VANCOUVER – CUPE support staff at Vancouver Community College are going on strike. CUPE Local 4627 served 72-hour strike notice this morning for job action starting on Monday with a full withdrawal of services planned for Tuesday.
At a union meeting last night, the members gave their union executive an overwhelming 93% strike mandate.
CUPE 4627 chief steward Jo Hansen says the 420 members are tired of waiting for the government’s Public Sector Employers’ Council (PSEC) to approve the college negotiating in good faith for a settlement. Their last contract expired more than two years ago in 2010.
“The college is still waiting for PSEC ‘permission’ to negotiate monetary items under the province’s Cooperative Gains Mandate,” says Hansen adding, “We’re through waiting. Our members have the right to free collective bargaining and we will be taking escalating job action at VCC until that happens.”
The union says an overtime ban will be initiated on Monday as soon as the 72-hour waiting period is complete, followed by a one-day full-out strike on Tuesday at both campuses (Broadway and Downtown). After that the union is planning rotating, escalating job action to push for productive negotiations.
CUPE 4627 represents library technicians, clerical workers, administrative, technical, warehouse, program assistants and cafeteria workers at VCC.
