Bulletin
Avis – WorkShare and Labour Relations Budget Decision
September 25, 2020
To: All MoveUP members at Avis
Your union wanted to update you on a couple of important items.
WorkShare Program
We were advised yesterday by Avis management that a decision had been made to discontinue participating in the WorkShare Program. This was not surprising as WorkShare has proven to be very poorly administered. There have been constant issues arising including the delay in the WorkShare department approving the application despite a promise by the government that approval would be given within a ten day period. Your union has written to MP Peter Julian regarding the delay in approval and the subsequent decision to only start payment four weeks after the approval. In turn, Mr. Julian has sent a letter to the Minister of Employment, Workforce Development and Disability Inclusion, Carla Qualtrough (attached here) asking that the decision be reviewed. Although we have not heard back from the Minister, Mr. Julian has thanked your union (letter attached here) for raising the matter and has promised to keep us posted when he receives a response.
It is quite clear that the fact that your union had to go to these lengths in order to try to fix what should be a pretty easy problem is an indication of the many problems that have arisen with the program.
The plan is to end the program by October 10th. Unfortunately, there will be a few more layoffs as the work will no longer be shared but because the cuts have already been so deep, there will not be too many more layoffs. All members who continue to work will be moved to full time hours.
Labour Relations Decision re: Avis and Budget
As we advised in the last bulletin, the Labour Relations Board (LRB) ruled on September 4th that Avis and Budget need to be considered a “common employer” for labour relations purposes. The decision also suggested that the parties work out the remedies of how that would look moving forward. The LRB also offered its services if the parties were unable to agree.
Unfortunately, the parties have not been able to agree to what Avis and Budget would look like in terms of labour relations going forward. Your union’s position has been that the Budget employees should be merged into the superior MoveUP collective agreement. The other union involved has not agreed to our position.
Your union asked for an LRB Special Investigating Officer to be assigned to assist the parties. This has been done and the parties are scheduled to meet via Zoom on Tuesday September 29th. We are hopeful that any outstanding issues can be resolved and we can start the process of moving the Budget workers into the superior MoveUP collective agreement. Having all workers under one collective agreement will put us all in a stronger position.
In Solidarity,
Shawn Lakusta, Union Representative
Christy Slusarenko, Vice-President of Combined Units