Latest news with #MGEU
CBC
08-04-2025
- Business
- CBC
Strike at Métis, Michif child and family services agencies ends, members back to work Tuesday: MGEU
Social Sharing After just under two weeks in the picket lines, workers at two Métis and Michif child and family services agencies will go back to work on Tuesday, after their union says it's reached an agreement with the employer to resolve outstanding contract negotiations through arbitration. More than 330 employees of the two agencies — the Winnipeg-area Métis Child, Family and Community Services, and Michif Child and Family Services, serving the Dauphin, The Pas and Brandon areas — went on strike on March 25. The employees, who are represented by the Manitoba Government and General Employees' Union (MGEU), have been without a contract since the previous agreements expired on Jan. 31, 2023. Workers had been asking for a new agreement that matched the four-year, 14 per cent wage increase members represented by the MGEU in other civil services got last year. Late Monday evening, the union announced it has reached an agreement with the agencies to resolve outstanding contract negotiations through interest arbitration, effectively bringing the strike to an end. In a statement, MGEU president Kyle Ross said the resolution "is an important step forward in our efforts to achieve wage parity for CFS members." "We will continue to advocate for that outcome in arbitration," he said. Last week, MGEU applied to the Manitoba Labour Board to have the current contract dispute with the agencies resolved by an independent arbitrator. On Monday, the union said it would withdraw that application, after the employer agreed to voluntary arbitration. As part of the agreement, the parties are scheduled for a hearing on April 22, with the arbitrator committing to deliver a ruling within four weeks. Union members from both agencies will return to work on Tuesday, MGEU said.
CBC
03-04-2025
- Politics
- CBC
MGEU tests new Manitoba labour legislation in strike by child and family services agencies
Labour legislation passed last fall in Manitoba is about to be tested by one of province's largest unions. The Manitoba Government and General Employees' Union has applied to the provincial labour board under new provisions of the Labour Relations Act to (LRA) have the current contract dispute with two child and family services (CFS) agencies resolved by an independent arbitrator. More than 300 members at Michif Child and Family Services and Métis Child, Family and Community Services are now in their second week of a strike, fighting for wage parity with other provincial workers who do similar jobs, MGEU president Kyle Ross says. "It's alarming to note that neither of these employers has approached the MGEU to get back to the bargaining table with a fair and reasonable offer for these workers," Ross said Thursday at the Union Centre on Broadway in Winnipeg. That foot dragging is putting families and kids at risk, even moreso as layoffs to 20 per cent of the unionized staff at the agencies take effect Thursday, he says. MGEU's filing argues those layoffs infringe on the workers' ability to strike in a meaningful way because, in order to maintain a certain level of essential service more workers will now have to leave the picket line to go back to work. The recent amendments to the LRA mean a union can ask the Manitoba Labour Board to order a dispute be resolved through arbitration if the requirement to perform essential services has compromised the right to strike and the right to collective bargaining. Most of the striking workers are employed at shelters operated by the CFS agencies, created to prevent Métis children and youth in care from being placed in hotels and to help young adults aging out of care. As a result, not all of the unionized workers have been on the picket line. About half have been working to maintain an essential level of care required for vulnerable youth, whose quality of life could otherwise be at risk, the MGEU says. The layoffs have added another concern for workers who are trying put pressure on the employer by striking while also balancing a level of care. They have now been without a contract since the previous agreements expired on Jan. 31, 2023. Any wage increases bargained into a new contract should be retroactive to that date, but Ross is concerned the employers will argue those payments only apply to members still working when the new deal is ratified. "Those workers who were laid off today stand to lose two years of retroactive pay," he said. The Manitoba Métis Federation has said budget constraints led to the layoffs but "the employer hasn't laid bare what their financial situation is," Ross said. "They have a duty to let us know what their financial situation is so we can understand when they're issuing layoffs and when we're bargaining. But we have yet to hear that from them," he said. In the meantime, funding from the province to CFS agencies has increased by more than 14 per cent over the past three years, including more than $2 million in new funding in last month's budget, Ross says, "so the money for wage parity is there." "We believe those layoffs are part of a bargaining strategy. We've been arguing with them for over two years and there was no mention … at any time that there would be layoffs coming. Then, once our members chose to push back and take a strike mandate, they brought down these layoffs." On March 24, Southeast CFS was able to avert a strike and reach a new collective agreement by offering wage parity, Ross says, adding both the Métis CFCS and the Michif CFS received proportionally similar funding increases.
