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Fredericton: The Union representing highway workers, CUPE Local 1190, is re-launching its campaign “Bad Roads Hot Line” for the winter.

Daniel Légère, CUPE NB President; Andy Hardy, CUPE 1190 president; Joey Kelly, CUPE 1190 Sec.Treas; Brian Watson, CUPE 1253 president .

“We were hoping to shut down the toll-free number but the information we received from the department officials concerning the Winter Maintenance Program clearly indicates that the new Liberal Government do not intend to allocate more resources to the program” said Andy Hardy, President of CUPE Local 1190.

“According to the schedule we received from the Department of Transportation and Infrastructure, we will have less plow operators on the roads this winter.  They will be reduced by 3.  If you take into account last year’s reduction, this season we will have 73 fewer snowplow operators on the roads.”

“Last winter, our members who looked after plowing and maintaining the roads have confronted some harsh winter weather. It’s not officially winter yet and already we have been hit with some major storms.”

“With fewer operators and plows and with equipment breaking down, once again the citizens of this province, especially the ones living in the rural areas, will not get the proper service. Many times last winter, the citizens of this province had to wait to get their roads and streets plowed.”

“When we launched the Bad Roads Hotline – 1-888-874-7198 – our goal was to give New Brunswickers a chance to voice their concerns about slippery roads and poor salting and sanding. We received more than 1,200 calls on our Hotline from concerned New Brunswickers across the province.”

“It wasn’t enough to convince the former government to reverse the cuts he made to the Winter Maintenance Program. Unfortunately so far, the new Liberal Government seems to be following the same path. This is why we are re-launching our Bad Roads

Campaign,” concluded Hardy.

The CUPE NB Convention call letter and credential form will be mailed out mid January 2015.

Resolutions for the 2015 Convention must be submitted to the CUPE NB Secretary Treasurer no later than January 15, 2015 with no exceptions made.

Resolutions Requests 2015

Campbellton:  A month after being locked out by the City of Campbellton, CUPE Local 76 members, the city’s outside workers, will be back on the job on Monday.

The Local reached a tentative agreement late yesterday afternoon after three days of mediation. The members accepted the offer last evening.

“This was a very difficult round of bargaining.  We are very disappointed with the way our employer behaved”, said George Parker, President of CUPE Local 76.

“At the end of the day, we were able to keep our Defined Benefit Pension Plan and we pushed back on contracting out. We now have a minimum of 25 members guaranteed under our collective agreement.  As well, for the length of this contract, no current employees can be laid off or have their hours of work reduced due to contracting out the work of the bargaining unit”, added Parker.

“The membership was overwhelmed by the support they received from the citizens of Campbellton.  Every day during this lockout, people showed up on the pickets lines with coffee, sweets, food and money.”

“We can’t thank enough the CUPE members for the financial support they gave us.  CUPE members that we have never met before showed up on the picket lines and walked with us.  We could not have imagined such a show of solidarity,” concluded Parker.

Campbellton– CUPE Local 76 members who work for the City of Campbellton are on the picket lines this morning after being locked out by the municipal council.

“It is unfortunate the City council chose confrontation over negotiation,” said George Parker, president of CUPE Local 76.

“Last week, in a last ditch effort to reach a collective agreement, the Union requested the intervention of a mediator. The City sent a third party to the table with the mandate to get even more concession from its workers,” says Parker.

“The next day, the city contracted out the snow removal services.”

“When Mayor Bruce MacIntosh said talking about the lockout ‘they had very little choice’ — well they had the choice to sit down and negotiate with its workers, not try to bully their way through negotiation. Since we began this process, the city never altered its course.”

Only once in our history, we were unable to provide the service to the residents of Campbellton. We were locked out by the city more than 30 years ago!”

CUPE Local 76 represents 43 employees who work mainly in the water department, waste water, streets, recreation, workshop, inventory, fire department and police dispatch.

The collective agreement expired on December 31, 2013.

Campbellton: The union representing the City of Campbellton outside workers, CUPE Local 76, is asking the Minister of Post-Secondary Education, Training and Labour to appoint a mediator in order to reach a collective agreement with its employer.

“Instead of threatening to lock us out and contracting out our jobs, we believe the City should return to the bargaining table to try to reach a collective agreement,” said George Parker, President of CUPE Local 76.

“We requested the appointment of a mediator last Friday and we hope the City will come back to the table instead of moving forward with a possible lock-out and contracting out of snow removal.”

