Article 23

To be discussed given the separate Unified and Correctional Bargaining Unit collective agreements.

The Employer’s position is that the number of union leaves that currently cover both bargaining units should not be expanded or diminished.

The Team is open to discuss the number of Union leaves which are currently covered in  the Correctional Bargaining unit Collective Agreement.  The union reserves the right to negotiate changes to the number of union leaves that may be applicable and necessary for the new Correctional Bargaining Unit.  We are determined  to ensure no loses in this article

Article 49

Article 75

Effective sixty (60) days from the date of ratification, an employee shall be entitled to special leave of up to two (2) days per year to attend to unforeseen dependent and elder related care for the leave referenced in Articles 49.1 or 75.1.

For clarity, this leave shall be granted so long as the employee has remaining special and compassionate leave under Article 49.1 or Article 75.1.

Where possible, employees will be expected to give reasonable notice in respect of any leave of absence for the purposes of unforeseen dependent and elder related care. 

While it is good that the Employer finally recognizes the need for dependent and elder care, they however, want you to trade your bereavement time to use these days.

Legislative changes have now passed. The Employer proposes that the impact of the changes be discussed at the standalone sub-committee.

The team has given extensive attention to this new Legislation, and will oversee and include all gains for members within it.

Propose to amend the MCSCS Provincial Overtime Protocol to:

Eliminate the requirement to wait five (5) minutes after leaving a message or a page for an available overtime opportunity. Instead, where possible, the manager will leave a message or page for an employee and move onto the next call without waiting a set time period.

The manager will only be required to make one (1) call per calendar day to the employee, with respect to any overtime opportunity that is offered.

Overtime will accumulate over a consecutive six (6) calendar month rolling period instead of a four (4) calendar month rolling period.

The five minute window is important to allow people the opportunity to call back. The employer often ignores this provision and has to pay out overtime grievances. This is an erosion to your protection to fair and transparent overtime distribution.

Another Erosion would be limiting the number of calls in a day to 1 instead of 2 calls  Again, the employer has identified areas of the agreement that cost them money upon violation.

An example of how this would negatively impact a member would be:  the employer offering you “any” shift on a day that you are only signed for a dayshift.  That offer, of a shift you are not signed, would preclude your future opportunities under these proposed amendments.

Upon review ,these changes offer no immediate or future benefit to the membership. We have not received the employer rationale on these issues, which again appear to be purely concessional and obvious attempts to bypass our rights in the Collective Agreement and allow the employer to hire whoever they want, whenever they want.  

The Employer wishes to discuss the number, composition and related expenses of ministry committees.

We are awaiting clarification regarding this demand.   

The Employer is seeking to discuss the high level of sick leave usage across the Correctional Bargaining Unit, with a view to identifying measures to improve attendance across the bargaining unit.

The bargaining team is unsure of how the employer has measured the “high level” and has requested further information including, yet not limited to data and comparators. The employer has noted this is an item for discussion. It is the Bargaining Teams position to be diligent and well informed in responses to the employer’s non-monetary proposals. Your Bargaining Team continues to research responses to all items which will impact members.

Through a memorandum of agreement, upon agreement of the ministry, union and employee, to permit an employee who is permanently in a MCSCS management position to voluntarily return to the last permanent OPSEU Correctional Bargaining Unit position the employee held prior to being appointed to the permanent MCSCS management assignment.

The return of the employee to the Correctional Bargaining Unit would be contingent on there being a regular vacancy and that there would be no adverse impact on any member of the Correctional Bargaining Unit by way of displacement or change of assignment.

This does not benefit the Corrections Bargaining Unit.

In recognition of emerging mental health issues which is a key priority to address, the Employer proposes:

Establishing a Joint Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) Prevention Committee that would focus on PTSD prevention, intervention and recovery. The Committee would gather information, identify strategies and develop recommendations within a set timeframe for the implementation of a PTSD Prevention Plan with particular focus on first responders, as well as to develop a performance measurement and monitoring framework.

The Employer must recognize the importance and significance of maintaining paid time off (CTO, ACL and POA Days).  Corrections employees utilize these leaves as a mechanism to cope with the strains and stresses of our work.

As evidenced by the Government’s recent media announcement citing that Probation, Probation & Parole Officers and Provincial Bailiffs will now be included into PTSD Legislation, exposure to Trauma and the development of PTSD is a real threat to a broad spectrum of Corrections Workers. Accordingly, the focus of PTSD prevention must go beyond primarily concentrating on our First Responders.

Our current Occupational Stress & Injury Committee (OSI) has been stifled with unnecessary delays whilst the Employer runs its own independent mental health initiative in a silo that is not inclusive of bargaining unit members as selected by the Union thereby leaving doubt in the mind of the Union as to how committed the Employer actually is to get behind such an initiative and back it with an actual budget and resources that will truly action a strong prevention program.

So, it’s yet to be seen whether or not the Employer’s PTSD proposal is mere lip service to a politically sensitive issue or whether the Employer is finally committed to getting serious in the prevention and curative aspects of PTSD.

As a result of the passage of legislative amendments to the Employment Standards Act, the Employer proposes that the parties discuss any impacts to rights/entitlements at the standalone sub-committee.

With the passage of ‘Fair Workplaces, Better Jobs Act (Bill 148) into law on November 27th, 2017, we are intent on ensuring new legislative entitlements are captured in our Collective Agreement.

The Employer’s position is that the following COR appendices should be deleted, as they are no longer in effect:

• Appendix COR 33 (Administrative Compensating Leave)
• Appendix COR 38 (Salary Progression Freeze)

While we agree that COR 33 is an expired item, our position is that it should be renewed with improvements

We agree that COR 38 is an expired item and should be deleted. Further to deletion we have included remedies for those affected by the grid freezes in our demands.