PSAC has filed an unfair labour practice against the Parks Canada Agency for refusing to provide seasonal and term workers the pensionable lump sum payment negotiated as part of the collective agreement signed September 26. 

• The Parks Canada agreement is now available

Parks Canada blamed wildfires for the nearly eight-week delay in signing the collective agreement, causing many of the very PSAC members who were on the frontlines fighting these fires to lose out on receiving the $2,500 lump sum payment. For members to receive the lump sum payment, they must be in the bargaining unit when the collective agreement is signed.  

The delay means approximately 300 Parks Canada members who are term and seasonal workers will not receive the payment, including firefighters who battled wildfires, members in seasonal term positions at Canada’s historical sites, in the midst of a national housing crisis. Contracts for these workers typically end between late August and early September. 

The Parks Canada bargaining team has made it clear throughout this round of bargaining that this employer’s over-reliance on and abuse of term and seasonal workers is unnacceptable. Now, these same precarious workers will be burned again. 

PSAC will be arguing that members who have completed their contracts since the ratification on August 4 should receive the $2,500 pensionable lump-sum payment that was negotiated in good faith at the table. 

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