By Craig Gibson
The Ottawa-Carleton Catholic School Board is facing the threat of empty offices and dirty classrooms in January if two unions representing secretaries, teaching assistants, custodians and other support workers go on strike.
“A strike would really hurt and people are concerned,” says Wendy Schieman, the president of CUPE Local 2357 which represents 600 clerical, technical and special education support workers employed by the Catholic board. “We are good people and we do good stuff and it’s time for us to take a stand.”
Last week, Schieman’s CUPE members voted 92 per cent in favour of a strike mandate. Both sides later met with a provincially-appointed conciliator.
Last month, members of the Service and Commercial Employees Union Local 272, representing 300 custodial and maintenance staff, voted 95 per cent in favour of a strike mandate. They’re scheduled to meet with the board and a conciliator at the end of November.
Schieman says a CUPE walkout would affect a number of areas inside the schools including some special education classes and offices where secretaries do clerical work, take care of students’ general needs and dispense medications.
Schieman says her union wants improved sick leave and better bereavement days. And secretaries want to stop being responsible for giving students medicines such as Ritalin – as long as doctors and parents fill out the appropriate forms and supply the pills secretaries have the right to dispense drugs, she says.
The union and the school board haven’t talked about salary issues in their negotiations yet, says Schieman. On average, members last received a pay hike six years ago and the average secretary earns $26,000 a year.
The custodial union is still waiting for the board to make a salary offer, says Tim Young, the union’s local president. Until that happens the union can’t make any decisions on what it will be demanding in a new contract.
“We’ll give it our best effort during the conciliation talks but if we don’t reach any agreement we are going to start gearing up for a strike around Y2K. It will be a bad time for the board if we aren’t in the buildings then,” says Young.
The negotiations are still early in the process and the board thinks it can reach an agreement with both unions before any possible strike action, says Ross Brady, superintendent of human resources at the Ottawa-Carleton Catholic School Board.
“I think the relationship (between the board and the unions) is very positive,” says Brady.
“We are at a stage now where parties are usually attempting to facilitate making decisions.”
He says although the board has not developed any type of action plan in case either of the unions goes on strike, the schools would manage.