{"id":17827,"date":"2019-12-16T15:15:40","date_gmt":"2019-12-16T20:15:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.benefitscanada.com\/news\/northumberland-county-workers-fighting-proposed-changes-to-std-leave-140415"},"modified":"2019-12-16T15:15:40","modified_gmt":"2019-12-16T20:15:40","slug":"northumberland-county-workers-fighting-proposed-changes-to-std-leave","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/2019\/12\/16\/northumberland-county-workers-fighting-proposed-changes-to-std-leave\/","title":{"rendered":"Northumberland County workers fighting proposed changes to STD leave"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Copyright: <\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Kelsey Rolfe<\/span> | December 16, 2019<\/p>\n

The union representing 33 employees of the Northumberland County social services department says the county is attempting to weaken employees\u2019 short-term disability leave and remove their right to work a compressed workweek.<\/span><\/p>\n

On Dec. 12, the Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 3725 began contract negotiations with the county using a provincially appointed conciliator. Union members \u2014 who are county employees in income support, housing, childcare and outreach \u2014 have been working since Sept. 30 without a contract.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jaime Bingham, president of Local 3725, says a second day of conciliation will be scheduled for the new year.<\/span><\/p>\n

Read: Western Forest Products, union at impasse over LTD benefits, wages<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Currently, union members have a short-term disability plan that provides employees with 17 weeks of sick leave paid at 100 per cent of their salary. Northumberland County is seeking to remove that provision and replace it with three days of fully paid leave, with the remainder of an employee\u2019s leave paid at 75 per cent.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe have an aging workforce, so . . . more and more of our workers are going off [to have] necessary surgeries,\u201d said Bingham. \u201cReducing [the STD leave] to 75 per cent means you may refuse a surgery because you financially can\u2019t do it.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

Northumberland County is also seeking to remove the 28 hours per year employees have to use for medical and non-medical appointments within the workday, which are part of the STD leave provisions.<\/span><\/p>\n

Read: New Indigenous Women\u2019s Healing Centre collective agreement includes paid days off<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

The county is also looking to eliminate employees\u2019 ability to work a compressed workweek. Currently, half the office has Mondays off and the other half takes Fridays off. And they work from 8 a.m. to 5:15 p.m. with a half-hour lunch every day to make up the time.<\/span><\/p>\n

Bingham says the demographics of the union\u2019s members skew overwhelmingly female and the flexible scheduling allows them to manage family commitments. <\/span>\u201cAs mainly female employees, we\u2019re the caretakers of our family and we use the compressed workweek to [go to] appointments for our . . . parents and children and spouses,\u201d she says. \u201cThey seem to be attacking the female-ness of the workforce.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Members gave the bargaining committee a 100 per cent strike mandate, though the union hasn\u2019t set a strike or lockout deadline.<\/span><\/p>\n

Northumberland County did not respond to Benefits Canada<\/em>\u2018s request for comment.<\/span><\/p>\n

Read: Ontario case could clear up questions on limitation periods in LTD claims<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Read the full article at BenefitsCanada.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kelsey Rolfe | December 16, 2019 The union representing 33 employees of the Northumberland County social services department says the county is attempting to weaken employees\u2019 short-term disability leave and remove their right to work a...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17827"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17827"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17827\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17827"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17827"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lifeinsurance-orleans.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17827"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}