NSGEU recommends civil servants reject tentative agreement with province

The labour peace the Nova Scotia government thought it had was shattered on Friday, as the bargaining committee for the province's 7,600 unionized civil servants recommended rejecting the tentative agreement reached with the province late last year.

The Nova Scotia Government and General Employees Union's bargaining committee had endorsed the deal in November, but also put off a vote with the membership.

The change of heart was sparked by "the government's heavy-handed legislative interference," a press release from the committee said Friday afternoon.

During the fall sitting, the governing Liberals used its majority to pass Bill 148, the Public Services Sustainability Act. That allows the province to impose a two-year wage freeze, followed by raises of one per cent and 1.5 per cent, with a half per cent at the end of year four.

'Nothing has changed'

On Friday, the Nova Scotia government put out a statement attributed to Finance Minister Randy Delorey, urging the union to take the existing agreement to its members.

"We put forward the best deal we felt was possible under our fiscal environment," the statement said. "The deal remains the same, nothing has changed."

The president of the NSGEU disagrees.

"Bill 148, basically, is what happened since," Joan Jessome told reporters on Friday.

"We've been around the province. We've talked to thousands of our members and they are quite irate and disappointed and disgusted — to be quite frank — about how they've been treated by their employer, the government.

"It was an unnecessary piece of legislation."

Union worried province would impose contract

Although it was adopted by the provincial legislature on Dec. 18 — after lengthy and sometimes overnight sittings — the law has not been proclaimed or brought into force.

The call for a rejection of the agreement could force the McNeil government to impose a settlement, rather than go back to the negotiating table.

When the tentative agreement was first announced in November, Jessome said the bargaining committee felt pressured by the possibility the government would impose a contract.

But on Friday, she appeared unfazed by the prospect of having Bill 148 enacted.

"They could be angry enough and vengeful enough — which they've been in the past — to impose Bill 148 on us immediately," she said.

"But either way, the members know what's at risk. They know that that offer's better to be imposed than to ever accept."