Hydro-Québec unions have joined forces to guarantee all workers the right to collective bargaining. CUPE 957 (Syndicat des technologues d’Hydro-Québec), CUPE 1500 (Syndicat des employé(e)s de métiers d’Hydro-Québec), CUPE 2000 (Syndicat des employé(e)s de techniques professionnelles et de bureau) have filed applications with the Labour Tribunal (Tribunal administratif du travail), to modernize their union certifications. Essentially, the unions want to update the agreements in order to represent more workers.
Created more than 60 years ago, Hydro-Québec’s union certifications are among the oldest in Quebec. As such, the need to modernize accreditation has never been greater.
“The actions CUPE and our unions have taken will certainly snowball given that many public sector, parapublic sector and related government-sector unions are struggling to fight subcontracting and privatization,” explains Mathieu Dumont, coordinator of CUPE’s Organizing Department, who also refers to Hydro-Québec’s CUPE-affiliated unions as beacons for working conditions in the public sector.
Robert Claveau, president of CUPE 957 says, “Hydro-Québec is building a parallel labour pool to the one that already exists. An unfair and unjustifiable regime has been created over time between workers who are unionized and over a thousand employees working for what non-unionized workers call ‘little Hydro’.”
“We must have certifications that protect us against privatization, structural changes and Hydro-Québec’s unbridled desire to subcontract,” concludes Frédéric Savard of CUPE 1500.
“Hydro-Québec excludes jobs for unionized employees from the promotion line on the basis of legal criteria that were invalidated by labour courts 30 years ago,” adds Dominique Champagne, president of CUPE 2000.
CUPE 4250 (Syndicat des spécialistes et professionnels d’Hydro-Québec) is also taking a stand on the issue.
“We stand with the other unions regarding the need expressed,” Gilles Cazade, president of CUPE 4250, says supportively. “We would be failing in our historically held duty if, at the dawn of Plan 2035, we were to renew our collective agreements without modernizing our certifications.”