It has now devolved into name-calling, with the striking Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) accusing the Trudeau Liberals of poking the pooch rather than pushing forward with negotiations.
The government, in turn, has accused the massive union of the same.
Hence, progress in getting the 155,000 strikers back to work has been lost in the din of duelling accusations.
The union blasted Ottawa’s Treasury Board for its failure to respond to a revised contract offer and called on the prime minister to help hasten the pace of contract talks.
But the office of Treasury Board President Mona Fortier fired back an hour later, saying efforts to meet with the union went unanswered on Friday, and a Saturday afternoon meeting was cancelled nine minutes after being arranged.
The union’s national president, Chris Aylward, said he was still waiting for a response to new proposals tabled on Thursday evening as Fortier challenged Aylward’s timeline.
Fortier’s board said the union was “unreachable at the common issues table” all day on Friday. It reached out again through a mediator on Saturday with plans to put forward a revised offer of its own at 1 p.m., but accused the union of thwarting those plans.
“The union took three hours to respond to the request, initially accepting the meeting at 12:31 p.m. and then at 12:40 p.m. advised they were no longer available at that time,” the board’s statement read. “While our negotiators and our offer waited, Mr. Aylward chose instead to go on television to complain he had not received it.”
For his part, Aylward focused most of his criticisms on Fortier during Saturday’s bargaining update.
“This screams of the incompetence of Mona Fortier … and her team,” Aylward told reporters outside an Ottawa hotel. “The prime minister has done nothing to move these negotiations along. Our members are fed up.”
Fortier’s office also accused the union of inflexibility, a trait it said was evident in Thursday’s offer, but noted both sides returned to the table after the news conference.
Aylward said Prime Minister Justin Trudeau should take a role in the negotiations and exert his influence to ensure the talks progress more quickly.
Trudeau said last week, however, that the government believes in collective bargaining, adding there have been advances at the bargaining table.
On Saturday, Aylward offered encouragement to union members on the picket lines.
“Stay strong,” he said. “We are not going to let them wear us down or wear us out. We will stay here until we get the fair deal that our members deserve.”
The union has said almost a third of all federal public servants are involved in the job action, leaving few departments untouched.
Barring a last-minute deal to end the largest public sector strike in Canadian history, the thousands of public service workers will return to the picket lines on Monday to back demands for a new contract.
PSAC launched strike action last Wednesday after a deadline passed to reach a deal with the federal government. Contract talks continued through the weekend, with wages, hybrid work and seniority the main issues in the dispute.
Over the weekend, as noted, PSAC’s national president and Treasury blamed each other for the slow pace of contract talks.
A frustrated Aylward said the union presented Treasury Board with a “comprehensive package” on Thursday but by Saturday afternoon, he had not received a reply.
“We still not have heard back yet from Treasury Board on a package that we give them Thursday night, and this is Saturday afternoon. This screams of the incompetence of Mona Fortier as the president of Treasury Board and her team,” he said.
On Sunday, Fortier told CTV’s Question Period that talks continued through the weekend, despite what she refers to as “ups and downs” and “kicking and screaming” over the past couple of days.
“I’m not going to be distracted by the kicking and screaming,” Fortier said. “I am focused on making sure that we have a deal that is fair and competitive for the employees, which we have, and that is also reasonable for Canadians.”
