Government Operations Committee on Oct. 7th, 2016

[Richard St-Onge]

If I may, I will start by answering your question and then I will yield the floor to my colleagues who know a lot more about this than I do.

My approach was to say let us take the opportunity presented to smash all the standards we are thinking of, because we are capable of doing things differently.

I have no idea about possible solutions. I spoke with some close family members earlier; they are people we have collectively at our service, who are probably super smart in their own fields and could propose good options. I really see this as smashing it and I do not want to create a traditional bank with the post office.

Now I will yield the floor to my colleagues.

[François Senneville]

If I understood correctly, the issue for employees is somewhat the same as for the corporation: to incorporate postal banking into the corporation. For the employees, that also implies acquiring knowledge, improving their work, and then amazing job opportunities.

The way to test out whether a partnership is possible is to talk with bankers, caisse populaire managers and other people in that world.

If we do not have that discussion, we will never be able to know whether the postal banking project is viable or not. I will not beat around the bush: we have not found very much in the studies on postal banking that have been brought to our attention, since they were extensively redacted.

To date, we have not seen anything negative relating to postal banking. We are keeping an open mind and saying that everything is open and everything is possible. Let's talk about it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Kmiec, you have five minutes.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to thank the witnesses for being here. I am a member from the west and I am going to try to ask my questions in French.

I know the collective agreements contain a lot of technical terms, but I am going to use my iPad to find as many terms as possible in French. I also have a few questions about the collective agreement negotiated by your union.

A little earlier, you mentioned a section of the collective agreement that could be used to offer new services at no cost to Canadian taxpayers. Could you tell us a little more about that?

[François Senneville]

I had made copies of Appendix T for everyone, but I see that they have not been distributed. In any event, you should receive your copy a little later, and otherwise you can find the appendix on our Internet site.

Appendix T to our collective agreement gives the members of the service expansion and innovation and change committee a mandate to sit down at the same table to discuss various projects. The committee is composed of CUPW members and members of Canada Post management.

When I say it costs nothing to either taxpayers or the government, I mean that this appendix was added in the course of bargaining the collective agreement and the union had to invest bargaining capital in that.

One of the sections of the appendix provides for an amount that has to be funded by Canada Post for the work of the committee, whose mandate — which is very well described, also — is to identify proposals, determine the viability of projects, and identify partners, costs and the way they will be implemented. The committee also has a mandate to do a trial of the project.

One of the sections even provides that, if necessary, exceptions can be made to the collective agreement in order for the project to be implemented.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

I am sorry, but I only have five minutes.

[François Senneville]

Yes.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

At the very end of the document "Save Canada Post", CUPW gives five options.

In the Atlantic region, a lot of your members have talked about an employee-managed post office, as you also did today. I see that in your five options, you are proposing partnerships or cooperatives. There are various options.

Do you have a preference?

[François Senneville]

Do you mean a preference among the employees?

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

CUPW presents various options. However, I want to talk about just one option, that there be postal banking that would be managed by you.

[François Senneville]

It would not be managed by Canada Post; is that what you are saying?

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

That is right.

[François Senneville]

As I mentioned, the options are not closed. The union is not ruling out any option for the moment, because we want to have preliminary discussions. Whether it is what is in Appendix T or...

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

I am sorry to interrupt you.

Some members of the union have told us this would be a good idea and it would be viable to do it. Of course, we do not want Canadian taxpayers to have to invest even more in Canada Post, since up to now, it has been capable of managing itself.

Would you be prepared to agree to the public funds in your pension being used for the initial investment needed to set up this postal banking system?

[François Senneville]

Are you talking about the Canada Post employees' pension fund?

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

The workers, yes.

[François Senneville]

It is a little strange to hear that question. The people who are opposed to a defined benefit pension plan argue that the pension fund is not viable and there is no money in the fund. So I find it hard to see how you can be saying today to take money out of the pension fund to finance setting up a postal banking system.

We are told there is no more money in the pension fund and we have to save Canada Post. So how could money that does not exist be taken out to finance setting up a postal banking system?

If there were discussions and we had the facts in front of us, we would not be closed to that solution. For the moment, it does not seem to me to be feasible, but I do not have a closed mind. No one in our organization has a closed mind and no one opposes that definitively.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Mr. Simard, you said that some people had had to resign. From my knowledge of human resources, that is called constructive dismissal. When an employee's working conditions are changed, is the employee not protected by the collective agreement? If employees who work days are told that, starting next week, they will be working nights, does the collective agreement protect them? This is what is called a constructive dismissal. The employee is being dismissed.

[Jean-François Simard]

The collective agreement allowed it. There was no more daytime work. Under a provision of the collective agreement, those workers were moved to other shifts. Unfortunately, when you are a single parent head of household, you have no other option. You cannot be away from home because you do not have a babysitter. The notice was so short that some people simply jumped ship, not without regrets.

[The Chair, Conservative, Tom Lukiwski]

Mr. Lightbound, you have the floor.

[Joël Lightbound, Liberal, Louis-Hébert, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

That was precisely my question. In another life, I was a lawyer. Ordinarily, when the essential terms of the job are changed unilaterally, that is called constructive dismissal. I was wondering exactly that, whether the collective agreement allowed it. That answered my question.

I have one small comment to make. You said earlier that there are satellite offices in pharmacies, be it Brunet or Jean Coutu. That made me think of the Walmart in Jonquière, which closed after being unionized. There was a whole argument, but I do not want to go into that. I just wanted to add a grain of salt.

I want to thank you all very much for your testimony. It has been very interesting. Mr. Senneville, we had met before. You had talked to me a lot about postal banking, and I want to come back to that.

Would you say that Canada Post is an innovative corporation? I am asking all three of you.

[François Senneville]

No, at this point, it is not. I am not saying that to attack. Appendix T is not being used to its full potential. The tools that are available to do better with the corporation are not being used. On the contrary, all that is happening is discussions to find out how to cut the service. To me, that is not creativity, and it is certainly not innovation.

The number of Tim Hortons was mentioned earlier. There are 6,200 or 6,300 postal facilities in Canada. It is impossible that some use cannot be found for these facilities by offering services to Canadians in remote regions, and even in urban centres.

I have a firm opinion about postal banking. Vincent said earlier that Service Canada could offer its services directly in those post offices. There may not be employment insurance offices, but there are post offices in our towns. Perhaps that could be a bit of help to us. That is innovation. It is a way to use our infrastructure, that is already paid for, to generate revenue and make everything essentially useful. That is not what is being done at present.

[Joël Lightbound, Liberal, Louis-Hébert, QC]

I would like to hear your thoughts as well, Mr. Simard and Mr. Lambert, who work at Canada Post.

[Jean-François Simard]

I will confirm that it is not. Canada Post is not innovative when it comes to services, unfortunately, but it has to start to be. It should also innovate in the area of employee and customer relations. That is a major failing.

[Vincent Lambert]

I have worked for Canada Post since 2004. In my first year on the job, it was the closing of 300 Saint-Paul. All I have known are cuts and closings.

I heard about the post office that is in town, in a very tourist-oriented part of town. That location sold various spin-offs, such as little Canada Post trucks, stamps, and lots of things. That post office made a lot of profit with those products. Then, overnight, it was decided to remove all of them. Those products meant it could turn a profit, but they abandoned that part to focus only on services, when it was those products that make the profits possible.

Personally, I have not seen a lot of innovation on Canada Post's part.