Westlock County has suspended its three-month severance offer to employees.
CAO Peter Kelly, in an Oct. 13 e-mail to the Canadian Union of Provincial Employees, said he did not believe the offer was in breach of the collective agreement until he sought and received legal advice that afternoon.
“As a result, I have suspended the offer, as it applies to CUPE employees, pending discussion and input from their union representatives,” he wrote.
In a letter dated Sept. 26, Kelly offered all full-time and permanent employees three months severance if they chose to accept the offer by Oct. 15. CUPE spokesperson Lou Arab said during an Oct. 9 meeting, employees voted overwhelmingly to filed a complaint.
The Alberta Labour Relations Board has accepted the union’s complaint, which alleges the county demonstrated “anti-union animus” and has interfered with the administration of the union by offering a severance package with prior discussion with the union.
Employees or groups of employees will have until Oct. 27 to file written statements with the board, should they wish to do so.
Arab said he believes one or two employees did take the offer before it was suspended, although he said he couldn’t be definitive.
“There were also two more that we know of that were going to take it but were unable to because the county took it off the table,” he said.
He said the big issue is still getting an explanation as to what changes, precisely, are being planned that would necessitate every single employee getting a severance offer.
“And if they do go ahead with it, there will have to be some discussions through the union because we have the authority to bargain on that,” Arab said.
“They can’t just change the terms and conditions of our collective agreement, which they agreed to a month or two ago.”
Kelly has declined to comment on this issue, and reeve Bud Massey has said the only changes being talked about have to do with keeping the office open over the lunch hour and having a live voice answer the phone when people call the county office.
Arab said the union hasn’t heard this from the county so can’t confirm if that is the extent of the change, but did read those comments in the Westlock News.
“The reeve is out to lunch if he thinks that those kinds of changes necessitate offering severance packages to every single employee of Westlock County,” he said. “I don’t know what planet this guy lives on but those are relatively standard changes that managers might want to make.”
Those changes have apparently been suspended as well; on Oct. 17, calls to the county office were again being answered by a machine and the message indicated the office was closed for the lunch hour.
Interest in this issue has grown beyond Westlock County’s borders, with a Global News reporter and cameraman attending the Oct. 14 council meeting to do a story on the offer.
Massey said he was surprised that an Edmonton news outlet would be interested in the story, adding he and council believe the whole thing has been blown out of proportion.
“It started out as voluntary offer because some people thought they might want to leave. It was intended to be a very positive thing,” he said.
Former reeve Ken Mead, who served in that role from 2004-2007, provided comment for that news story and indicated he felt council was “dysfunctional.”
“That’s the opinion of one individual,” Massey said.
“Is it an accurate statement? Absolutely not. Council is working well together, and we’re working well with administration.”
Massey said a meeting between the county and CUPE was set for Oct. 17, and he hoped whatever negotiations needed to take place would be resolved between administration and the union rather than through the Labour Relations Board.
Arab said the union feels the same way.
“I certainly hope we can settle this between CUPE and the county and then we can withdraw the complaint,” he said.
“That would ultimately be in the best interested of not only the employees but the taxpayers as well.”
