Grievance resolves

July 29, 2006

Brothers and Sisters,

Over the last two weeks, we have been working with the company to resolve quite few outstanding grievances.

The company has committed to try and clear up as many as possible and are being true to their word on this issue. Rick Wilson, the AVP of Labour Relations, has spearheaded this latest drive on company side, and it is appreciated.

Almost all the resolves are for the full amount requested in the grievance, though there are a few that we have negotiated on, depending on the facts and arguments of the case.

We have already resolved dozens since the middle of July and there are quite a few more to come. So, if you receive an extra payment on your cheque, look at your statement to see if it is a grievance resolve, and then contact your Director so that we can officially close the file.

You should receive a grievance resolve letter from us, but the company is breaking new ground here, by actually arranging the payment quicker than we can get the letters out to you. I would like to commend Jackie Romaine and Scott Seeney on this, it is a welcome surprise.

I would also like to thank Directors Spikula, Helfenbein, Doherty and Delongchamp for their hard work and diligence on keeping the grievances current and then working on these resolves with the company.

The outstanding grievances are roughly half as many as what they averaged just three short years ago, with a shelf life measured in months now, instead of years. However, we want to decrease that even more. It does take a lot of work, on both sides of the table but the company has once again committed to try and communicate better to their supervisors on how to interpret the Collective Agreement and if they can finally accomplish this, we'll succeed. At least the grievances that we have had to file are now being addressed, for the most part, in a timely fashion.

Also, its my understanding that the MBR grievance resolves over the June 2004 reductions, have finally been paid out. This resulted in over a hundred members receiving compensation, most were in the thousands of dollars. If you did not receive a payment and were entitled, please contact your Director and we will investigate.

Fraternally,

Bill Brehl
President
TCRCMWED