Grievance Updates

Written by Darcy Hryn-Bird, ASPA Member Services

Our Member Services Officer, Darcy Hryn-Bird, is currently handling twenty-one (21) active grievances.  Unsure  what a grievance is or how to file one?  For more information go here.

Most of the outstanding grievances are related to the employer failing to deduct Association dues from several positions across campus.  ASPA has been raising this issue with the Employer for the last number of years and started to file grievances when it became clear that our message was not being heard.  The grieved positions are currently in the “Research” group and are not in the scope of any bargaining unit.   We believe that these positions are similar to what our members are currently doing.  The reason that ASPA is pursuing these grievances is not to get more dues or increase our membership, but to ensure that employees of the University have been appropriately placed in a bargaining unit. We have made some progress on a few of the grievances in this area, but the movement is slow going.  

ASPA also has a number of grievances at Arbitration, either waiting to be heard, or have been heard and are waiting an award.  The themes of these grievances are wrongful layoff, termination, denial of a leave of absence.  Arbitration awards can take a long time to be received.  In at least one instance there was an 18 month wait for the Arbitrator to provide us with the award.

Most recently however, ASPA was able to resolve a couple of grievances just prior to the Arbitration hearing.  These were as follows:

• Position Placement Article 7.2.1 – The employer had posted a position at a different Phase from what was vacated even though there had not been any changes to the duties of the position. The resolution was the creation of a new Family and Salary Range for our Head Coach positions with Huskie Athletics.
• Salary Continuance: policy discriminatory.  The policy noted pregnancy as part of their exclusions criteria.  The parties agreed to remove this exclusion from the policy.  You may still see it in the plan summary as the process to change this can be quite lengthy.   However, individuals administering the salary continuance plan are aware that this has been removed.  This means that you will not be excluded from accessing salary continuance just because you are pregnant.

If you have questions about provisions in the Collective Agreement or in your workplace please do not hesitate to reach out to our Member Services Officer, Darcy Hryn-Bird at darcy@aspasask.ca or 306-966-7392 or contact the office at 306-966-2471 or aspa@aspasask.ca.