Members of the FEA teachers union march to begin their strike, on Nov. 23 in Montreal. All the unions affiliated with a Quebec labour alliance representing around 420,000 public sector workers have now reached tentative deals on working conditions with the provincial government.Ryan Remiorz/The Canadian Press
The group of four Quebec unions that represents 420,000 public-sector workers says a government proposal that ended months of labour action includes a pay increase of 17.4 per cent over five years, significantly more than the province’s initial offers last fall.
The CSN, CSQ, FTQ and APTS unions, dubbed the “common front,” represent teachers, education support staff, lab technicians and many other types of public workers. They held 11 days of strikes in November and December, part of an escalating labour conflict that shut down schools and delayed health care procedures throughout the province.
The common front disclosed the government’s new wage offer, up from the rejected increases of 12.7 per cent last month and 10.3 per cent in October, in a website statement Wednesday. The common front announced the proposed tentative agreement last week, which will be reviewed by the individual unions and, if approved, presented to members in a vote.
A separate union, the Fédération autonome de l’enseignement (FAE), which represents about 40 per cent of Quebec’s teachers who had been on a month-long strike, also announced a tentative agreement last week.
None of the unions released details about the offers last week. FAE spokesperson Hélène St-Pierre declined to comment Wednesday.
In addition to the pay increase, the common front obtained “a clause to protect purchasing power during the last three years of the collective agreement and numerous improvements in working conditions,” it said in its statement.
“Significant gains have also been achieved in terms of group insurance and vacation leave, along with gains related to parental rights and the attraction and retention of skilled workers and psychologists, among others,” the group said, adding it also got “some improvements” and avoided setbacks with respect to pensions.
Decision-making bodies at the CSN, CSQ, FTQ and APTS are “reviewing the content of proposed agreements worked out at the central table and at each of the sectoral tables to determine if they actually constitute an overall tentative deal.”
If that is the case, the tentative deal will be presented to union members for votes during January. Members will receive more details in a Jan. 7 newsletter, the statement says.
Quebec Treasury Board spokesperson Anne-Hélène Couturier declined to comment or confirm the information shared by the common front owing to continuing negotiations.
Separately, about 80,000 nurses and other health care professionals represented by the Fédération interprofessionnelle de la santé du Québec (FIQ) said in late December they had made an offer to the government and were waiting for a response. FIQ spokesperson Félix Tremblay said the union, which is also not part of the common front, would not talk to the media before Jan. 15.