Inside workers ratify new collective agreement with city

City’s inside workers, represented by CUPE, approved their new deal with a vote on Wednesday. City council will hold special meeting on Thursday to finalize the agreement.

Thestar.com
March 10, 2016
By Jennifer Pagliaro

Toronto’s inside workers have ratified a new collective agreement with the city after a vote Wednesday.

CUPE Local 79, which represents more than 20,000 workers including child-care and shelter workers, nurses, cleaners and planners, announced the result of the vote Wednesday night at 11:30 p.m. The union said it would not release the percentage or comment on the strength of members’ support for the agreement.

Council is scheduled to hold a special meeting to finalize the deal on Thursday.

“We are pleased our members ratified the agreements we negotiated, made possible because of the strength they showed during bargaining,” Local 79 president Tim Maguire said in an emailed statement.

“We achieved some improvements and more important, pushed back serious concessions that would have hurt both the quality of city services and city jobs.”

The agreed-upon deal comes after weeks of negotiating, a more than weeklong work-to-rule campaign that saw inside workers performing only basic contracted duties, and a tense standoff that pitted Maguire and Mayor John Tory in a war of words over major sticking points - including wage increases, shift scheduling and the contracting out of jobs.

The deal includes a total five per cent increase over four years, below inflation - what essentially amounts to a pay cut. It also gets rid of a provision known as “jobs for life” that would allow the city to contract out jobs of members who would not have the ability to bump into new jobs if they don’t have 15 years of seniority by the end of 2019.

Tory has said previously the deal offered by the city was fair to workers and also reflected the challenging economic times faced by the city.

The deal is similar to what was earlier ratified by members for CUPE Local 416, representing more than 5,000 outside workers.

Local 79 represents four separate bargaining units. The fourth unit of members who work part-time in long-term care facilities will see their future contract go to binding arbitration because they do not have the right to strike, the email statement from the union said.