Your Bargaining Committee is pleased to announce that a tentative settlement has been reached with the Employer after 5 months at the bargaining table. All of the items that you wanted fixed have been addressed, in almost every case to the complete satisfaction of the bargaining committee,- wages, the amount of bargaining unit work done by excluded staff, and fair transparent processes for job selection and harassment investigation. Highlights of the agreement follow after the ratification meeting information below.

The Bargaining Committee is recommending that you vote YES to this two year, eight month agreement that expires on September 1, 2022.

Please attend or call in to the ratification meeting scheduled:

Tuesday, January 14, 2020

BCGEU Area Office

158 Oriole Road, Kamloops

5:30 p.m.

Click Here to Download a PDF of the DRAFT Collective Agreement

Any members unable to attend the meeting in person may call in via tele-conference, 1-866-562-0090. When asked for the Access Code, input 363683#. This will allow you the opportunity to ask any questions you may have.

Voting will be conducted by electronic ballot. You will receive voting credentials and instructions via email.

Highlights of your tentative agreement:

1. Wages (Appendix A of agreement, page 45)

a. For all direct service positions:

i. Effective September 1, 2019 all wages move to be equivalent to the Community Social Services General Services (CSS) agreement rates - hourly rate increases vary between 14% and 44% as all the jobs at Kamloops Y were different distances from the sectoral rates; and

ii. Effective April 1, 2020 and 2021 the same increases as CSS including low wage redress (typically at least 5.5%); and

iii. Effective April 1, 2022 the same increases as CSS on April 1, 2022 (this is the subject of the next round of bargaining for CSS and is not yet known).

b. For the Facilities Attendant position:

i. Effective September 1, 2019 the wage moves up 14%; and

ii. Effective April 1, 2020 5.3%; and

iii. Effective April 1, 2021 2.7%; and

iv. Effective April 1, 2022 2%.

2. Sick Leave, Health and Welfare Benefits, Pension (Articles 24 and 25, pages 35 - 37) - no change to current entitlements. Future entitlements will be the same as for the rest of the Kamloops YMCA-YWCA employees.

3. Expiry (cover and Article 29, page 42) – your agreement expires September 1, 2022 which is timed to allow for the CSS agreement that expires on April 1, 2022 to get bargained and ratify so that your pay rates can continue to be matched to theirs. Your agreement will be in force on the day that it's ratified by both you and the employer.


4. Complaint and Grievance Procedure (Articles 9 and 10, pages 7 - 11) - your collective agreement is different than the employer's policies in lots of ways. One of the most important differences is that your collective agreement can be enforced by you with the help of your union if you believe that the employer hasn't followed it correctly.

In fact, if your employer never followed the agreement and no one complained about it, the employer could continue indefinitely. These rights you have just won need your participation to become alive and meaningful in the workplace.

If you believe that your employer hasn't followed the agreement it's important that you take action quickly as there is a time limit to submit a complaint / grievance - 21 days after the error is made or you become aware of the error. After that time you can still pursue a complaint but it might not succeed because of timeliness.


5. Bargaining Unit Integrity (Clause 3.3, page 2) - Protection against further encroachment by excluded positions and a commitment to reduce that encroachment. Protection for superior benefits for employees whose positions are currently excluded and move into the bargaining unit in the future.


6. Job Posting Language (Article 13, pages 15 - 17) - Standardization of selection criteria (now defined as knowledge, ability, performance, and relevant qualifications) across all jobs and standardization of the weights of those criteria within a job. Put more plainly this means that all Anti-Violence Crisis Workers will be scored with a standardized scoring system across different postings and likewise for all the other jobs. Competitive job selection language with seniority tiebreaker for relatively equal candidates


7. Harassment (MOU#2, pages 48 - 49) - comprehensive language based on CSS, including complaint process.


8. Special Leave (Article 21, pages 28 - 30) - up to 10 unpaid days per year in addition to other leaves like court appearance leave and those provided by Employment Standards.

9. Casual Call out language (Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) #1, page 46, in place since October)

a. Moving from casual seniority based on hire date to seniority based on hours worked and posted quarterly;

b. Giving part-time employees the option to pick up casual shifts (before casual employees);

c. Increasing the availability that casuals must provide from 8 shifts to 12 shifts per month;

d. Enabling employees to revise their availability once the schedule for the following month is posted on the 20^th of the current month;

e. Making modest changes to the current scheduling system such as making response times proportional to the amount of notice provided for a vacant shift call out

10. Casual Employee language (Article 28, pages 40 - 42) - clear language on casual employee rights covering what work is casual work, probation, seniority and rights to leave of absence not covered under the Call out MOU.

11. Member Engagement (Article 6, page 6) - 30 minutes of union orientation within first 30 days of employment for all new employees.

12. Layoff (Article 14, pages 17 - 19) - layoff rights triggered when your hours are reduced more than 4 hours, or you lose health and welfare benefits.

13. Overtime (Article 17, pages 22 - 24) - employees get reimbursed for dependent care expenses incurred as a result of accepting overtime work.

14. Occupational Health and Safety (Article 23, pages 32 - 35) - comprehensive language based on CSS, straight time pay for attending meetings. You should read the details in the agreement as they're too numerous to mention here.

In solidarity,

Alix Dolson, Bargaining Committee Chair

Chelsea Koronko, Bargaining Committee Member

Edie Fisher, Bargaining Committee Member

Brent Camilleri, Staff Representative

Download PDF of Notice Here
Download PDF of Draft Collective Agreement Here

UWU/MoveUP