Toronto Public Library Workers Union
Toronto Star Article
Toronto library workers in contract talks with city
The head of the union representing 2,200 library staff say the city is not helping end "precarious" jobs.
RICHARD LAUTENS / TORONTO STAR
The city’s negotiations with Local 4948, representing 2,200 library staff, half of whom are part-time, started earlier this month. Their four-year contract expired Dec. 31.
By: David Rider City Hall Bureau Chief, Published on Thu Mar 10 2016
The Mayor John Tory administration has new contracts with inside and outside workers but librarians — the only city staff to strike during the Ford years — are at the bargaining table and not happy.
“Our big issue is precarious work and they don't have one thing on the table to address that — their proposals would further entrench precarious work into our city,” said Maureen O'Reilly, president of the Toronto Public Library Workers Union.
“We don't see any bit of difference compared to the Ford years. Tory seems to have adopted the same strategy — get as many concessions as possible out of the unions, and in fact break them.”
O’Reilly spoke Thursday shortly before city council unanimously approved a four-year contract with city inside workers in CUPE Local 79 that, like the deal with outside workers in Local 416, reduces benefits, phases out job security and raises wages below the rate of inflation.
The city’s negotiations with Local 4948, representing 2,200 library staff, half of whom are part-time, started earlier this month. Their four-year contract expired Dec. 31.
The success of Toronto’s library system — with over 32 million items borrowed annually — is thanks to the hard work of overworked staff who made contract concessions in 2012, after a showdown with the Mayor Rob Ford administration and strike that shuttered the branches for 11 days, O’Reilly said.
This time the city is seeking further concessions similar to those made by Locals 416 and 79, plus some library-specific ones, she said. They include introducing a new overnight shift for staff who deliver books between the 100 branches and those who shelve them.
She said library management appear to be renewing efforts to have libraries stay open late at night, with minimal or no staff, like a system pioneered in Denmark. Users there can let themselves into “open libraries” with chip-enabled devices and sign out materials with a scanner.
The current contract prevents libraries opening later than 10 p.m., and only then with full staff.
O’Reilly expects the city will demand library workers agree to phase out job security that currently prevents staff from losing jobs to contracting out if they have 11 or more years’ seniority.
“We need more than a status-quo agreement,” O’Reilly said, when asked if another strike is possible. “It would be eight years of no improvements and just concessions.
“The mayor said it was good governance to offer police more than 8 per cent (over four years) to achieve labour peace and I’m saying they need to make a decent offer to library workers.”
Asked Thursday about the library workers, Tory said: “We're at the negotiating table with them and our objective is exactly the same as it was for all the other employees across the public sector in the city of Toronto, which is to find a deal … which is fair to those workers who do a good job for us in our libraries but at the same time fair to the people we serve who are the taxpayers and citizens of Toronto.”
Ana-Maria Critchley, a spokeswoman for the library system, said in an email: “We’re working to reach a settlement that is fair and reasonable to both parties, to the residents of Toronto, and are optimistic that this can be achieved.”
The 2016 Library Budget and Impact on Negotiations
A L W A Y S F O L L O W T H E M O N E Y
The 2016 Library Budget and Impact on Negotiations
At the Special City Council meeting on February 17, 2016 the City of Toronto approved the Library budget of approximately $175.9 million dollars. This represents a 1.6% increase plus enhancements of $0.958 million representing a 0.5% increase which supports Toronto’s Poverty Reduction Strategy for a total of a 2.1% increase overall.
Clue No. 1
The budget as submitted from the Library Board included a reduction of 6.9FTEs in the page classification as an “efficiency expenditure reduction”. The budget also included the creation of 5 permanent FTEs in E-Services. (previously grant funded)
The Poverty Reduction enhancements include the following:
· Sunday open hours - 1 full year at 8 branches - commence July & August
North York Central Library, Toronto Reference Library, Albion, Cedarbrae, Lillian H Smith, Malvern, Northern District, Richview
· Sunday open hours – 6 new locations – commence September
Bridlewood, Centennial, Runnymede, Fort York, Mount Dennis, Scarborough Town Centre
· Youth Hub expansion (2 FTEs new)
Maria A. Shuchuka, Fairview
· Internet Wi-Fi hotspot lending
· Malvern Digital Innovation Hub (1 FTE new)
Overall, this netted out to a 1.1 FTE increase to the compliment. This will put an enormous pressure on the library to fund future Sunday service and pressure at the bargaining table to find a solution.
Clue No. 2
However, an additional motion put forward by the City will reduce the Operating Budget for all City Agencies* by a total of $1.249 million with savings to be realized from a spending freeze on discretionary expenditures. (*excluding Police and TTC who were included in a separate motion) also passed.
This means the Library budget will be cut but at this time the amount is unknown. This also means that cuts to the library budget directly are hidden by the Tory administration with this sleight of hand. Obviously lessons were learned under the Fords. This also means that the library is funding its own growth in services by cutting staff in one area to support staff in another area. Again this is being done in the absence of a staffing model.
A motion by Councillor Stephen Holyday to collect library fines on the property tax assessment, another old Ford motion, was defeated.
Clue No. 3
Several motions by Councillor Michael Thompson to cut the police services budget failed. Some of the savings realized here would have gone to fund the library. Mayor Tory voted against all of Thompson’s motions.
Clue No. 4
Councillor Mike Layton certainly put forward an interesting motion:
That City Council request the TPLB to request the City Librarian, in consultation with the Office of Equity, Diversity and Human Rights, to report to the Library Board on a staffing and service delivery mode that meets the service levels outline in the Strategic Plan, including using a Job Quality Assessment Tool.
Presumably this motion will examine if an adequate staffing model is in place and secondly will determine why the Library has a 50% part-time level when the rest of the city is far below that.
The motion was defeated by the Budget Committee when it was first presented. The majority of the Budget Committee is stacked by Tory’s cronies. The defeat that the motion would not go forward to the Executive Committee chaired by Tory. However, it did come back around at the Special City Council meeting.
So Who Voted Against It?
John Burnside, John Campbell, Christin Carmichael Greb, Gary Crawford, Justin J. Di Ciano, Stephen Holiday, Giorgio Mammoliti, DENZIL MINNAN-WONG, Ron Moeser, Frances Nunziata, Jaye Robinson and JOHN TORY.
Clue No. 1 plus 2, 3 and 4 = ANOTHER CONCESSIONARY ROUND OF BARGAINING WITH A MAYOR WHO IS NOT A FRIEND OF THE LIBRARY
Solidarity with Local 79 on February 25
Show your solidarity with Local 79! Brown bagging event at Nathan Philips Square:
Thursday, February 25 at 12:15 pm
Click here for CUPE Local 79 President Tim Maguire on CBC.
Family Day Skating Party!
The Library Workers will be at Mel Lastman Square on Monday, February 15 at 10 am to give out free hot chocolate, library union swag and buttons!
A Great City is Built on Good Jobs
Library workers are 75% women. 50% Part-time. Precarious work cannot sustain our great public library service.
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