Negotiations with Concordia trades employees - Offers rejected at downtown campus, strike mandate at Loyola

MONTREAL, Nov. 28, 2012 /CNW Telbec/ - Negotiations between Concordia University trades employees and management, which have been ongoing for more than 4 years, remain at an impasse. Loyola Campus trades employees who gathered for their general assembly yesterday voted unanimously in favour of a mandate to use pressure tactics up to and including a strike. Ninety-one percent of their maintenance co-workers at the Sir George Williams Campus also rejected management's final offers and already have a mandate to strike.

"The University persists in making wage offers that are well below the current market for qualified trades employees. They're hiding behind the government's salary policy, which does not apply to this case at all," said union staffer Luc Julien, who represents the Loyola Campus employees.

Concordia University trades employees deployed pressure tactics several times last year, including a one-day strike in the spring and several lunchtime demonstrations. "It's distressing to see management turn a deaf ear to legitimate demands. These qualified employees, who ensure that the university buildings' electromechanical systems are operating properly, simply want to be paid at a level equivalent to that of their co-workers in other universities," added Richard Boudreault, the union's representative for workers at the downtown campus.

The USW/Syndicat des Métallos represents 32 trades employees at Concordia University's Loyola Campus and 64 others at the Sir George Williams Campus.

The USW/Syndicat des Métallos, an FTQ affiliate, is Quebec's largest private-sector union. Its members - more than 60,000 - work in all sectors of the economy (mines, metallurgy, industrial manufacturing, university campuses, security, the hotel and restaurant business, trucking, taxis and more).

SOURCE: UNITED STEELWORKERS (USW)

Clairandrée Cauchy, 514 774-4001, [email protected]
Communications Officer