – and can come to solutions that work for everyone.”

“We are here to fight for you and make positive changes in the workplace.”

The meeting was also the occasion for the Local to approve its standard local bylaws (reminder: a template for standard local bylaws can be found here). Regional Vice-President Patrice Rémillard was on hand to hold the vote, which yielded a unanimous approval.

The meeting concluded with an update on collective bargaining by PSAC Research Officer Shawn Vincent. The bargaining team is currently reviewing input it has received since February from the membership; it will be assembling a package of proposals shortly.

Vincent took the opportunity to talk about the tough battle ahead over sick leave. The government has been very vocal in its desire to drastically change our sick leave program as we know.

“That item has been the subject of discussion already – not just with PSAC, but with several other unions in the federal sphere,” explained Vincent.

“One of the very interesting things about this particular round of bargaining for federal public service workers – for the first time that I can remember, the federal unions that are party to the National Joint Council have signed a solidarity pact on this issue; none of them is interested in taking what the federal government is trying to sell us in terms of this radical change in sick leave.”

If you haven’t already, please visit the PSAC website and sign the pledge in support of paid sick leave for all Canadians.

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Looking for more information? Download the brochure that was distributed during this meeting.

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