Canada’s Public Service Union Predator Class

One of the province’s largest public sector unions has launched a $24 million lawsuit against three former senior employees and at least 15 individuals or businesses it alleges they had undeclared ties to, accusing them of a scheme including payments for bogus or unfinished work as well as kickbacks.

The statement of claim, which has not been proven in court, was filed Thursday by the Ontario Public Service Employees’ Union and comes amid its ongoing financial forensic audit and just two months after it filed a $6 million-plus case in Ontario’s Superior Court, also alleging financial irregularities.

The federal government and unionized workers are preparing to lock horns over double-digit wage hikes to account for higher inflation and rules for remote work in what is shaping up to be a heated series of contract negotiations.

This year’s negotiations are particularly unusual and intense not only because of inflation, but because of the size and scope of public-service departments that are at the bargaining table, and the number of workers gearing up for strike votes.

OTTAWA – The union representing more than 10,400 federal public servants who operate government buildings and services is asking for a 47-per-cent increase in total compensation over three years, a demand that is “far beyond” reasonable, according to an independent commission.

Give us a 30% wage hike and pay us for meals when we work overtime at home, federal workers say.

Those are some of the demands of employees of the Canada Revenue Agency currently negotiating contracts post-pandemic.

Two large federal government unions – the Union of Taxation Employees (UTE) and the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) – are demanding huge pay raises. Outrageous pay raises. Raises that, in the real world, could fairly be described as “nuts.”

One of the never-ending narratives is that the Ontario government is cutting education funding. But is it true?

Not by any measurable standard, be it money or staffing levels.

A school strike has been averted in Ontario as education workers and the government reached a tentative agreement late Sunday afternoon.

The agreement comes after a weekend of intensive negotiations between the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) and the province.

Few details have been released about what is included in the tentative agreement; however CUPE has previously said the government had come to the table with a 3.59 per cent wage increase for workers.

Unions planned nationwide protests to counter Ford’s use of notwithstanding clause

Before Ontario Premier Doug Ford announced he would rescind his use of the notwithstanding clause to ban an education union from striking, labour leaders discussed a potential nationwide protest that would have temporarily shut down not just the province’s auto plants, but the country’s ports and even the Confederation Bridge to Prince Edward Island.

In the end, the full-scale show of force never happened. It was called off last Monday after Mr. Ford and his Education Minister, Stephen Lecce, decided they would back down.

Sounds like an insurrection to me.

Premier Doug Ford said he is willing to rescind the legislation that made the Ontario education workers’ strike illegal if their union is willing to stop their mass walkout.

“As a gesture of good faith our government is willing to rescind the legislation, are willing to rescind section 33, but only if CUPE agrees to show a similar gesture of good faith by stopping their strike, and letting our kids back into their classrooms,” Ford said Monday morning.

Public service unions are going to have to be smashed one day, just not under Ford’s tenure.