Pickets remain up and the day action in Saskatoon is on. We will be bringing the Employers final offer to the membership for a vote early next week and are asking you to reject their insulting offer.

Please read our media release dated November 21, 2007, as well as the letter which we submitted to the Universities representative Mr. Trew where we presented the Employer with an opportunity to put our members back to work and end the strike. Considering the reaction from the Employer, we have to question how serious the Employer was in agreeing to proceed to conciliation in the first place.

Unfortunately, the Employer entered into conciliation talks on November 20, 2007 with an offer that was even less than what we had going into conciliation. The Union will be posting and presenting a more detailed response to the employers offer as soon as possible. Details of the vote will also follow. The following are the highlights of their offer:

The lump sum payments which were previously agreed at 5% per year have now been reduced to 4.5% in 2007, 4.75% in 2008 and then back up to 5% in 2009.
    See Employers Final Offer:
    Page 1 #2 bullet #6 – 2007 - 4.5%
    Previously was 5% Bullet #4 - 2008 – 4.75% previously was 5%

The Employer indicated they would agree to provide the additional 0.9% funding from the last round of bargaining for Regina benefits provided that Regina agree to the same reduced benefit package as Saskatoon which means a considerable reduction in their benefits. The Employer will also not agree to any improvements in Saskatoon but did propose an injection of $100,000 or less than one half days wages saved during our job action.   
    See Employers Final Offer:
    Page 2 #5 U of R to inject 30,000 to benefits and U of S 100,000 something that was not there on Oct. 25.         They also changed from asking for a realignment of our benefits to telling us that the U of R would change to     the same benefits that the U of S have.

The Employer now wants to apply the memorandum of agreement on EDO’s to both Regina and Saskatoon.
    See Employers Final Offer:
    Page 3 #11 U of R and U of S were not both included in this. There were 2 bullets added at the end #4 of the     Oct.25th 5:30 document pertaining to Regina.

Additional language added to the increment language which would make it grievable if an increment was unreasonably withheld. The current practice would continue in Regina but there would be a moratorium in Saskatoon until January 1, 2009.
    See Employers Final Offer:
    Page 5 #21 Added more language to article 11.3 pertaining to increments.

A $750.00 retention bonus was added for anyone who was on staff on January 1, 2007 and remained on staff until October 31, 2008.
    See Employers Final Offer:
    Page 5 #20 Retention bonus was added $750 for each employee at the end of Oct.31, 2008.