From January 17 to 19, our AFS Bargaining Team met with the employer to continue negotiations for the renewal of our collective agreement.
This was our first bargaining session since the Agency’s December return to the office edict.
Our employer expects virtually all of its employees to shift to teleworking up to three days a week, as opposed to continuing to telework, mostly on a full-time basis, as we have been doing since March 2020.
Given our demonstrated dedication to our employer and Canadians, it would be reasonable to assume that the employer would be willing to recognize our rights to fair consideration in telework requests.
Unfortunately, in an about-face, CRA has now told us that they have no interest in even discussing basic telework language in our collective agreement.
The employer’s voluntary decision to implement a return to office edict and their failure to discuss telework contract language has left us with no choice but to file a bad faith bargaining complaint.
Regardless of our employer’s conduct, your union is committed to continuing negotiations on all or our outstanding bargaining concerns. We delivered presentations in support of telework, flexible working hours, and numerous caregiving and family related concerns. No responses were received from the employer.
Unfortunately, it has become clear that our employer either has no mandate to discuss anything of substance, or has chosen to not to discuss any matters of substance.
We will continue to adapt our approach to bargaining to ensure that we reach a fair settlement of our contract including fair wage increases for all our AFS members.
Your ongoing support is essential to our negotiating a fair collective agreement for all AFS members.
Please provide your non-work email to PIPSC to ensure that you receive regular updates on our bargaining. You can update your information at pipsc.ca/member-tools/change-of-address
We also encourage our members to join our PIPSC-IPFPC AFS Group/Groupe VFS Facebook group.
In solidarity,
Doug Mason, AFS President
AFS Bargaining Team:
Doug Mason, Chair
Chris Roach, Vice-Chair
Allaudin Alibhai
Simon Chiu
Jean Couillard
Shawn Gillis
Pam Kubicz
Mary Lycett
Dan Quinn
Al Ravjiani
Vance Coulas, Negotiator
AFS Bargaining Status Summary
Survey Members for Bargaining Demands – completed
Finalization of Bargaining Demands – completed
Serving of Notice to Bargain – completed
Exchange of Bargaining Demands – completed
Negotiations to Achieve Tentative Agreement – in progress
Establishment of National Strike Committee – if necessary
Identification of Local Strike Captains – if necessary
Distribution of Strike Manuals to Stewards – if necessary
Essential Services Agreement – completed
Public Interest Commission Report – if necessary
Membership Strike Vote – if necessary
Strike Action – if necessary
Tentative Agreement (TA) – goal
Bargaining Unit Ratification Vote – after TA Reached