February 2009
Fact Sheet
Pay inequities will persist under the Expenditure Restraint Act
When PSAC entered into discussions with Treasury Board in November 2008, both parties aimed to develop a framework for settlement for the five Treasury Board bargaining units represented by the union.
During the discussions, it quickly became apparent that there was no common ground on which to reach a settlement for the Technical Services (TC) group, despite the fact that the parties had recognized historic pay anomalies between our members in the Technical Services unit and comparable workers elsewhere in the economy.
As a result, PSAC and Treasury Board jointly requested that the Public Service Labour Relations Board (PSLRB) conduct an independent pay study. The results of that study were provided to the parties in 2008 and were intended to provide a basis for both the negotiation and the arbitration processes.
Now, Section 23 of the Expenditure Restraint Act of Bill C-10 could make the results of the pay study meaningless.
This provision is exactly opposite of both the spirit and intent of our November 2008 discussions with senior representatives of the Treasury Board, where it was clearly decided that the TC group would be allowed to continue on a course that would see the issues in dispute addressed at arbitration.
Another of our Treasury Board units may also feel the effects of Section 23. A pay study for the Education and Library Science (EB) unit, negotiated back in 2004, is in the final stages of completion. Section 23 could mean that long-standing pay inequities may not be addressed.
The PSAC believes that the Expenditure Restraint Act is unnecessary from an economic perspective, contrary to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms and will severely damage labour relations.
As a result, Bill C-10 should be amended by deleting the Expenditure Restraint provisions in their entirety. Failing that, negotiated collective agreements or arbitration awards must be permitted to address pay studies conducted jointly by the union and the Treasury Board or under the auspices of the PSLRB.
Should the Expenditure Restraint Act remain a part of Bill C-10, we urge Parliament to amend Section 23 (a) of the Expenditure Restraint Act by adding “unless the restructuring of rates of pay is applied on the basis of a joint Union/Treasury Board pay study or a pay study undertaken by the PSLRB.”
Date Modified : 2010/07/29
