Representing 1,300 Manitoba Workers

Spring Report Covers Many Topics

A newsletter that reports on recent activities by the Communications Energy and Paperworkers Union has been put together by Wendy Sol (right), Administrative Vice-President of the CEP Western Region. In it, she reminds members to mark September 23 to 26 on their calendars. Those are the dates of the 2007 Western Region Conference in Edmonton. Based on the strategic planning done at the last conference, two workshops will be offered as well as plenary sessions.

The workshops will be on organizing and political action. CEP needs to organize new workers to increase the union's density in its traditional areas and to protect workers. A Convention resolution mandated a national task force on organizing which is to report at the September convention.

The newsletter also deals with the issue of foreign ownership of Canadian telecoms. CEP has considerable experience with this issue. Kohlberg Kravis Roberts (KKR) along with their Canadian partner Yellow Pages Group of Montreal recently purchased Media group (Directory pages) from Manitoba Telecom Services (MTS). Two days after KKR assumed ownership they told one-third of the workers they no longer needed their services.

All this after they blocked the workers from exercising their rights to bump or take a buy out with MTS. The good news is CEP won a grievance at arbitration. In the award the arbitrator was clear that when a business is sold the purchaser does not buy the workers - they are not slaves to be sold.

The workers have a choice as to whether they want to work for the new employer or in this case exercise their rights under the collective agreement. As is typical in these types of situations, the employer is appealing the decision.

A Steering Committee was formed for the Telecommunications sector of CEP and after several meetings a unanimous report was issued to the Telco locals in April. There will be a National Telecommunications Conference to be convened by the president in September. The purpose of the conference will be to share information, analyze trends and develop bargaining strategies and goals to be attained for the telecommunications sector.

Wendy has more to say about this and other topics. If you would like to read her full Spring Report, click here to download a PDF of it (208 kb, Adobe Reader or similar required).