Bargaining Update

Bargaining Update

As previously announced, conciliation ended on April 12, 2024, and we were unable to reach an agreement with Nav Canada. This was the last day before the mandatory 21-day cooling off period. We filed our submission for a Maintenance of Activities Agreement (MOAA) with the Canadian Industrial Relations Board (CIRB) on May 15, 2024, and our rebuttal to Nav Canada’s submission May 31, 2024. The application is ongoing as we wait to hear back from the CIRB on our right to withdraw services. To date, the CIRB has not rendered a decision nor called for oral hearings as requested by both parties.

As a union, we believe in free collective bargaining – including the right to strike.

As you know, in the federal sector, we finally received protection against scabs with the passing of the anti-scab legislation. However, the MOAA application is a way for employers to drag out negotiations and try to demoralize memberships. We need that fundamental right to strike.

Do not allow Nav Canada to wear you down and get you to accept a subpar offer. Hold the line!

This has been a very frustrating round of bargaining for CANSA. The other two Unifor locals in Nav Canada, Local 5454 and Local 2245, settled with the company early on in our bargaining. As Unifor expects pattern bargaining for all the Nav Canada Unifor locals, we certainly expect them to treat CANSA with the same respect, integrity and value in the work that our members do.

This is not what we were seeing at all as bargaining was unusually slow and plagued with delays as Nav Canada bargained with the other Nav Canada unions to break the established Unifor pattern.

It was very evident to the team and I that Nav Canada was working hard to delay and reset the pattern. This was reinforced during conciliation when their lead negotiator opened with a statement announcing that if we got the Unifor pattern, every other group would get it through arbitration. They let us know, in no uncertain terms, that they are not bargaining with us, but the other Nav Canada unions.

Nav Canada appears to be part of a concerning number of federally regulated employers who are trying to rely on the government to help them get out of fair collective bargaining and undermine members’ right to withdraw services as provided in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms/Canada Labour Code.

These companies know the value of their members. They just hope the government will give them a discount as observed when Air Canada and WestJet quickly settled when no back-to-work legislation was forthcoming. This is an example of the rampant corporate greed that seems to be infecting major corporations across this country.

While CANSA was in conciliation with Nav Canada, working diligently to bargain a fair and honest collective agreement, Nav Canada worked on and submitted a letter with the House of Commons in support of amendments proposed by Federally Regulated Employers – Transportation and Communications (FETCO) to seek relief from the effect of anti-Scab legislation.

They also requested “essential worker designations to be extended to employees deemed training professionals in the area of air navigation/air traffic services.” Nav Canada ended the letter by stating, “We employ over 4,500 highly skilled, uniquely trained workers across the country, and regularly work and engage in good faith with our eight unions who represent approximately 86% of the NAV CANADA workforce.”

How is secretly sending a letter to the House of Commons requesting exceptions to anti-scab laws and for the government to assign essential worker designations to one-third of our union considered engaging in “good faith?” They want to remove our members’ right to withdraw services to get a fair deal. With the exception of a one-year extension, this local has only ratified a single collective agreement in approximately two decades. The rest have gone to arbitration for third-party decision.

On top of all this, Nav Canada just announced a 3.73% rate increase “mainly due to investments in operational training and staffing.” It is our sincere hope Nav Canada will invest some of that revenue into bargaining a fair and honest wage with CANSA as we represent an important component in the delivery of Air Traffic Control training. If they do not, we plan to exercise our right to withdraw operational training services 72 hours after the MOAA is announced by the CIRB.

To see the Unifor media release on this, click here.

In Solidarity,

James Walker

President CANSA/Unifor 1016