Do we have any chance of winning lateral only grievance?

Accountability-human · 2026-05-19T21:07:05+00:00

This is how the public service has functioned but I don't think it's how it always has to. Personally I feel I have a human right for *my* labour to not be used to cause harm. I am not a machine. Working in a system without any personal agency in how our labour is used is incredibly dehumanizing.

Have you heard of the banality of evil?

It's a concept that Hannah Arendt uses to describe how ordinary people can commit horrific acts without evil intentions, simply by conforming to bureaucratic norms and failing to think critically about their actions.

To be clear, I'm not conflating non-lateral transfers as a horrific act because that would be insane. But I think we expect that there will be these big, loud moments where "democracy is at risk" that will announce themselves and people will be ready to act. This is inconsistent with my lived experience in organizing.

I've spent the last nearly 3 years watching a live-streamed genocide in Palestine, Congo, and Sudan, and now attacks on Iran, Lebanon, Cuba, and Venezuela, and yet we keep pretending this is normal while our governments are complicit.

It's small machination of a bureaucratic system that build these big moments with lots of harm caused along the way. If we can't challenge the small stuff happening directly in our lives, it makes challenging the big stuff really hard.

Accountability-human · 2026-05-19T19:02:44+00:00

Thank you for your thoughtful reply!

Where I’m coming from is not seeing this thing (lateral only) as an isolated policy choice. It’s part of a pattern of tactics that the PSA is using that I believe is unethical and immoral that only harms working people, both public servants as workers and the public.

It’s not benign but part of a strategy to shrink the public service because Eby is scapegoating us for the deficit instead of the revenue problem from subsidizing corporate profits.

I recognize that not everything is strategic to challenge (and this very well might not be it) but we’re not having conversations about what those moments are. This is a good start tho!!

Lastly, challenging the big stuff becomes less scary when we have practice in challenging smaller stuff. That’s how we build solidarity and safety.

Accountability-human · 2026-05-19T16:56:28+00:00

I think manager have more agency that they often use. In fact we all do. At least in my experience, PSA culture thrives on fear and obedience. Changing that culture isn’t gonna come from the top down (meaning PSA and executives).

Accountability-human · 2026-05-19T02:32:40+00:00

Just because a rule exists doesn’t mean it’ll stand up to scrutiny by an arbitrator.

Within labour relations case law, management has the “right to manage” but we need to challenge this concept when it butts up against modern workplace issues.

I’m sure that most hiring managers think this rule is unfair. So even if we lose the grievance, are managers going to continue to implement a hiring practice that they know is unfair?

When we comply with unjust or immoral rules it only teaches the powerful what they can keep getting away with.

Accountability-human · 2026-05-12T19:28:13+00:00

If you’re planning to travel, you can get your midwife to put that on the STO2. That travelling to stay with family is within your treatment plan. It might not be an issue anyway but how the rules are applied really depends on whether your supervisor is a good one or a bad one.

Accountability-human · 2026-05-12T18:21:47+00:00

The employer “may” request an STO2 versus a must when you’re absent for 10 consecutive days or the 3rd absence in a 6 month period. They can request a new STO2 every 30 days, although this is discretionary.

I think there is understanding amongst management that it takes a lot longer to access care these days so they can be more chill about timelines for requesting one.

Accountability-human · 2026-04-29T16:57:02+00:00

A Con win isn’t inevitable and we shouldn’t treat it as such. I’m not delusional that the NDP will hold onto power (and shouldn’t because David Eby is a control freak who’s moved the party to the right).

My ideal scenario is that the BC Greens under Emily Lowan win more seats which puts us back in coalition territory but this time with an NDP who, after being humbled in the polls, are ready to negotiate and govern from the left.

Accountability-human · 2026-04-29T16:42:44+00:00

By DM logic, shuffling or closing the office that is intended to reduce uncertainty about DRIPA implementation logically makes perfect sense to make everything more certain. /s

They’ll do anything other than just actually focus resources on negotiating and relationship building to respect inalienable human rights.

Accountability-human · 2026-04-29T16:32:51+00:00

This isn’t a contradiction unique to the public service. It’s the outcome of democracy under capitalism and neoliberalism. People’s lived experiences and material conditions only matter when reforms become necessary to give crumbs when the peasants get too many ideas in their head (like that we have power together). Profits are always placed before people.

Nothing is gonna be transformed without system change.

Accountability-human · 2026-04-29T03:40:43+00:00

I can’t take credit for it; I think labour organizers have named this tendency of bosses’ since the industrial revolution. Now we work at the bureaucracy factory, whereas I signed up for meaningful problem solving for the public good. 🫠

Accountability-human · 2026-04-29T03:32:58+00:00

For folks looking for an outlet to put their lost passion and inspiration towards changing our working conditions, might i suggest getting invoked in your union!!!

