Back in May, the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees published an update on their website regarding contract negotiations for workers employed by the Town of Bonnyville.
These 60 or so workers include administrative support, IT workers, early childhood educators, landfill workers, mechanics, pool worker, welders, public works workers, and building maintenance operators.
The May update indicated that the bargaining team (which includes a facilities maintenance specialist, a pool supervisor, and an AUPE negotiations officer) for the workers had reached a tentative agreement with the employer.
The last collective agreement for these workers expired at the end of 2024.
Last month, AUPE published another update saying that a majority of workers had ratified this new collective agreement.
The new contract consolidates the wage grid, so it shrunk from 11 steps to 8 steps. The increase between steps has changed from 2% to 3%.
It also brings raises in each year of the 3-year contract, which expires at the end of 2027.
| 1 January 2025 | 4.00% |
| 1 January 2026 | 4.50% |
| 1 January 2027 | 5.00% |
This works out to a combined increase of 13.5% over the life of the contract, or 14.11% if you account for compound increases. That’s an average of 4.5% (4.70%) per year.
Let’s compare this to the increases they saw in their last 3 contracts.
| 1 January 2017 | 1.00% |
| 1 January 2018 | 1.50% |
| 1 January 2019 | 0.75% |
| 1 January 2020 | 1.25% |
| 1 January 2021 | 1.00% |
| 1 January 2022 | 0.00% |
| 1 January 2023 | 2.00% |
| 1 January 2024 | 2.00% |
This works out to 9% over 8 years, which is an average of just 1.13% per year, much less than the new contract.
Inflation, however, during this period was 24.08%. That means the workers were struggling with a cut of 15.08% to their real wages leading into negotiations.
Their 13.5% increase comes close to making up for these lost wages, but remember that the new raise is over 3 years, and those 3 years will include more inflation.
For example, inflation in Alberta between January 2024 and January 2025 alone was 2.53%.
While a 13.5% raise will definitely help, it won’t be enough to pull these workers entirely out of the inflation-induced hole they’ve been forced into.
Some other highlights in this new contract include increases to the boot allowance increasing (from $200 a year to $600 a year), flex spending account (from $750 a year to $1000 a year), and acting incumbency pay (from 3% to 5%).
Workers will receive a 15% discount on programmes offered by the pool. This is in addition to the free pool passes they already receive.
