Electrical workers get first wage increase in 5 years

Last month, the Mediation Services department of Alberta Jobs, Economy, and Trade published the December 2024 Bargaining Update.

This monthly report provides information about the unionized workforce, primarily in Alberta. In December, Mediation Services received settlement information regarding 24 private sector and 10 public sector bargaining settlements, covering 2,429 and 3,797 workers respectively.

Among those settlements was a contract for about 85 workers employed by the Canem Systems at their Calgary and Red Deer locations. As of March 2022, when they settled their previous contract, there were 210 unionized workers, which itself was down from 313 in the collective agreement before that.

The company specializes in electrical construction, so the number of workers they employ varies on the number of contracts they have. Plus, they had a location in Lethbridge as of the last contract, and those workers were included in collective agreement. Now, it’s just Calgary and Red Deer workers, and the company no longer has a Lethbridge office listed on their website.

These workers include all hourly employees of Canem Systems in Calgary and Edmonton, and they’re represented by the Canem Systems Employees Association.

The previous contract for the workers expired in December 2024. The new contract was settled the month before, in November 2024.

According to the bargaining update, these workers will receive one wage increase in their new 2.5-year contract.

For the Calgary workers, the increase is as follows:

	2022	2024	Change	% change
1st-Year Pre-Apprentice	$15.00	$15.60	$0.60	4.00%
1st-Year Apprentice	$18.25	$19.50	$1.25	6.85%
2nd-Year Apprentice	$21.90	$23.40	$1.50	6.85%
3rd-Year Apprentice	$25.55	$27.30	$1.75	6.85%
4th-Year Apprentice	$29.20	$31.20	$2.00	6.85%
Journey level	$36.50	$39.00	$2.50	6.85%

As you can see, everyone will get a 6.85% except for first-year pre-apprentices, who will get only a 4% increase.

Now for the Red Deer workers:

	2022	2024	Change	% change
1st-Year Apprentice	$16.50	$17.00	$0.50	3.03%
2nd-Year Apprentice	$19.80	$20.40	$0.60	3.03%
3rd-Year Apprentice	$23.10	$23.80	$0.70	3.03%
4th-Year Apprentice	$26.40	$27.20	$0.80	3.03%
Journey level	$33.00	$34.00	$1.00	3.03%

In this case, everyone will get the same increase, although they don’t seem to have pre-apprentices in Red Deer. Even so, their roughly 3% raise isn’t even half that of what Calgary workers got. And their new wages are lower than the 2022 wages of the Calgary workers.

Oh, on that note, those technically aren’t even 2022 wages: they’re 2019 wages.

That’s right. The 2024 raises are the first increases these workers have seen in 5 years. On top of that, there are no other scheduled increases before the contract expires in August 2027. Not this year, not next year, and not in the first 8 months of 2027.

Let’s review the wage increase situation for these workers.

	Calgary	Red Deer
2020	0.00%	0.00%
2021	0.00%	0.00%
2022	0.00%	0.00%
2023	0.00%	0.00%
2024	6.85%	3.03%
2025	0.00%	0.00%
2026	0.00%	0.00%

This works out to an annual average increase of 0.98% for the Calgary workers and 0.43% for the Red Deer workers.

Meanwhile, the consumer price index in Alberta increased 25.1 points over 5 years, from 144.0 in May 2019 to 169.1 in May 2024. That’s a 17.43% jump.

Since these workers got increases of 6.85% and 3.03% over a 5-year period but inflation was 17.43% during the same period, they’re left with a cut to real wages of 10.58% and 14.40%, respectively.

And since there are no more wages in the rest of the contract, the situation will worsen, given that they still have over 3 more years (May 2024 to August 2027) of inflation ahead of them.

Here are some highlights of other changes in the contracts.

There is an entirely new section added to the article on grievances:

Any difference arising between the Employer and the Association concerning the interpretation, application, administration, or alleged violations of the provisions of this Agreement, (an “Employer Grievance”) may be submitted in writing by the Employer to the Association, within fifteen (15) days of the matter arising or coming to the attention of the Employer.

The Employer and the Association shall use good faith efforts to resolve the Employer Grievance. If the matter in dispute is settled, the Employer and the Association shall sign a memorandum of settlement. If the matter is not satisfactorily settled within a period of fifteen (15) days from the date of which the written submission was provided, either party may notify the other to have the matter heard by a mutually acceptable arbitrator.

In the article on employer rights, Canem now has the ability to pay workers when laying them off in lieu of giving them adequate layoff notice. If a workers is laid off, they have the option of filing a grievance, which is a 6-step procedure normally. However, with the new contract, workers filing a layoff grievance cannot escalate past the fifth stage. In other words, they won’t have the option to bring in a third-party arbitrator.

Workers are paid an additional amount of pay each pay period for vacation pay. This amount is a percentage of their gross earnings and depends on the length of employment. The percentage has increased for some longer-term workers.

	Old	New
< 10 years	6%	6%
10–15 years	8%	8%
15-20 years	9%	10%
20+ years	10%	12%

The standard workday has shifted to start an hour earlier: 07:00 instead of 08:00. That means the shift ends earlier, too: 15:30 instead of 16:30.

Canem provides a travel allowance for out-of-town work; however, as of the new collective agreement, mileage and the living-out allowance will be available for only those workers who live more than 70 kilometres from the worksite address.