2017 Toronto Centre Fall Newsletter

Greetings

Your local Executive wishes our members a Safe & Happy Labour Day!

GTA Modernization and its effects on you...

You may have suspected it: now a comprehensive study has confirmed it.

Long commutes are bad for both people's health and productivity. That long commute may be driving down your IQ too.

Remember, with the GTA modernization some of us will be spending long hours sitting in traffic commuting to work daily. The research suggests you will be shedding IQ points as well. The study conducted by Leicester University in the UK looked at 500,000 people between the ages of 37 to 73 over the course of five years and found that people who commute two hours per day had lower IQ scores compared to people who commute less than 30 minutes.

Another study of more than 34,000 workers across all UK industries was developed by Vitality Health, the University of Cambridge, RAND Europe and Mercer, examined the impact of commuting, along with flexible and homeworking on employee health and productivity.

It found those who commuted to work in under half an hour gain an additional seven days' worth of productive time each year as opposed to those with commutes of an hour or over.

And longer commutes appeared to have a negative impact on mental wellbeing too, with longer-commuting workers 33 per cent more likely to suffer from depression, 37 per cent more likely to have financial worries and 12 per cent more likely to report multiple aspects of work-related stress.

Being stuck in traffic eats up time that could be spent with family, completing tasks and have personal time. Therefore, commuting time not only have an economic cost, but also a human health cost.

A longer commute could hurt your waistline too. How? Commuting is a highly stressful experience, which can lead to reduced physical activity leading to increased BMI and blood pressure, and less time for healthy eating (more take-out food), physical activity, being sociable and less sleeping. All these factors leads to poor health.

What was highlighted above are just some of the affects. So, do we really need this GTA modernization to happen?

Prepared by: Rajan Tharmarajah

THE CRA WAGE GAP

As the CRA eventually resumes bargaining with our AFS group and when we’re asked to ratify an agreement, let’s just keep in mind some of the wage settlements of the past and how they stacked up to the general rate of Canadian inflation rate.  Caution: wage settlements represent a portion of collective agreement bargaining, albeit a very important one.

Consider the following:

1. A comparison of historical wage increases against inflation rate increases from 1970 up to the last collective agreement of 2014, indicates that we have fallen behind in all AU ranges by margins of 5.25% to 20.5%.

Level - Wage Gap

AU1 - 5.25%

AU2 - 6.7%

AU3 - 14.0%

AU4 - 16.5%

AU5 - 20.5%

Note the last collective agreement gave an additional wage increment to the top range of the AU 1 and AU 2 salary.  This explains why their wage gap is below double digits.

2. The shaded area of the graph below represents periods of wage settlements below inflation.  On the vertical axis are the rates of inflation and wage settlements and on the horizontal axis the time in years of roughly 3 decades, from 1987 to 2015. Aside from the decade of 1997-2007, AU wage settlements have been consistently below the general inflation rate.   If we take into account the higher GTA inflation rates the gap is wider.

Bargaining Update

Bargaining updates are on the Pipsc website; e-mail updates are provided to members. The next bargaining round is from Sept 19-21, 2017

AGM

This year our AGM will be held in November. Tickets will be on sale in October.

Labour Day Parade Monday September 4th

PIPSC Organizers: Din Kamaldin - dkamaldin@aol.com

Peter Gilkinson - petergilkinson@bell.net

Time parade begins: 9:30 a.m. at Dundas and University

Time arriving at the Ex: 11:30 a.m. Lunch:    Lunch voucher redeemable at the Ex provided

Cost to participants: $0 Admission to Ex: Yes, using a wristband, which will be handed out. If you would like to participate, please contact one of the organizers. Pipsc has 200 wristbands and they will be given out on a first come, first serve basis

Can you bring someone?...Yes, and they will get a wristband Ex admission as well”

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