The headlines for current month's news items are listed immediately below.
Click on the headline of your choice to see the entire text of the article.
|
New CFIA contract signed by parties
Updates to Key Info Workplace Information Binder sent to Locals
Members urged to provide input to Panel considering
possible transfer of AAFC labs to universities
One last big push urged as our ‘Rand’ campaign
tops 600 new Agriculture Union members!
Agriculture Union joins in Saskatoon Labour Day BBQ festivities
Sondra Lall: Our August ‘Rand campaign’ winner!
London-area Locals mark Labour Day in grand style
New CFIA contract signed by parties
(Posted September 26, 2007)
It’s signed, sealed and delivered.
Our CFIA members have a new collective agreement. The one-year contact, retroactive to last January 1, was signed by both parties on September 21. It provides a salary increase of 2.5 per cent.
More details are available on the Web site of our bargaining agent, the Public Service Alliance of Canada, by clicking on the following link:
http://www.psac.com/news/2007/bargaining/20070921a-e.shtml
Updates to Key Info Workplace Information Binder sent to Locals
(Posted September 20, 2007)
Local Presidents and Secretaries will soon be receiving the annual updates to our popular Key Info workplace information binder.
The binder's indexed topics cover a wide variety of workplace-centred issues. They have proved to be an invaluable resource to Local Officers in their important work of servicing and representing our membership.
An existing topic – ‘Collective Bargaining Process: Roles of the Agriculture Union and the PSAC’ – has been updated.
As well, important additional content has been produced for two current topics. ‘Terms Of Reference –Union Management Committee’ has been added to the existing topic entitled ‘Union-Management Consultation Committees’. And, ‘NJC Grievances’ has been added to the existing ‘National Joint Council’ topic.
Last, but certainly not least, a new ‘Secretary-Treasurer’s/Treasurer’s Handbook’ has been produced for inclusion in our Key Info binder.
An updated ‘Table of Contents’ has also been included in the mailing to Locals.
As well, all Key Info topics have been updated on our Web site. They continue to be available to Agriculture Union members for downloading in either RTF or PDF file formats HERE.
Key Info topics will continue to be updated, and new subjects added, as we go forward. Suggestions for additional topics are more than welcome, and can be e-mailed to the National Office.
Members urged to provide input to Panel considering possible transfer of AAFC labs to universities
(Posted September 18, 2007)
The Harper government’s 2007 budget signaled its intention to study the possible transfer of management of federal laboratories to either universities or the private sector.
To that end, it has established a four-person ‘independent expert panel’ that will report to the President of the Treasury Board. The government has asked the four Panel members to identify:
• the type of non-regulatory science that should be transferred;
• which partners should be involved;
• an appropriate governance framework; and
• up to five laboratories that could be early candidates for transfer.
The non-regulatory laboratories operated by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada could well be among those possibly transferred.
The Agriculture Union accordingly met on September 12 with Dr. Marc Fortin, Assistant Deputy Minister of AAFC’s Research Branch, to discuss our members' concerns regarding the possible transfer of these labs to universities.
From this discussion, it seems at this juncture that AAFC would not be an advocate of the wholesale transfer of its laboratories. Indeed, in a recent internal Departmental notice, Dr. Fortin said “we believe there are opportunities to develop partnerships between AAFC, industry and academia that would add tremendous value to our respective, but independent, efforts.”
This position appears to be consistent with our belief that the research mandates of AAFC and universities are distinctly different.
While our union will continue to pursue this issue with the employer, the Public Service Alliance of Canada and other similarly-affected PSAC Component unions, our members can support our efforts by providing direct feedback to the Panel members.
Information on the work of the Panel, and on providing this critical input, can be found at:
http://www.tbs-sct.gc.ca/fedlab-labfed/index-eng.asp
One last big push urged as our ‘Rand’ campaign tops 600 new Agriculture Union members!
(Posted September 15, 2007)
Wow! Six hundred new members…and counting!
