September 11, 2000
CONCILIATION FAILS:
MUN-MUNFA TALKS BREAK OFF
As many members will now know, conciliation talks between MUNFA and the administration broke off at noon on Friday, September 8. The breakdown in efforts to reach a Collective Agreement came after a series of sessions in which the government conciliation officer met separately with each side.
As we reported in Negotiating News #15, conciliation efforts adjourned on August 25 in order to give the administration two weeks to prepare responses to MUNFA's financial proposals as well as responses to 16 other Collective Agreement articles. On September 8, the administration produced responses on six articles but indicated that they were still unprepared to table a response to MUNFA's financial proposals.
When it became apparent that there would be no salary proposal from the administration, MUNFA asked (through the conciliation officer) if the administration was prepared to respond to MUNFA's proposals concerning early retirement and pension plan changes. Again the answer was negative. The conciliation officer attempted to get a written commitment from the administration to have responses on financial matters on Monday. His effort was not successful.
A review of the list of articles on which the administration had produced proposals revealed that they were ones on which points of disagreement were relatively few. In view of the administration's intransigent refusal to negotiate substantive financial matters, there appeared little point in continuing the conciliation process. The conciliation officer agreed that an impasse had been reached and indicated that he would file his report to the Minister of Environment and Labour by the middle of this week. A full report on all of these events will be made by the Negotiation Committee at the membership information meeting.
When the officer's report is received by the Minister, a 15-day time period begins. At the end of this period, MUNFA will be in a legal position to call a strike vote. Although we continue to hope that a strike will not be necessary, MUNFA members should now be prepared for that eventuality.
DATE: THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 2000 TIME: 7:30 P.M. PLACE: H.S.C. MAIN AUDITORUIM |
|---|
MUNFA Negotiating Committee:
All issues of Negotiating News are accessible at http://www.mun.ca/munfa/negnews.html