On December 12 The Canadian Press has presented its main bargaining proposals. Predictably the company is continuing to push for economic concessions from Guild members. The list of initial proposals is short but significant.

The big target, once again, is the company pension plan. CP management is suggesting that employees give up all future interest payments on the repayment of the funds that Guild members loaned to CP some years ago to help keep the pension plan afloat.

The company has also announced its intent to further reduce the workforce early in 2015 by as many as nine positions.

We aren’t surprised to see this sort of “shock and awe” tactic from the company. Those of you who were around for the last round of negotiations will recall that the company’s initial proposals included a 10-percent salary rollback for all employees. Of course we take the company’s concerns seriously, even if we disagree on the best ways of achieving the overall goal of making sure the company survives and remains competitive.

As for the Guild’s initial proposals, we concentrated on areas where we can help maintain and improve our members’ working conditions and their job satisfaction. We’ve decided to keep discussions around monetary issues for a later stage in the bargaining process.

We have set an ambitious schedule for January with eight full days of talks scheduled. We have visited some bureaus already, with Edmonton scheduled for Dec. 18 and meetings coming up in Montreal and Halifax in mid-January. Meetings in Toronto will be scheduled soon.

Your bargaining committee:
Riaz Ladha, Toronto
Michel Lamarche, Montreal
Terry Pedwell, Ottawa – President, CP Branch
Keith Maskell, CMG Staff Representative