November 12, 2010 at 12:00 PM
Roll Call:
- District 711 (Vancouver) Don Ross, Tom Troughton
- District 712 (Calgary/Edmonton/Winnipeg) Regrets
- District 713 (London) Ryan Boundy, Mike Emery, Dan Bishop, Ben Bachl
- District 714 (Montreal/Ottawa/Quebec City) Patrick Chiasson, Daniel Marion
- District 715 (Halifax) Regrets
- District 716 (Toronto) Mike Lilly, Mike Kingston
Pension Committee
The next meeting is Nov 17th in Vancouver. Dan Brown from London and Daniel Kemper from Vancouver our Jazz Tech Pension Committee representatives.
Deferred Drug Card
All Jazz Unionized groups have met together twice this past year to discuss the benefits of adopting a deferred drug card. All groups are in agreement that we should go forward with the implementation. Look for more on that as the process unfolds.
Annual Benefits Review
Jonathan Cristo, Mike Lilly, Ghobud Khorasani and Don Ross attended the annual benefits review meeting in Toronto. The company hires an independent consulting company, Morneau Sobeco, to help them negotiate with Great West Life. They made a presentation for each unionized group separately. You may recall that the pilots had an unsuccessful bid to try and get us all sharing the costs instead of breaking it down per group. This argument was dismissed at arbitration, so all groups remain separate. The Company will be issuing a breakdown of benefit cost increases for next year. We need to remember that except for life insurance and Long Term Disability, we use a self funded benefit package. In its most basic form it means that what we used this year sets the rate for next year. Tech had a big increase in paramedical costs which include such things as chiropractors, acupuncture, massage, psychologists, x-rays, lab work etc. plus we are using more drugs! We were pleasantly surprised to see that the cost of Long Term Disability went down, but that did not do much to offset the other increases. Each District Chair has a copy of the presentation.
CARs Representative
Jim Sofonoff will be attending the13th Canadian Aviation Regulation Advisory Council (CARAC) Plenary Meeting being held in Ottawa November 18, 2010.
Vacation Bids
As posted, we were disappointed in the outcome of the Vacation Arbitration. The vacation bid process has begun at several bases and will continue through November.
Thomas Cook
Today was the first day of flights out of Toronto to Montego Bay, Cancun, Punta Cana and Puerto Vallarta.
Q400
The only update we have on these aircraft is that there are endorsement courses scheduled in December and January.
AMP/CAP
AMP (Attendance Management Policy) and CAP (Culpable Absenteeism Program) continue to be issues at our bases. The company is still using 10 sick days (including family days) to be the number they consider excessive and feel that at that point they can ask for doctor’s notes, even for one sick day occurrence! It was discussed how these programs are strictly a tool the company uses to intimidate employees to not use their sick days.
Health and Safety Coordinator
Ben Bachl visited Halifax this past week and will visit Toronto next. He hopes to get to Edmonton, Ottawa and Winnipeg in the New Year. There has been a real shift in the attitude towards Health and Safety since the fall incident in Halifax and the directives from HRSDC (Human Resources and Skills Development Canada), over safety violations. The Jazz executive has been extremely focused on it. If Health and Safety officers have issues that need addressing at their bases, now is the time to bring them forward.
In Solidarity,
Don Ross
CAW VP Local 2002
Jazz Technical Services
(800) 932-4564 ext: *5004