War is never the answer
At a time when war is raging in Ukraine and its people are fighting courageously to defend their country, Quebec’s central labour organizations—the FTQ, the CSN, the CSQ and the CSD—strongly condemn Russia’s unjustifiable invasion of that country.
See the following inter-union statement in support of Ukraine for more details.: https://www.csn.qc.ca/actualites/declaration-intersyndicale-de-soutien-a-lukraine/
See also the text written by the Collectif Échec à la Guerre giving a global vision of the armed conflict. https://www.cahiersdusocialisme.org/non-a-la-guerre-en-ukraine/
Let us all denounce these war measures and stand in solidarity with the people of Ukraine.
Last minute news concerning face coverings
We are now allowed to remove our masks in class while teaching, as long as we can maintain a distance of 1 meter from the students. Of course, we can also choose to keep our mask on. The College should send a more detailed notice soon.
We have a Collective Agreement!
Indeed, the final text of the agreement was signed on Tuesday, 1 March. This means that the new contract applies right away, and its conditions, including salaries, become relevant now and retroactively, starting on April1 2020. And NO, it is NOT an April Fool’s joke. The new Collective Agreement can be downloaded here (in French, the English version will be available at a later date):https://cpn.gouv.qc.ca/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2022/03/CC_FNEEQ_2020-2023_sans_modifications_15Fev2022VF-PRO.pdf
We are negotiating the next Collective Agreement !
In an absurd conflation of politics and public health realities, the negotiations for the 2023-202? contract effectively started slightly before the signature of the 2020-2023 agreement. Never a dull moment. Usually, the experience of the previous agreement fuels the discussions of the following one, but given the timing, we will not be in a good position to proceed this way. It can make things difficult, but it can also work for us as the partie patronale is in the same situation. We’ll see; things are just getting started.
Salary Adjustments
Following the signing of the Collective Agreement, our salaries will be adjusted to include the negotiated increases. Every teacher will receive a 2% increase for any work done since the 1st of April, 2020, and an additional 2% increase for any work since the 1st of April, 2021. For this coming April 1, 2022, we will also get one more 2% increase for the remainder of the agreement. The College has 120 days to distribute all the retroactive unpaid portions of our salaries. We can expect this money to be distributed during the Summer. Of course, our regular salary should be adjusted going forward as well.
The new agreement also includes two non recurrent payments (lump sum) of $602.68 per FTE – one at the beginning of the agreement, (April 1, 2020); and one a year later. Since both these dates are in the past, the College has to pay these within the next 30 days. We are likely to receive the lump sums on the next pay cheque, on 17th of March, or the following one. Of course, these non recurrent payments apply to hourly paid teachers as well, and they amount to $1.15 per paid hour. ($602.68 ÷ 525 hrs)
The Collective Agreement also now recognises the work experience of hourly paid continuing education teachers on a pay scale. (Yay!) The College should contact people to whom this applies soon by sending a notice. Teachers will have 30 days after the notice is sent to provide the College with proof of employment in order to determine their salary on the new scale. Work completed at Vanier should not require documentation, and if you have done day work, your experience should have been documented when you were hired, and should be applied right away to your Cont. Ed work. Let us know if you notice anything missing from your pay.
GA, on negotiation issues, changed to April 20th at UB
(This cancels the planned March 23rd GA). This was decided at the last Association Council as we are not yet ready to determine the top issues for the 2023-202X negotiations. Phil Lagogiannis, our négo representative, will be coming to our Association Council meeting on March 31st (all are welcome). We will then present motions to be discussed and voted on at the April 20th GA.
VCTA Elections
The VCTA elections are coming in April for positions on the Executive, Association Council, Academic Council and CRT. Dates will be decided at the Association Council meeting of March 31st. Do consider running! The more members involved, the more representative we are of the membership’s concerns.
Number of Days for Tax Deduction
Most of us will use the simple assessment for work days at home during covid. You need only put in the #s of days you were available to the College but worked at home. In 2021, for most of us, this only means the period from Jan 4th to June 11th. And you are not to include sick days or vacation days. For most teachers, in the day division, this would come to 115 – 6 = 109 days (as we had 2 days off at Easter, 1 at Victoria day in May and 3 strike days). This will not be true for everyone: you may have had other sick days; you may have worked summer school; or in Cont Ed. Each day can only count as 1 day (i.e. if you worked in the day and again in the evening for Cont Ed that would count as 1 day). If you want to do a more detailed cost analysis you can ask HR for the T2200 form.
Upcoming
March 11 – Academic Council at 1pm.
March 31 – Association Council 1:30pm – Guest: Phil Lagogiannis
April 7, 14, 21, 28l – CRTs on the 22-23 Allocation projet.
April 20 – General Assembly at UB.