Ontario Public Service

We have a tentative deal!

We are pleased to report that, after eight months, we have reached a tentative agreement with the Ontario Public Service (OPS) Employer.

If you vote to ratify the agreement, it will last three years—from April 1, 2022 to March 31, 2025. It includes meaningful wins on the issues that members prioritized.

The AMAPCEO Board of Directors has unanimously endorsed this tentative deal and are asking you to vote YES to ratify the agreement.

The tentative agreement includes:

• Maximum compensation increases allowable under Bill 124: 1% per year for three years and the right to obtain an appropriate remedy in the event our legal challenge to Bill 124 is successful.
• Major improvements to health benefits, including a flexible new $525 Health Care Spending Account for members and your dependents on top of existing insured benefits.
• Substantially improved access to psychological services and higher coverage rates.
• Preserved alternative work arrangements—the strongest provisions of any public sector union—with the requirement that requests be considered in good faith, and the right to dispute denials.
• Improved fairness for fixed-term employees, including immediate access to sick days to protect everyone from illness at work, and increased access to benefits.
• Greater job security, including job matching to vacant positions.
• Tools to advance equity, including a focused review of Employer policies to identify systemic employment barriers for equity-deserving groups.
• An improved accommodations process, where the union and the Employer would work collaboratively and constructively to resolve issues of accommodations to help members.

A more comprehensive list of changes, including the official Memorandum of Settlement, is below.

Overcoming the odds

This deal was not easy to achieve. It spanned eight months, including a provincial election, and was fraught with the Employer’s outright refusal to budge on hybrid work.

In the face of significant Employer pressure for concessions, your bargaining team held firm. They successfully defended our enviable alternative work provisions, while negotiating other gains in health care, job security, and workplace equity. They negotiated a fair and reasonable deal that sees no concessions.

All of this was in spite of the dark shadow of Bill 124, the government’s unconstitutional wage-restraint legislation. AMAPCEO is a founding member in a coalition of unions that are challenging the bill in court. We are confident justice will be on our side, but it will take some time. Importantly, this tentative agreement includes a clause to preserve AMAPCEO’s right to obtain an appropriate remedy in the event our challenge to Bill 124 is successful.

On alternative work arrangements

We were hoping to secure a commitment from the OPS Employer for a minimum number of remote working days, and a fair process to arrive at that. This is not unreasonable, since many of us have been working remotely for at least a few days a week for nearly three years now.

The Employer flat-out refused to enshrine any remote or flexible work minimums or standards in the Collective Agreement. They were completely intransigent on this issue for eight months, and it was clear from our conversations with the neutral third-party mediator that we would not have achieved our desired outcome on this issue.

In fact, not only was the Employer unwilling to enshrine new language, but they were also determined to force you to give up the rights you already have in order to bring us back in line with what other public sector unions have—which is not much. They even wanted to take away your right to grieve unfair denials.

No other public sector union has been able to achieve what we were bargaining for, because no other public sector union has been able to achieve all that we already have:

• the right to request Alternative Work Arrangements (AWA), including remote work;  
• the right to have those requests considered in good faith and in light of their operational viability; and
• crucially, the right to dispute denial of those requests.  

The Employer tried to force concessions on this issue because they know the provisions we have are valuable and unique to AMAPCEO. And they know that “operational viability” looks a lot different now than it did before the pandemic.

This is an opportunity for our fight for more flexible working arrangements to continue, just using different tactics. A successful ratification means that going forward, we will be able to focus on exercising all the rights we have protected and using all the tools at our disposal to secure alternative work arrangements for those who want them. For more on this, please attend one of the four town halls. Details are below.

Given the odds we faced and in light of all that we able to protect and enhance, this hard-fought contract is something we can take pride in accomplishing. This is a contract that provides our members with provisions no other bargaining agent was able to attain, while protecting flexible work language that is the envy of others.

These wins were in part made possible thanks to your workplace actions. From virtual backgrounds to desk flags to coordinated breaks, you showed the OPS Employer that we were serious about our demands and a fair deal. Thank you to everyone who acted, and to those activists who led the cause in the workplace.

Now, let’s seal the deal with a strong YES vote.

Stronger together,

Your AMAPCEO Board of Directors

Highlights from the Tentative Agreement

Term

• A three-year term, aligned with Bill 124’s mandated 1% moderation period. 

• April 1, 2022–March 31, 2025

Maximum compensation increases

Across-the-Board Salary Increases 

• Under the tentative deal, AMAPCEO-represented employees will receive the maximum compensation increases allowable under Bill 124 to individual salaries and to all salary ranges. These are:  
  • 1% on April 1, 2022 
  • 1% on April 1, 2023
  • 1% on April 1, 2024 
• Annual merit pay provisions are not impacted by Bill 124 and will continue. 

Protected Rights to Obtain a Bill 124 Remedy 

• The tentative deal includes an agreement that AMAPCEO retains the right to seek a remedy relating to compensation in excess of 1%, in the event that its challenge to Bill 124 is successful. This is similar to what other unions have bargained, including in the education sector.
• AMAPCEO is a member of a coalition of public sector unions challenging Bill 124 in court, although if the challenge is successful, it will likely take several years until the issue of remedy is determined.

Major improvements to health benefits

A new Health Care Spending Account 

• Under the tentative deal, the Employer will establish a Health Care Spending Account (HCSA) for each permanent employee (whether full-time or part-time) enrolled in the Supplementary Health and Hospital and/or Dental plans. The HCSA is not an insured benefit. It is over and above the current insured plans.
• HCSAs can be used for either, or both of: 
  • eligible medical expenses as defined in the Income Tax Act. These include many items not covered by insured plans, such certain types of medical equipment and some paramedical providers (e.g., in-vitro fertility treatments); and/or 
  • out of pocket expenses under the insured plans where the expense is eligible under the Act (e.g., if an employee spends $90 on a registered massage therapist, and is reimbursed $35 under the insured plan, the employee can choose to apply $55 from the HCSA to the expense to achieve full reimbursement). 
• HCSAs will be funded: 
  • $100 effective April 1, 2022 
  • $425 effective January 1, 2023 
  • $525 effective January 1, 2024 
• HCSAs are for the eligible employee and their dependents as defined by the Act (which is a broader list than for insured plans).
• Balances from one year may be carried over into the next calendar year. Balances would be forfeited after that. For example: the $100 applied April 1, 2022 must be used by December 31, 2023, the $425 applied January 1, 2023 must be used by December 31, 2024, etc. 
• Coverage would begin for new hires after they have completed two months’ continuous service.  Coverage ends on the last day of the month in which employment terminates. 
• HCSAs will be implemented within 90 days of ratification. Eligible employees can make retroactive claims to April 1, 2022. 

Improved access to and coverage for psychological services 

• Under the tentative deal, psychotherapists will be included in the plan as eligible practitioners for psychological services. The plan currently only covers psychologists and social workers. 
• Psychotherapists are easier to find and their rates tend to be lower, so this improvement will make accessing mental health services much easier. 
• Effective April 1, 2022, coverage for psychological services will increase from $40 per half hour to $60 per half hour, and annual coverage from $1,400 to $1,600 per calendar year. On April 1, 2023, coverage will increase to $80 per half hour. 
• Eligible employees can make retroactive claims to April 1, 2022.