No. 8

July 22, 1997

Q.I keep seeing Treasury Board's newspaper ads and I heard Treasury Board legal counsel, Mary Eberts, say that they are waiting for the PSAC to resume negotiations. What's happening?

A.What Mary Eberts didn't say is that it's Treasury Board which is refusing to resume negotiations. They won't return to the table unless the Alliance changes its position on the date of retroactivity; a position which is in accordance with CHRC policy and for which there's a strong legal precedent. If the Alliance were to change its position, many members would be deprived of payments they are owed. Their ads also say that equity is a right, yet Treasury Board knows its offer does not meet equity requirements.

Q.The Alliance is asking for an awful lot more money than Treasury Board has offered. Aren't we being greedy?

A.Our calculations would give employees in female-dominated groups the same rate of pay as the average rate of pay received by males performing work of equal value. That seems only fair and is what was done in past complaints.

Q.Why can't we just take what Treasury Board is offering now and get the rest when the Tribunal rules?

A.Treasury Board will not make any payments now unless we give up the right to anything more.

Q.Are funds available for Treasury Board to pay us what we are owed?

A.Yes. In June 1996, a spokesperson for the President of the Treasury Board said in the House of Commons that funds were set aside in the 1995 budget to resolve pay equity complaints with the PSAC.

Q.So why do these ads keep talking about fairness for Canadian taxpayers?

A.Why indeed, when Treasury Board keeps adding to the cost. Treasury Board is paying Mary Eberts $2,325 per day, which is more than many PSAC members make in a month. A CR 4 earns approximately $2,429 per month, a CR 3 about $2,187, and a word processing operator about $2,055. All of these figures (including Mary Eberts' pay) are based on a 7.5 hour work day. Every full-page ad in the Ottawa Citizen, Ottawa Sun and Le Droit costs taxpayers a total of about $16,000. The recent Ekos poll (which showed that Canadians support pay equity) wasted more money. The consultant hired for the equal pay study in the 1980s received well over a million dollars in U.S. funds and, in addition, there were about 75 person years of public service time spent on planning the study and pay equity job evaluations, which Treasury Board proceeded to ignore. Once Treasury Board found out how much money was owed, its staff and a number of outside consultants worked on tactics to avoid paying before the January 1990 partial payments were announced. Throughout the Tribunal hearings from 1991 to 1997, up to four Department of Justice lawyers at a time and countless Treasury Board staff provided increasingly bizarre and constantly changing arguments to the Tribunal. This strategy culminated in a final submission which claimed the amount paid in 1990 was actually far more than was owed. In addition, the costs incurred by the Canadian Human Rights Commission in carrying the case against Treasury Board could also be included since the CHRC gets its budget from none other than (you guessed it!) Treasury Board. The three Tribunal members, two of whom travelled weekly from British Columbia and one from NewBrunswick, were also paid by the taxpayers, although not directly by Treasury Board. The chair received $450 per day, and each of the members were paid $325 per day. The Tribunal hearings lasted nearly six years and were delayed many times by Treasury Board.

Q.Can members do something to get things moving?

A.Talk to other people at your worksite. Plan an event together to support pay equity. Call your PSAC Regional Office to get ribbons and other materials and to link up with activities they are planning. Phone numbers for all Regional Offices and Component National Offices appeared in the last bulletin. If you haven't already done so, write or e-mail your Member of Parliament and let him or her know of your frustration that money appears to be available to fight pay equity but not to pay those who deserve and need it most - low-paid women who work for the federal government.