That’s the total number of new members we’ve welcomed so far this year as part of our nation-wide campaign to sign up ‘Rands’ – dues-paying co-workers who, for one reason or another, have yet to sign a union card.
As you know, we’ve been regularly posting our annual monthly Rand sign-up winners on this Web site. But those individuals have been literally the tip of a huge iceberg.
Thanks to a tremendous effort by our activists right across the country, the Agriculture Union is bigger, healthier and stronger. We’ve been able to strengthen Local solidarity, an important matter during a critical year of contract negotiations. As well, our extra numbers will gain our union even greater representation at the PSAC National Convention.
Our Rand campaign officially ends at the close of this year. As December 31 approaches, we’re asking our Locals to make one last big push in the remaining weeks to sign up as many more Rands as possible.
The poster pictured in this article has been sent to all Locals by the National Office as a reminder of both the great work done to date and the need to keep up our efforts.
To those who have helped make our campaign such a great success, please know that your work to date has been very much noticed and appreciated.
Now, let’s finish our campaign with another surge of new members!
Agriculture Union joins in Saskatoon Labour Day BBQ festivities
(Posted September 14, 2007)
Agriculture Union officers and members were out in force at the Saskatoon and District Labour Council’s annual Labour Day BBQ.
Howard Willems, our Fourth National Executive Vice-President, Northern Saskatchewan Regional Vice-President Brenda Baergen and Marianne Hladun, our union’s National Director for Equal Opportunities were among the more than one thousand union members, family and friends attending the ever-popular picnic.
The above photo shows Howard and Brenda (standing on the left) at the PSAC’s ‘Public Services Are Cool’ table; the one below shows Marianne applying a no-doubt-temporary tattoo to the leg of Larry Hubich, President of the Saskatchewan Federation of Labour.
Sondra Lall: Our August ‘Rand campaign’ winner!
(Posted September 9, 2007)
Congratulations to Sondra Lall – the latest monthly winner in our year-long campaign to sign up ‘Rands’: dues-paying co-workers who, for one reason or another, have yet to sign a union card.
Sondra, a newly-signed-up member of Local 2 in Halifax, is the proud owner of a much-coveted and highly-prized (!) Agriculture Union mug. As well, her name joins those of all Rands who sign membership cards by year’s-end in becoming eligible for our grand prize – two round-trip tickets to anywhere in Canada that Air Canada flies, or $1,000 in cash.
The name of lucky grand prize winner will be drawn at the end of 2007. So, keep those membership cards coming in!
London-area Locals mark Labour Day in grand style
(Posted September 7, 2007)
For more than a century, Labour Day has been an occasion for celebration by unions and their members throughout North America.
More than just an end-of-summer holiday, it’s an occasion to pause and recognize the tremendous contributions working men and women make to the health and wealth of this nation.
For five years now, our Agriculture Unions Locals 16 and17 have shown this spirit by participating in a major way in the annual Labour Day Celebration festivities organized by the PSAC London Area Council. Attendees have included local dignitaries, MPs, MPPs as well as PSAC Ontario Regional Vice-President Gerry Halabecki, whose office generously provided the ‘Defending Quality Public Service’ T-shirts and co-sponsored the event.
For those unable to attend the Labour Day BBQ in downtown London, celebratory cakes were delivered to our members in both London offices.
The above photo shows Local 17 President Dorothy Drew and Vice-President Nancy Richter (sporting green PSAC T-shirts) and just a few of the more than 80 members who turned out for the August 30 festivities at AAFC’s London Research Station. Nancy also sports a second ‘hat’ – that of President of the PSAC Area Council, which represent approximately 3,500 PSAC members from six component unions.
The photo below of a group of Local 16 members includes President Jim Hale (far left) and José Evangelho (holding the cake). José is Local Vice-President and a representative of the London Area Council and also serves as the SW Regional Representative on the PSAC Regional Council.
Even management got swept up with the festivities, as the last photo shows. That’s Research Manager, Dr. Karl Volkmar showing the back of the PSAC T-shirt, flanked by Nancy (at left) and Dorothy.
