August 19, 2022
CATCA BULLETIN 2022-08
NATIONAL EXECUTIVE
Dear CATCA members, your national executive had continued their cross-country Q&A site visits this week by going to Gander. So far, we’ve had the chance to visit the Vancouver, Edmonton, Winnipeg and Toronto ACCs. It’s been great to meet with people. The sessions have been well attended, especially given the time of year and the amount of overtime everyone is working. There have been a lot of good questions and discussions. There is a lot of frustration among our members regarding the company, especially the issues created by the short staffing situation. All the more so because we saw this situation coming and tried unsuccessfully to influence the company’s decisions. Given what we know about ATC, recovery will be slow and painful – pace yourselves!
On top of that, members of the national executive spent last week attending the Unifor convention in Toronto, where Lana Payne was elected as the National President of Unifor. Congratulations, Lana. We also attended the National Aviation Council formed by Unifor meeting and seminars on technology and its potential impact on the aviation sector.
Our visits have so far focused on the ACCs, but we are trying to get into as many towers as possible, too. The reason for that is we want to introduce ourselves to as many members as possible over the summer. All are welcome at the ACCs, but visits will continue to other units in time also.
NATIONAL OFFICE
At the National office, we have recently hired Shannon Magee to join our staff. Shannon’s addition will provide some welcome relief to Judy, Karty, and Israel, who have been carrying the load since the convention. We are also in the process of developing a comprehensive communication plan to ensure we do the best job possible of communicating with our members and adapting to changing demographics and preferences within our membership.
Grievances continue to mount because our collective agreement is straining due to the lack of staff. Although the company has committed to more recruitment and training, the capacity for more remains and the focus on retention has not been strong enough. That will surely be a focal point when we enter collective bargaining a few months from now. Branch proposal meetings for that should be getting underway, and at the national level, we are also doing our preparatory work.
Collective Bargaining has begun with the Treasury board for our members working for Transport Canada. It will start in early November for our members working for Serco in Goose Bay. We will be working towards positive gains for both groups.
FAM FLIGHT
I’m hoping that as many of you as possible can get a fam flight to the ‘’Communicating For Safety’’ (CFS) conference in Las Vegas. Unfortunately, it took us so long to iron out all the issues regarding the restart of the fam flights because we know the tight timeline will present some challenges, but it will certainly be worthwhile for those that can make it.
FATIGUE PROGRAM
In addition, watch for an update on the fatigue program that should be communicated by Nav shortly. We have finally managed to change the time in a position to 4 hours, from 3 hours during midnight shifts, and to reintroduce a voluntary 8-hour short change once per cycle. We feel those changes are positive and strike a better balance between scheduling flexibility and placing appropriate safeguards around it.
We are looking forward to seeing as many of you as possible in Gander (August 18), Moncton (August 23), and Montreal (August 24) over the next few weeks. Enjoy what you can of summer, and thank you all for your professionalism and support.
On Behalf of the Executive Board;
Nick von Schoenberg Scott Loder
President Executive Vice President
Click here for the PDF.
