February 2008

It as been quite some time since my last report and a great deal has happened at NRC. During the fall, NRC underwent another “realignment” exercise that saw 50 continuing RCEA members declared surplus.  There were also around 10 early ends of terms, some of which were long terms.  Despite the lengthy consultation process that the RCEA engaged in with NRC, we were not pleased with the manner in which these cuts were conducted.  While most Institutes put forward sound business cases that made sense in the context of the “realignment”, several Institutes did not do so.  This has certainly affected morale around Council.  As well, less than half of those impacted were able to secure alternate employment with NRC and quite a few members were laid off.  Several issues have arisen during the course of the cuts which, in our view, go counter to the Workforce Adjustment Policy.  At least one of these concerns that, is the impact on continuing employees who accepted term positions, has been the subject of a Policy Grievance.  We certainly expected that we would be participating in a “postmortem” review of this exercise, but NRC has yet to either propose or schedule such a review.

We will be quite busy during the rest of the year.  All of our 6 collective agreements have already or will expire during this time.  By April we will be in a legal bargaining position for all groups.  Once again, however, we are at the mercy of both Treasury Board and NRC as to when any bargaining can commence.  Two groups have already submitted demands, the OP group is in the process of finalizing their demands and preparations will commence shortly to prepare demands for the remaining three groups.  Chairpersons for three of the categories have been identified and group committees have been established.

The AD, AS and CS agreements were signed on January 10, 2008, a full 8 months after the Arbitral Awards were issued for those groups.  This delay is causing serious problems with the implementation of one of the new provisions, the cap on carry over of vacation leave for the AS group.  I am in the process of approaching NRC to discuss ways of lessening the impact at the end of the current fiscal year. 

I recently met with all other bargaining agents, as well as the Federal Superannuates and, who are involved in the pension surplus litigation, to discuss the next steps.  A decision was reached to appeal the Ontario Superior Court’s decision.  I encourage you to check our website for updates.  You will also find an update on the pay-direct drug card.

I am in the process of planning the regional travel schedule, which will be posted on our website.  I would like to encourage regional members who work in close proximity to a regional Institute to attend these meetings and to contact the Institute representative for the day, time and location of the meeting.  With respect to National Capital Region Institutes, your Institute representative(s) will be arranging informal lunch time meetings to give you the opportunity to meet Joan Van Den Bergh and myself and to ask whatever questions you may have. 

As always, I appreciate hearing from any member at any time and I encourage everyone to visit our website on a regular basis. We certainly make every effort to post new information as soon as it becomes available.

Sincerely,

Serge Croteau
President