AFS Saint John Subgroup Meeting March 27, 2023

Held At:  Lily’s Lakeside Casual Dining Commenced: 5:45
 

ITEMS

The meeting was called to order at 5:45 pm by Chair, Lori Rowe. UPON MOTION duly made by Lori, seconded by Tim, and unanimously carried, it was resolved the agenda of the meeting was verified and approved.

1. Dec 07, 2022, Minutes – Minutes were distributed by Sabra Howe via email on March 27, 2023, in preparation for this meeting. UPON MOTION duly made by Mike Kane, seconded by

Mike Melvin, and unanimously carried, it was resolved the December 2022 minutes meeting was verified and approved.

2. Financial Report by Treasurer, Lori Rowe on behalf of Aaron Everett –The account balance is

$2,977.03; the year started with $416.93, then an allotment of $2,557.00 was received for 139 members (last year 124) plus a small amount of interest was earned. There is an outstanding amount of $91.98 owing to Lori for the HST portion of the Executive notebooks that were ordered last winter. UPON MOTION duly made by Sabra, seconded by Tim, and unanimously carried, it was resolved to accept the financial report.

3. Old Business

   1. Executive Notebooks – The books were bought and distributed to the Executive. Some will be given away at the June Sub-group AGM.
   2. Andrew Bullen – at the last meeting it was thought that Andrew would be withdrawing his role as a steward due to a move to Grand Manan; however, he has renewed his Stewardship. Yay!!
4. New Business
   1. Mike Melvin joined the group. Welcome Mike! Mike completed Steward training in February and currently works in the ECAS group; however, he is returning to an audit position in the very near future.
   2. Return to the office – 40% of working hours.

This announcement came after our last meeting. Saint John and Bathurst were to return onsite on April 1^st; however, the Saint John office has been delayed until October.

Moncton is scheduled to return to the onsite presence in July after the renovations.

Lori advised any members who previously requested accommodations before the mask mandate was removed, should resubmit. New responses are invasive.

3. Employer – Union Communication

There has not been any briefing with unions at the sub-group level for the last two months. Communication has stopped. Does this have anything to do with the negotiations with PSAC?

4. Sub-Group and Branch AGM

The scheduled date is June 21^st at Riverside Country Club. Our regular yearly scheduled date of early June was previously booked.

Mike Maxan discussed similar funding as in previous years between the Branch and subgroup. UPON MOTION duly made by Mike Maxan, seconded by Lori, and unanimously carried, it was resolved to accept and approve similar funding arrangements as previous years for the June 21^st AGM.

(d) Bargaining Update

The employer simply does not get it! The employer will not talk or discuss anything with substance. A couple of advancements have been made: the employer has agreed every quarter to provide member names and coordinates, and bereavement leave will be given for an unborn child.

Monetary demands will be at the next bargaining session in April. Additional bargaining days have been scheduled for May and June.

5. Bargaining in Bad Faith Complaint filed

PIPSC had requested to have discussions with the employer to discuss telework contract language; however, the employer refused to discuss it with the union. Then in late December, the employer implemented a return to the office, which ultimately left the union with no choice but to file a bad-faith bargaining complaint.

6. Labour Relations tickets

Labour relation tickets are very large; they were getting approximately 10 tickets per week, but now they are getting hundreds and even thousands per week resulting in a huge backlog. Management is speculating it is most likely due to the accommodation requests.

7. Annual General Meetings:
   • AFS AGM June 9-10^th in Gatineau.
   • PIPSC AGM scheduled Nov 26 to 29th.

Sabra moved to adjourn the meeting at 7:00 pm.