SAFA
SAIT Academic Faculty AssociationSAFA Negotiating Committee
Terry Sway, Spokesperson
The dates set for our interest arbitration regarding our Collective Agreement are March 15th and 16th, 2012. SAFA has contacted SAIT to enquire if they would be interested in continuing negotiations up to that date in an effort to reach a settlement that could be taken forward to the membership to ratify. SAIT declined, saying that if SAFA wanted the same wage settlement as NASA (NAIT Academic Staff Association), then we would meet in arbitration. In any event, we always ask for retro-activity with regard to any pay increases we receive through arbitration. Any pay increases would be applied retro-actively back to July 1st, 2010.
It may be beneficial to review how our collective agreement arbitration works. The legislation that we (SAFA) exist under is the Post Secondary Learning Act (PSLA). That legislation and our own Collective Agreement require binding arbitration if the two parties – SAIT and SAFA – cannot come to a ratified collective agreement at the bargaining table. The composition of the arbitration panel is one nominee from the employer (SAIT) and one nominee from the Association (SAFA). These two nominees come to a mutual agreement on a third person to act as Chairman of the arbitration panel. The Chairman, or arbitrator, of our up-coming interest arbitration is David Jones Q.C. He has written over 400 awards over the past 20 years in matters arising from collective agreements throughout western Canada in both the public and private sectors. No member of the arbitration panel can be someone who has been involved in the negotiation process leading up to the arbitration.
During the arbitration, each side presents their positions to the panel. Each side has a team but the actual presentation is done by one person from each side. SAIT’s presenter is their lawyer, Barb Johnston. Our presenter is Terry Sway, Labour Relations Officer for ACIFA. Terry was involved with our bargaining team during the negotiations phase of this round of bargaining.
Once presentations have been made to the panel, the panel then reviews the testimony and supporting evidence and decides on what the contract language should be by issuing an arbitration award. This award is written by the Chairman of the panel and is binding.
Usually, during the negotiations phase, the two sides have come to agreement on many things and, as a result, not all sections of the collective agreement will be in dispute. Typically, and specifically in our case, the main bone of contention will be wages. The employer will argue that they don’t have the ability to pay more (for one reason or another) and the Association will argue that it isn’t a question of ability, but, instead, one of willingness to pay.
At this point, it appears that the rest of ACIFA have settled and that the pattern of settlements has been set – at least as it pertains to wages. This is important as it is the settlement pattern within our industry and, as important, what our closest comparable organization (NASA) settled for that will influence the arbitrator’s award. NASA’s wage increase over three years was: 0% with $1000 signing bonus year one, 2% year two and 3% year three.
I found this video that gives a humorous look at a management pre-bargaining planning meeting. www.youtube.com/watch?v=iObqguaNDdA Hope you enjoy itJ.Please feel free to stop into the SAFA office for a chat or just to say hello whenever you like.
Al Brown
SAFA Labour Relations Officer
Labour Relations Officer Update