THUNDER BAY -- Members of the Ontario Public Service Employees Union across the province will be working without a contract at the end of this year.
Strike mandate votes were held last week, with totals overwhelmingly support towards pursuing job action if deemed necessary after their current collective bargaining agreement expires on Dec. 31.
Mary Cory, regional executive board member with OPSEU, said that is a direct response to the last proposal submitted by the province, which was received last month.
“The proposals are total takeaways,” Cory said at a rally held Monday outside the office of local MPP Michael Gravelle (Lib., Thunder Bay-Superior North).
“We’ve had three years of zeros from this government… There is not one good thing in the proposals they’re offering to us.”
In addition to no wage increases, the union has a list of job-specific demands they are targeting to improve working conditions.
One of those involves case workers with the Ontario Disability Support Program, which has been beleaguered by the introduction of a new computer system earlier this fall.
“This has been total chaos across the province. I’ve talked with people in Toronto, Kenora and Thunder Bay and it is complete chaos and creating large stress for the case workers in all the offices,” Cory said.
The system has been blamed for millions of dollars in social assistance overpayments across the province and Cory expressed concern about the scheduled payouts for December.
Sandra Snider, president of OPSEU Local 736 which represents workers in the region within the departments of Service Ontario and the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities, said her members voted 92 per cent in favour of a strike.
“That offer was so disrespectful. All we hear from our employer is how they want young people and the first thing they did was cut wages to young people by five per cent,” Snider said.
There is also concern about how the service offices are meeting the needs of people in Northwestern Ontario.
Snider said there is a disregard for the role those offices serve in many regional communities.
“They don’t care that these small towns need services,” she said. “They want to reduce services, cut hours, cut staff so they’re part time because they don’t care about servicing the people of Sioux Lookout or Terrace Bay.”
Correctional workers across the province voted 96 per cent in favour during their vote.
“We’re going into a dangerous situation,” member Greg Arnold said. “We don’t want to be striking. The government has the willpower to do this if they want to. They can completely prevent a strike.”
The union represents about 120,000 workers across the province.
