In the Georgia Straight (August 16-23, p. 16) an article appeared entitled: “Anton: Vision using strike for political gain.”

The article indicates that some City Council members are using the strike as a “disguised political action against Sullivan” and CUPE locals are involved in trying to damage Mayor Sullivan’s reputation.

Councillor Anton’s accusation is simply not true. CUPE and CUPE 391 are not using this strike to “disguise political action” or to damage Mayor Sullivan’s reputation. It is about getting a fair collective agreement for Vancouver’s library workers.

In fact, as his past actions have shown, Sam Sullivan does not need any help in bringing about negative feedback regarding his leadership during the strike. As the Mayor of Vancouver, his actions and inaction have been in no small part responsible for the situation that has developed.

It is his responsibility to ensure that residents receive the services they need and deserve. Sadly, all the Mayor has done so far is to fail in his responsibility to both citizens and civic workers by NOT directing his management team to negotiate a fair collective agreement as quickly and painlessly as possible.

Unfortunately for Mayor Sullivan and Vancouver City Councillors, inevitably when all is said and done, Mayor and Council are directly responsible for the welfare of the city and they will be judged by the actions they take.

Questions have also arisen about CUPE locals making donations to various civic political parties. Just as it is the right of developers, big business and various special interest groups and individuals to contribute to political parties of their choice, it is a democratic right for labour unions to also contributed money to political parties that support issues that are important to our members.

On the CBC TV local news at 6:00 pm on August 16, it was announced that the offer of 17.5% over 5 years to striking library workers was, according to the union, “not enough”.

Perhaps the reporting of the facts was not enough either.  The report neglected to make any mention of the pertinent local issues.  Nor was any indication given of “why” it may have been rejected.

What was missing was the importance of our four main concerns: pay equity, benefits for part-time and auxiliary workers, job security, and overall improvements to benefits.  Nor was it noted that for many library workers the continuing employer demand for major concessions to benefits and rights fought for and won in previous rounds of negotiations forms a major barrier to meaningful negotiations.

The Vancouver Province newspaper reports (August 17/07, pg.3) that the City contracted Ipsos Reid to conduct a telephone poll.  This poll asks Vancouver residents about their views on an offer of 17.5% over 5 years to the City’s unionized workers.  According to the article, 89% of Vancouver residents believe the offer is fair.  In addition, 60% of respondents expressed concern about the effect on their taxes.

Please remember that the current labour dispute is not just about a 17.5% over 5 years.  It is about local issues of which the survey makes no mention.

This past weekend, both the Vancouver Sun and The Province published large advertisements from the City of Vancouver outlining the City’s position on the current strike. The ad in Saturday’s Sun took up half of page A17, while the identical ad in Sunday’s Province encompassed an entire page (also page A17).

Without addressing the costs involved in publishing full and half-page ads in the weekend editions of daily newspapers (an expense covered by the taxpayer), the advertisement itself contains a number of misleading and inaccurate points.

Under the heading “Current City of Vancouver Benefits”, the City suggests that statutory holidays are provided by the City as benefits to its employees when in fact the majority of these holidays are mandated by Provincial legislation.

The ad also suggests that “compressed work week days off” are extra days off (with pay). In fact, staff on compressed schedules work the equivalent hours of non-compressed staff fully covering their schedules in advance of their fortnightly day off.

Under the heading “Key Issues”, the City suggests that CUPE’s opposition to contracting out and layoffs and its insistence on factoring seniority into hiring practices are demands specific to this round of contract negotiations. Protecting members from layoffs and insisting on fair play in hiring practices are fundamental principles to the union movement, which no bargaining unit would willingly surrender.

However, all is not doom and gloom in the media. There is also positive news on a couple of fronts. The Tyee (http://thetyee.ca/) released a story this morning outlining the issues surrounding CUPE 391’s struggle for pay equity (for the full story see http://thetyee.ca/News/2007/08/20/LibraryStrike/). The article makes references to the research outlining how the Library’s wages have fallen behind other those in other municipal and library sectors.

In addition, Saturday’s Globe & Mail ran a story by Laura Drake addressing the issue of the Ipsos Reid poll commissioned by City, partial results of which appeared in Friday’s Province. The article notes the controversies surrounding the poll, particularly the disputes about costs, and mentions one poll participant who maintains that she was asked directly whether she supported the Union or the City. (For the full story, click here).

This morning’s Vancouver Sun featured a front page article entitled “Civic Strike Could Last Months, City Says.” The content of this article came out of a meeting City spokesman Jerry Dobrovolny had with the Editorial Board of The Sun. Mr. Dobrovolny makes a number of interesting and outrageous allegations about the unions’ motivations for going out on strike. He specifically refers to the counter-proposal our Bargaining Committee made to the Employer during Friday’s negotiations.

Mr. Dobrovolny alleges that CUPE 391’s counter-proposal includes “significant new demands” related to pay equity. He maintains that the City is “absolutely baffled” by these demands. As pointed out by both Ed Dickson and Alex Youngberg in the article, the Bargaining Committee tabled no new demands during last week’s negotiations. The Bargaining Committee merely made amendments to their proposals on job evaluation and pay equity.  Amendments to proposals and compromises are how collective agreements are usually negotiated.

It is important to remember that pay equity is an important and complex topic. Contrary to the spin coming out of City Hall, CUPE 391 does not expect a final settlement on pay equity to emerge from the current contract negotiations. Rather, the Union seeks to create a framework for moving forward on this important issue. Such a framework would include setting up a Committee to examine Library positions and compare them with similar positions in the City of Vancouver and oversee the implementation of a Gender Neutral Job Evaluation Plan. Other municipalities have successfully negotiated steps forward on the path to pay equity through this round of contract negotiations.

Accompanying the headline of this morning’s front page Sun article was the provocative subtitle “Union says demands will rise ‘the longer the strike goes on’.” This actually refers to a statement on CUPE 1004’s website regarding a signing bonus, something CUPE 1004’s Acting-President, Mike Jackson, maintains is a standard demand in the event of a prolonged strike.

On a more positive note, today’s Sun also published a letter to the Editor (page A10) regarding Saturday’s half-page ad from the City of Vancouver. Entitled “City’s PR spin wastes tax dollars”, the letter draws attention to the costs involved in placing the ad and notes that the ad would have been composed by a “PR flak”. Here is the full text of the letter.