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[ ...More ]Publication date : 2023-06-26
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[ ...More ]Publication date : 2023-05-06
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[ ...More ]Publication date : 2023-05-04
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Contract talks with federal lawyers deadlocked, headed to conciliation
12-07-2017
The Liberal government and the union representing federal lawyers are heading to conciliation after the failure of a final bid to break a longstanding deadlock over pay and workload.
Ursula Hendel, president of the Association of Justice Counsel, said the government and union were unable to sort out their differences on five critical issues with the help of a mediation panel. Conciliation hearings have been scheduled for October. A conciliation decision is binding.
The two sides have been engaged in three years of difficult bargaining, with a revolving cast of Treasury Board negotiators appointed over the course of the talks, said Hendel. She said the government has yet to even table a wage offer; it gave a 5.5 per cent raise over four years to all other federal employees.
The union, however, is seeking raises averaging 20 per cent — and higher for some — to narrow the widening wage gap with lawyers working for the provinces of Ontario, Alberta, Quebec, B.C. Saskatchewan and Manitoba.
The AJC represents 2,700 federal lawyers at Justice Canada and the Public Prosecution Service of Canada, and those who provide in-house legal services to departments and agencies.
The lawyers — along with prison guards and border guards, pilots and professors — are among the last major holdouts in reaching contract deals with the government.
Hendel said the top issues are pay and changes that would help resolve mounting workload and burnout on the job. She said low pay and excessive work are the two main reasons federal lawyers look for other jobs.
But the collective bargaining landscape has changed considerably since the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling last summer on trial lengths, known as the Jordan decision.
Hendel lobbied several dozen MPs before Parliament rose for the summer to explain the impact of the Jordan decision and the stalemate in collective bargaining.
In the Jordan ruling, the court set strict timelines to ensure any accused is tried within a reasonable time. Under the new timelines, delays that drag out cases beyond 18 months in provincial court or 30 months in superior court are considered infringements on the constitutional right to a timely trial.
Since then, reports indicate more than 200 criminal cases across the country have been thrown out due to unreasonable delays. Judges have stayed cases involving murders, sexual assaults and drug trafficking.
All told, defence lawyers have filed 1,766 applications for stays of charges because of unreasonable delays. The Crown proactively stayed other charges because they were not expected to survive a Jordan application; 67 stays were ordered by the Public Prosecution Service of Canada.
The provinces and federal government are taking steps to tackle the delays but Hendel said the full impact of the Jordan decision won’t be felt for several years. She argues any fixes invariably will put more pressure on Justice lawyers and prosecutors.
She said efforts to address the problem — whether by speeding up cases, reducing the number of cases going to court or bringing in more judges — will increase the workload on prosecutors.
“I am not sure what governments are going to do … but there are few ways to tackle this that doesn’t involve more work for prosecutors,” said Hendel.
Hendel said prosecutors would face pressure to ‘triage’ cases and make difficult decisions about which ones are serious enough to prosecute — decisions which could be painful for victims.
“I don’t know if prosecutors are being told to pull marginal cases to save serious cases,” she said.
“But it difficult to tell victims who have been injured that your case is not worthy of prosecution simply because we don’t have the resources. It is easier to go back to court and have a judge say this is not going to proceed and go to trial.”
Meanwhile, Hendel said prosecutors are leaving for higher-paid positions with provincial governments, or are being offered judicial appointments, which leaves more work for the remaining employees.
The issue has hit the radar of opposition MPs, who recently questioned Kathleen Roussel, the newly appointed director of the PPSC, about how she would manage the pressures.
“We have people … fleeing to the provinces because they offer better pay and are actively hiring people, and where we have the remaining pool suffering from that burnout, first from losing their colleagues and then having to deal with more work,” said NDP MP Alistair MacGregor.
Roussel, who is not involved in collective bargaining, said she’s looking at new ways to recruit and build a “brand” for PPSC.
“It is not just how much you pay. I think some of it is being recognized as an employer of choice that provides good work, training opportunities, and a collegial environment to work in.”
Compensation for overtime is a big issue. Hendel said lawyers — whether they’re litigators, prosecutors or those writing legislation — routinely put in long hours. They aren’t entitled to overtime but management has the discretion to authorize up to 10 days a year to compensate for extra hours worked.
Hendel said the leave system isn’t working. It is applied inconsistently and many find they can’t afford to take the extra days within six months, after which they lose it.
“The system is broken, ridiculously broken,” said Hendel.
“We can’t force them to hire. We are asking them to pay us or compensate us and recognize the hundreds of hours of we put in for no overtime.”
The union is seeking compensation tied to the hours worked, paid in time-off rather than money. The union doesn’t have any statistics on the number of overtime hours lawyers are working.
The union is proposing time-and-a-half once lawyers have put in 215 hours over the course of four weeks.
Hendel said lawyers are the only federal employees — other than a handful of professors — who aren’t entitled to overtime.
Federal lawyers were not unionized until 2006. They initially had access to overtime but lawyers and managers were not comfortable with the system. The union later gave it up for a 10 per cent raise and the leave system.
The union also wants lawyers to be compensated for working standby or on-call hours.
The union is asking for compensation for work-related travel and is seeking changes in the contract to allow five years of unpaid leave.
It is also seeking a provision that most other public servants enjoy — one that would protect their salaries if their jobs are reclassified to a lower level.
