Gregory Krokosh
The Committee met on November 09, 2022, to prepare for the upcoming meeting of the Well-Being National Advisory Committee (WB-NAC). The committee’s major concern was that to date the meetings were in no way consultative and not even briefings. They were simply a report from the employer on what had happened and an opportunity for the Unions to bring any issues of concern.
The WB-NAC met on November 10, 2022, and in the employer’s, opening remarks it was indicated that the Committee only dealt with issues of a National scope and that Regional and Local issues would be addressed at using regular Union-Management Consultation (UMC) processes. The issue that UMCs are not being held was raised, specifically for the Ontario Region, and we were advised that they would be beginning soon. The program updates and discussion of the statistics portion of the meeting had to be cut short as the employer was not prepared for the amount of feedback and questioning from the Unions. The balance of the updates is to be emailed to the Committee members. Lack of time for meetings has been a continuing concern but this was the first time a portion of a meeting had been skipped. As the previous three-year Well-Being plan is ending, the Unions are being consulted on the new plan which has to be submitted for approval by March 2023. The employer’s plan is to use the Public Service Employee Survey data and the Psychological factors, once completed by the National Health and Safety Policy Committee, as a framework for the new plan. Local Advisory Committees (LACs) were brought up under the Terms of Reference discussions with no clear decision.
As has been repeatedly mentioned by the employer, members of this committee are free to speak in either of the official languages but there is no translation and at this meeting the employer supplied documents in English only versions. These issues will be addressed with our LR advisor to ensure that this does not happen again and that documents would be provided well in advance of the meetings.
I am pleased that the WB-NAC is using the term consultation but the employer quickly falls back into using a term like review so it will take efforts on our behalf to ensure that there is true consultation on the creation of the plan, its roll out and its monitoring throughout the next three years.
Respectfully submitted,
Gregory Krokosh
Chair of the Committee