In a decision rendered June 12, the Administrative Labour Tribunal (ALT) agreed with salaried workers in the orientation and mobility specialist (OMS) classification, who, disagreeing with a ruling by the CNESST (Commission for Standards, Equity, Health and Safety at Work) under pay equity maintenance provisions in 2010, decided to contest the tribunal’s decision as allowed under article 104 of the Pay Equity Act. These workers, members of the Federation of Professionals (FP-CSN) and CUPE-FTQ, had mandated their respective organizations to represent them before the tribunal.
The decision by judge François Beaubien is the crowning achievement of a 16-year struggle by OMS workers to have the value of their work recognized. All workers in this classification will now be awarded retroactive payments going back to December 31, 2010, with interest.
“This is a historic victory, not only for orientation and mobility specialists, but for the entire labour movement dedicated to defending pay equity,” said Kathrin Peter, interim president of the FP-CSN. “This ruling corrects a longstanding injustice and rewards the perseverance of workers who were harmed by the job evaluation conducted by CNESST.”
In his decision, the administrative judge recognized the evolution of tasks performed by these professionals and ruled that the physical effort inherent in the work of OMS workers is more onerous than what the CNESST and Treasury Board had determined.
“It’s the first time that the ALT has recognized changes in tasks and responsibilities to then reverse job evaluations carried out by the CNESST and Treasury Board in a file of this nature,” explained Sonia Bureau, vice-president for equity of the CPAS-CUPE. “This decision reinforces the importance of taking into consideration the evolution of tasks and pay equity principles in the evaluation of classifications of workers.”
