Photo: Judy Galea
Local President James Thompson (seated,
centre) headed the bargaining team that
included Debbie Hazlett (on his right) and Randy Morgan (on
his left). The team managed to secure a 21-per-cent
increase over three years for the newspaper's hopper feeders.
INDEX PAGE: James
Montagano, a member of the Local executive, signals his
satisfaction with the deal.
25 April 2005
Guild wins stunning 21% increase
for mailroom workers at CanWest daily
3-year deal gives hopper feeders 'huge' raise;
night-shift workers get big bump-up
Windsor Typographical Union | TNG Canada
Local 30553
Members of the Guild who work as hopper
feeders at The Windsor Star are the envy of their counterparts
across the country today. A new contract gives them a 21-per-cent
pay increase over three years and puts them in the upper
echelon of wages for that type of work.
"It's a huge raise for them," says an ecstatic
David Esposti, the TNG Canada Staff Representative who helped
the Windsor Typographical Union negotiate the new agreement,
which came in the wee hours of Friday and about 180 minutes
past a strike-lockout deadline.
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David Esposti
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The three unions that represent workers
at the CanWest-owned daily and which bargained as a joint
council, held ratification votes yesterday, garnering an
overall 93-per-cent thumbs up.
"There were no concessions at all" and
improvements for everyone who works at the newspaper, especially
night-shift workers, says Esposti.
The pay scale for hopper feeders, who run the machinery
that mechanically inserts flyers and special sections into
newspapers, is relative to rates for journeymen mailers.
The 35 hopper feeders at the Star currently earn $13.23 an
hour, or 44.5 per cent of a mailer's rate of $29.71 an hour.
By the end of the agreement, the hopper feeders will be earning
$17 an hour or 50 per cent of the wages paid to the 10 mailers
who are fellow Guild members.
The new agreement is a big feather
in the cap of James Thompson, whose recent election as
president rejuvenated the Guild Local. The 50 members who
work in the mailroom were "determined
to get what they want" and last month voted 100-per-cent
in favour of giving the bargaining team a strike mandate.
With mediation set for April 19-21 and both sides in an
open position as of 12:01 a.m. on Friday, April 22 (when
a strike or lockout would be legal), Thompson had predicted
negotiations would go down to the wire. In the end, they
went beyond it, by about three hours.
The bargaining team emerged bleary-eyed but triumphant with
a deal that provides for salary increases of 2.5, 2.5 and
3.0 per cent over the three years of the contract that runs
until Dec. 31, 2007.
In addition, the night shift differential
immediately increases by $1.50 to $14.50 per shift. This
represents a big win for the Guild Local, says Esposti, "because
most of our people work nights." He says it will amount
to $72.50 a week more for working nights and is well above
the average of $8-$10 a shift other daily newspapers pay.
Another plus for the Local, whose members belong to the
ITU Negotiated Pension Plan, is that the employer will increase
contributions by 50 cents per shift in each of the next three
years. By the end of the agreement, says Esposti, the Star will be paying $14 a shift, up from $12.50.
The employer in the end backed off two highly contentious
issues that could have precipitated a strike.
Members of the Canadian Auto Workers (with 150 employees
in reader sales and service, editorial, advertising and the
business office), and the Communications Energy and Paperworkers
union (20 workers in the pressroom) stood firm with the Guild
in refusing to give up an early-retirement provision the
employer wanted to delete from the three contracts.
The clause permits employees with sufficient years of service
to quit working at age 60 and for five years collect half
wages and full benefits. At age 65, the employee is officially
retired and collects a full pension.
Management had also proposed a change to wording in the
contract that the CEP interpreted as an encroachment on their
jurisdiction in the pressroom. Eventually, both sides agreed
to leave the wording intact.
Two other issues that Thompson identified as possible sticking
points involved benefits. Both sides agreed to maintain the
status quo in that employees will continue to co-pay dental
plan premiums and the employer will pay 100 per cent of medical
plan premiums.
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