Speaking at a news conference on Tuesday, Ford declined to give specific details about the government’s proposal, but said the offer would be particularly good for lower-income workers. “We want a deal that’s fair to students, fair to parents, fair to taxpayers and fair to workers, especially low-income workers,” he said. The workers, represented by the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), ended their protest on Monday hours after Ford promised to scrap a bill that used the clause to enforce a multi-year contract and barred workers from striking. Bill 28 was met with stiff resistance from CUPE and other labor unions. Ford said the law will be repealed when the Legislature reconvenes early next week. But in a press release on Tuesday, CUPE suggested it wants to see the law repealed sooner. “They sat up at 5am last week to get this rights-crushing bill through. We call on Ford and his friends to show the same sense of urgency to do the right thing,” the union said. WATCHES | Ford says the CUPE contracts will have implications across the public sector:
Ontario Premier sees ‘huge implications’ from potential CUPE deal
Ontario Premier Doug Ford has warned that a new contract with the province’s teachers will have a significant impact on public service wages, especially as negotiations with teachers continue. Ford said he wants to proceed with negotiations in good faith. “I don’t want to fight. I just want the kids in school. I’m past the stage of fighting, people don’t want that,” he said in a marked change in tone from last week, when both he and Education Minister Stephen Lecce said that they had no choice but to pass legislation to prevent a strike. However, he also warned that any agreement with education workers would impact the four major teachers’ contracts also in the bargain, and the CUPE increases could lead to “tens of billions of dollars” in teacher raises, and you should watch them Ontario results. “This is money we need for schools, health care, transit and infrastructure,” Ford said. “It’s money we need for vital services that the hard-working people of this province rely on.” Ford said the government had previously offered a higher sum than its original proposed contract, and it was “floored” that CUPE did not receive it. The government had initially offered raises of two percent a year for workers making less than $40,000 and 1.25 percent for everyone else, and the four-year deal imposed by the soon-to-be-repealed law gave 2.5 percent annual increases. raises for workers making less than $43,000 and 1.5 percent raises for everyone else. CUPE said the framework was not accurate because the increases actually depend on hourly wages and salary scales, so the majority of workers earning less than $43,000 in a year would not get 2.5 percent. CUPE initially sought annual wage increases of 11.7 percent and said it later filed a counteroffer that cut its wage proposal in half. The union says it is technically still in legal strike position, but will now focus on a renewed bargaining effort. Parents expressed relief at Tuesday’s morning walkout that schools reopened. Sona Popal, mother of a Grade 1 student, said she had to drop her child off at a family friend’s house while schools were closed because she and her husband had to work. “I’m happy and glad that today is the day they come back,” she said outside Thorncliffe Park Public School in Toronto. “Otherwise, it was like a nightmare for us, (figuring out) how to take care of our children at home if they don’t go to school.”
