FPSLREB Decisions

Date: 2021-08-25

File: 590-14-42691

IN THE MATTER OF

 

a Public Interest Commisison

 

under the Federal Public Sector labour relations act

 

 

And a renewal collective agreement for the Public Service Alliance of Canada (“the Alliance) and Her Majesty in Right of Canada as represented by the Office of the Auditor General of Canada (the “OAG”) in respect of all employees in the Audit Services Group bargaining unit (“ASG”) as determined in the certificate issued by the Public Service Staff Relations Board on July 28, 1999.

 

 

Indexed as

Public Service Alliance of Canada v. Office of the Auditor General of Canada

Before: Morton Mitchnick, chairperson,

Gary Cwitco and Jean-François Munn, nominees

For the Bargaining Agent:

Seth Sazant, Negotiator, Elanor Sherlock, Research Officer, PSAC

Caroline Leclerc and Corey McCormick, Team members

For the Employer:

Daniel Sipes, Negotiator and Sophie Béliveau, Director, Financial Management, Comptroller's Group, Nathalie Cousineau, Senior Paralegal and Administrative Officer, Legal Services, Claude Andrée Montsion, Director, Human Resources and Kimberly Leblanc, Principal, Human Resources

 

Heard via Videoconference,

June 29 and 30, 2021.

PUBLIC INTEREST COMMISSION REPORT

[1] This is the Report of the Public Interest Commission established to assist in the settlement of a collective agreement between the Public Service Alliance of Canada (“the Alliance”) and the Office of the Auditor-General of Canada (“the OAG”).

[2] In accordance with the Federal Public Sector Labour Relations Act, the Alliance served notice to bargain with the OAG on July 12, 2018 to renew the collective agreement for the Audit Services Group (“ASG”) which expired on September 30, 2018. The ASG group comprises positions that are primarily involved in the provision of corporate services, such as finance, human resources, communications and facilities. The following table presents the distribution of bargaining unit members across the respective classification levels:

 

[3] The parties met in negotiations a total of ten times between October 8th, 2020 and February 5^th, 2021. The Alliance declared impasse and filed for the establishment of a Public Interest Commission (PIC) on March 17, 2021. The present Commission was thus duly appointed and held hearings in the matter on June 29^th and 30^th.

[4] The parties enjoy a good working relationship, and their own negotiations brought them to, or at least very close to, agreement on the great bulk of the issues. The items that had been resolved as of the PIC hearings were:

• · Article 3 – Application

• · Article 14 – Leave with or without Pay for Alliance Business

• · Article 19 – No Discrimination or Harassment

• · Article 25 – Hours of Work

• · Article 28 – Overtime

• · Article 38 – Maternity Leave

• · Article 39 – Maternity-Related Reassignment or Leave

• · Article 40 – Parental Leave

• · Article 41 – Leave without Pay for the Care of Family

• · Article 42 – Personal Leave

• · Article 43 – Leave with Pay for Family-Related Responsibilities

• · Article 45 – Caregiving Leave

• · Article 47 – Bereavement Leave

• · Article 62 – Duration

• · New Article – Domestic Violence Leave

• · Appendix E – Supporting Employee Well-being

 

[5] Having engaged as well in informal discussions with the parties, the Commission has no doubt that if a way could be found around the two “core” issues preventing settlement, the remaining issues can be readily resolved by the parties through a continuation of their direct talks. The Commission will accordingly provide its comments only with respect to these two core issues.

[6] The factors of general relevance to the Commission’s task are of course set out in Section 175 of the FPSLRA, which reads as follows:

175 In the conduct of its proceedings and in making a report to the Chairperson, the public interest commission must take into account the following factors, in addition to any other factors that it considers relevant:

(a) the necessity of attracting competent persons to, and retaining them in, the public service in order to meet the needs of Canadians;

(b) the necessity of offering compensation and other terms and conditions of employment in the public service that are comparable to those of employees in similar occupations in the private and public sectors, including any geographic, industrial or other variations that the public interest commission considers relevant;

(c) the need to maintain appropriate relationships with respect to compensation and other terms and conditions of employment as between different classification levels within an occupation and as between occupations in the public service;

(d) the need to establish compensation and other terms and conditions of employment that are fair and reasonable in relation to the qualifications required, the work performed, the responsibility assumed and the nature of the services rendered; and

(e) the state of the Canadian economy and the Government of Canada’s fiscal circumstances.

 

[7] We have highlighted the reference to the internal relativities of the federal public service itself because, in the particular circumstances here, this really is the driver of the present impasse. As indicated, the bargaining has for the most part been constructive and successful. The problem, on the one hand, is the unusual situation which the Alliance is having to confront on the two issues adverted to above, and on the other, the fact that there has at this point been much water under the bridge in the present round of bargaining, leading to a well-established pattern for wage adjustments over the three years that the parties are in agreement ought to form the term of the present collective agreement. As the OAG not unfairly sets out in its Brief:

Most collective agreements expired in 2018, and since then, the Government of Canada has reached 51 tentative or signed agreements with groups covering close to 242,000 employees or over 88% of public servants in the core public administration and separate agencies.