“While we were in bargaining, in mid-September, the Employer published an invitation to tender for the snow removal. Ten days ago, the Mayor gave our union an ultimatum: accept the latest offer or snow removal will be contracted out for, not one, but three years and there could be a lock-out.”

“Our members were simply appalled by our Employer’s statement. It shows a total lack of respect for its employees. Why would the City pay a private contractor thousands of dollars for snow removal this winter when snow removal has always been done by city employees? We have all the equipment and the manpower.  Where is the saving there?”

Parker says, “It seems that the City’s rational for contracting out snow removal is that the service would be maintained if the outside workers go on strike. Our members have never been on strike and our intention is to not do so.  We have made that clear many times. Only once in our history, we were unable to provide the service to the residents of Campbellton.  We were locked-out by the city it was more than 30 years ago!”

The stumbling blocks at the bargaining table are wages, retirement allowance and job security. CUPE Local 76 has been without a collective agreement since December 2013.

Fredericton – Members of CUPE Local 508, the outside workers with the City of Fredericton gave their Union Executive, this evening, a strong strike mandate.
CUPE National Representative Ralph McBride says, “Based on the strong mandate we received from the membership we are asking the City to return to the bargaining table.”

McBride says, while the strike mandate they received is strong, no strike date has been set. Outstanding issues include wages and the Benefit Spending Allowance.

“In the 60 years history of this Local, the members have never been on strike. Bargaining is never easy but in the past, we have always been able to reach an agreement at the table,” explained Kevin Smallwood, CUPE 508’s President.

CUPE local 508 has been without a collective bargaining since December 2013. Outside workers in the city are responsible for services such as water and sewage, water treatment, pollution control centre, roads and streets maintenance and cleaning, mechanics, traffic and parks and trees.

CUPE NB asked the Leaders of the political parties questions on various issues such as Free Collective Bargaining and Pay Equity.
Click here to download their answers

Ask the Candidates

You can also download the latest edition of The Signal

All members of the Canadian Union of Public Employee in New Brunswick and Canada would like to express their condolences to the family and friends of Mr. William Dwight Mallock of Seal Cove in Grand Manan Island, NB, who passed away while performing his duties as a Paramedic on Saturday August 16, 2014 at the Grand Manan Airport. William D. Mallock had been a paramedic with Ambulance New Brunswick for the last twenty years and a member of CUPE NB Local 4848.

http://www.ells.ca/obituaries/90707#.U_ExlWmZlM8.gmail

FREDERICTON – For the first time since the beginning of the celebrations of New Brunswick, the New Brunswick Government publicly recognized the important contribution of its public services employees. During the celebrations of New Brunswick Day in Cocagne, on Monday August 4th, the Premier David Alward acknowledged the role of the public sector workers.
“In the last decade, it is the first time the leader of the Provincial Government has made the effort to say those words publicly during New Brunswick Day, which is notable”, said Daniel Légère, President of CUPE NB.
New Brunswick public sector workers in education, health care, social services, highway, and municipalities are on the front line everywhere every day delivering good services for all New Brunswickers, even during times of natural or unnatural disasters.
More than one hundred CUPE members and their families joined the celebrations in Cocagne, distributing brochures and promotional items, along with iced cold public water.

FREDERICTON – During the special one-day session of the New Brunswick legislature held Tuesday, July 29th in Fredericton, the Liberal Party made a commitment to binding arbitration for correctional officers in New Brunswick. The Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 1251, which represents 500 Provincial Correctional Officers, Human Services Councillors and Custodians, is pleased to hear such a commitment from the Official Opposition. The Union is now calling on the Conservative Government to do the same.

“It has been more than 3 years now that we have been without a contract. Our officers are the lowest paid in Canada, and because of that we have a serious retention issue. In the last five years, we have had hundreds of our workers leave our provincial correction institutions”, said Everett Godfrey, President of CUPE Local 1251.

“We have some of the lowest amount of officers per inmate ratios in Atlantic Canada working in our jails designed with an inmate ratio of up to 30 inmates to 1 officer and no protective barrier.”

According to Liberal MLA Bernard leBlanc, the issue “needs to be addressed immediately”.

“Over a year at the negotiating table and four rounds of conciliation, the provincial government failed to negotiate an essential Public Safety contract. This contract needs to be sent to binding arbitration for safety reasons”, concluded the President.