TORONTO, April 26,
2024 /CNW/ - Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) workers, members of OPSEU/SEFPO
Local 535, voted today to ratify their new collective agreement
after a one-month, historic first strike at the gallery.
The online ratification vote began Friday, April 26 at 4:30
p.m. 281 members out of over 400 archivists, assistant
curators, art handlers, food and beverages staff, retail and
custodial workers, art educators, technicians, and more who staff
the gallery cast ballots, 85% voting "yes" to accept the tentative
agreement reached by their bargaining team early in the morning of
April 25.
"We are walking away from one month on strike as a changed
local," said Paul Ayers, President
of OPSEU/SEFPO Local 535. "The dedication of workers standing up
together after years of deteriorating working conditions at the
gallery was nothing short of inspiring."
The new collective agreement between OPSEU/SEFPO Local 535 and
the Art Gallery of Ontario spans a
timeframe from December 1, 2022, due
to a one-year extension agreement, and will expire on November 30, 2025 – meaning workers will be back
at the table in little over a year.
Gains include an 11.4% wage increase for full-time and part-time
workers – including a 1% wage reopener retroactive to December 1, 2021 – as well as part-time
conversion language, expanded worker rights to hold employment in
multiple positions, and the establishment of a joint committee
aimed at reducing third-party contracting out of part-time labour.
The agreement also features improvements to meal allowances, shift
premiums, and bereavement leave for full-time employees.
The wage gains are welcome relief after years of wage
suppression, says Ayers. "As public service employees, our wages
were unconstitutionally capped at a 1% annual increase since 2020.
It stokes your fire, when members are struggling, to see management
receive yearly pay bumps in the range of 10-59%."
"This agreement opens important doors in the fight against
encroaching and long-standing precarity at the Art Gallery of
Ontario," added JP Hornick, the
newly re-elected President of OPSEU/SEFPO. "It's a product of
workers' creativity and perseverance on the line. As the first ever
strike at the gallery comes to a close, we hope that an important
lesson has been instilled in the AGO: workers are ready to fight
for their future and – if necessary – we will shut it down."
"To all of our community and labour allies that joined us on the
picket line and joined the chorus of public support: thank you for
standing with us in our fight for a future at the gallery," Ayers
concluded. "The relationships workers forge with each other through
strikes are a mosaic of victories. We're facing tomorrow together,
as a stronger union who knows the full-time and part-time fights
are indivisible. And we're not done here – this is only the
beginning."
SOURCE Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU/SEFPO)