Following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, economic uncertainty has led to agreements of a shorter duration, typically consisting of a three-year agreement based on the following pattern:

• - Year 1: 2.8%

• - Year 2: 2.2%

• - Year 3: 1.35% plus 0.15% for group-specific measures

Over 96,000 members in bargaining groups represented by PSAC have agreed to three-year agreements in accordance with this pattern.

[8] As set out, the above numbers include the members of a number of separate agencies.

[9] In light of all of that, what are the “exceptionalities” that cause the Alliance to persist, as it has, in asking for a settlement that (however modestly, given the number of employees here) exceeds that pattern across the sector? The Commission will set those out.

I. The “Grid” issue

[10] As the Alliance, once again not unfairly, sets out in its Brief:

Virtually all other bargaining units in the federal public sector have a wage grid. The current system of “broad band” pay levels where there are minimum and maximum rates identified with a specific increase given each year to move up that range is out of line with almost every other federal public sector bargaining unit. It is out of line with practice at the OAG itself.

 

...

The lack of a wage grid also makes it more difficult for members to know exactly what their pay rate should be. This is further complicated by the Phoenix debacle that has been ongoing for some time. The lack of transparency for members receiving their pay is certainly exacerbated by a broad band pay system.

...

 

While it may not be true in every single case, there is a very clear pattern that supports the Union’s position of implementing a pay grid. Further, the Union is not seeking to match the generally smaller spreads between minimum and maximum rates of pay, nor the generally lower number of steps within the grid.

[11] Close to 50% of the members of this bargaining unit are already at the maximum rate for the classification, and accordingly the introduction of this “grid” will affect little over half of the bargaining unit’s 166 members. But that still represents a cost, and the Alliance, in recognition of the pattern and consequent “mandate” of the OAG bargaining team, has proposed deferring this implementation until the last day of the agreement, being September 30^th, 2021. The OAG team has offered to implement the grid system, but, given the limitations of its current mandate, is only willing to agree to it if the cost, such as it is, is taken out of the general increase otherwise payable to all members of the unit

[12] The Commission does not lack sympathy for the OAG’s position. There is a further circumstance, however, that stands out here. During discussions regarding monetary elements in the last round of bargaining the Alliance proposed a wage grid that would bring this unit in line with the sectoral (and PA) norms, but ultimately withdrew the proposal. In the course of the following year, however, the OAG instituted a pay grid for its Auditors (the AP group), which represents some 50% of the total staff complement; and shortly thereafter the same was done for the Management (EX) group. Compensation for the latter group has not yet been finalized; but for the AP group, the transition to the grid was in addition to the application of the standard wage increases. The IT group was already on a grid, so that at this point the only group not yet converted to a wage grid, apart from the very small Law Management group, is the present group. The Commission believes the OAG is attuned to the problem that that sequence of events has created for settlement here, and the Commission is hopeful that a solution can be worked out that either adopts the proposal of the Alliance to convert this group to a grid on the last day of the collective agreement; or that sets out in a Letter of Understanding the terms for doing so, effective the first day of the next collective agreement.

II. The “Parity” issue

[13] The PA Group has generally been the comparator for this Group at the OAG. However, in the last round of bargaining the parties agreed to a wage adjustment increase for all ASG-05 and ASG-06 employees that created an alignment with the AP-02 and AP-03 groups, respectively. Since then, however, there was another increment added to the top of the pay scale for the AP-02’s and two more increments for the AP-03’s following a benchmarking exercise (using the AP group comparators). The Alliance is seeking the same addition to the top of the ASG-05 and ASG-06 scales, respectively, as well as an adjustment for the ASG-04 level.

[14] “Parity” having thus been reached for the ASG-05 and 06’s at least, it is not surprising that the Alliance feels strongly about maintaining that relativity in the present round. The OAG responds, however, that that wage adjustment was not an agreement to parity. In particular, the OAG states, the agreement was not driven by an examination of the exact comparability between the ASG and the AP group. The OAG’s motivation at the time was to facilitate mobility of qualified personnel from the AP ranks to fill ASG roles as needed. Since that adjustment to the rates, the OAG indicates, 6 APs have transferred to ASG-5 and ASG-6 positions and no ASGs have transferred to the AP Group from these positions. The OAG indicates that it does not currently have a recruitment or retention issue at these levels, and in the absence of a comparability assessment, does not see a need for further wage adjustments at this time.

[15] Once again the Commission recognizes the difficulty faced by the OAG. The fact remains, however, that if the parties can find a way to resolve this issue, coupled with the kind of arrangement suggested by the Commission on Issue #1, it would appear that this collective agreement will fall into place quite quickly. Additionally, as a purely practical matter, the OAG in deciding whether in this regard to press once again for some allowance in its mandate should give consideration to the prospect of its staffing issue resurrecting itself should the differential in rates with the AP counter-part be re-established.

[16] The Commission accordingly turns it over to the parties to see what can be done about these two issues that are currently standing in the way of a final settlement.

 

Dated the 25th day of August, 2021.

 

(Original signed by )

Morton Mitchnick

Chairperson