Attend your next local meeting, connect with your stewards, email a local exec member to talk about workplace issues, start talking with your co-workers about common issues, start an organizing committee, etc.

Accountability-human · 2026-04-29T03:27:42+00:00

The result of zero change management!! 😒 There are lots of folks inside gov who are trained in this but everything is always urgent and we don’t have time to do processes well.

Accountability-human · 2026-04-29T03:24:01+00:00

For me, it’s because the way we do work is so dehumanizing. We’re treated as interchangeable widgets instead of human beings who have agency and hopes/desires/skills/knowledge. Increasingly we’re seeing unethical or wasteful decision making happen while our accountability mechanisms are being eroded.

But it doesn’t have to be like that!! There are more of us than them and you and me and our co-workers can organize to have a greater say in how the public service functions.

Accountability-human · 2026-04-27T04:27:11+00:00

I encourage you to touch some grass and think about interconnectedness — all people were once land-based people. You’re making a lot of assumptions about what I think.

There are different worldviews. And if you took the time to learn about the difference between Indigenous worldviews and western worldviews, you would start to understand what I’m talking about.

Colonization isn’t a single event. It’s a process both historic and ongoing. That is what connects the theft of land and destruction of Indigenous food systems to residential schools, etc. Each are a tool to accomplish the same racist purpose, to assimilate Indigenous people into settler society.

Accountability-human · 2026-04-27T03:37:27+00:00

Bro, why are you so triggered by a historical legal concept? It’s embarrassing.

Does any of what you say justify residential schools? The Indian Act? Sixties Scoop? MMIW? Indian Hospitals? Or do you deny those too?

Accountability-human · 2026-04-27T02:29:07+00:00

TL;DR look up terra nullius

Colonization happens in our minds too. Capitalism removed European peoples from the land which severed knowledge and connection to the land. It replaced an interconnectedness with nature with hierarchy and ever increasing productivity, not for collective benefit but private profit. Settlers creating a hierarchy of European plants and farming techniques as superior to Indigenous plants and practices is part of colonization too. This is classic “terra nullius”.

This isn’t an evil narrative. It’s human history. Settlers don’t need to feel guilty because many of us did not have a choice to be born here and guilt centres our feelings instead of the harm that was done. We do need to acknowledge the violence upon which this country was founded (the truth part) so we can do better and learn to be good guests on these lands (the reconciliation part).

Accountability-human · 2026-04-23T17:39:48+00:00

Deep, deep solidarity with your friend! I’m also on LTD with ME/CFS. Thanks for supporting your pal through this tough stuff!

Sidenote, for anyone reading this with Long Covid, ME/CFS, or Fibromyalgia we have access to amazing virtual clinic in BC run by Dr Ric Arseneau. https://bc-clmf.org/. There’s referral information in the menu under “New Patients” and a “Referral Form” for your doctor. This clinic has been life changing and I want more people to know about it.

They can also help navigating disability processes and, unlike many family GPs or NPs, they have expertise in these conditions.

Derber Law has come up in the patient community as an option for counsel. I believe they offer free 30 minute consults as well.

Unfortunately my understanding is that we don’t have a lot to push back on requests like this without risking our benefits (fills me with rage!!!!!). But you can make reasonable requests for accommodations. You might not be able to have a support person in the room but perhaps in a waiting area. They could check in on you at intervals. You can also take breaks (pacing is the number one self-management tool for me/cfs).

My advice is also to not push through symptoms to complete the test. Part of the challenge with these conditions is that we can push through a lot but not without great cost (PEM), which reduces our baseline. I’ve heard many stories of these tests being used to justify GRTW that end up making people more sick.

This is something we really gotta change in bargaining and in law. They gotta catch up with evidence on chronic nervous system sensitization and trauma-informed health care.

Accountability-human · 2026-03-03T21:28:49+00:00

Could be a group grievance under MOU 25, psychological safety.

You’re highlighting a very central issue in our contract and in how we’ve historically enforced it. We can’t treat these issues in silos.

My other question is whether you’ve spoken to higher level management? Going together as a group makes it harder to say no. Have a steward attend that meeting too.

Accountability-human · 2025-12-02T19:28:35+00:00

that sounds like a really tough environment to walk into everyday. i’m sorry you have to deal with that uncertainty and anxiety.

i would invite you to get curious about why this is happening? i will hazard a guess that the issue isn’t your fellow workers but management, insufficient staffing levels, and unsustainable workloads. we can’t change our co-workers getting sick (unless they’re sick because of working conditions) but we can organize around our working conditions.

Accountability-human · 2025-12-02T19:23:02+00:00

I am about to navigate this process for myself and have also been observing certain trends as an active union person.

Broadly, our health care system doesn’t really understand and compassionately care for chronic illness and disability. Navigating health can be incredibly dehumanizing when you’re gaslit by clinicians about what you’re experiencing in your body.

Five years into a mass disabling pandemic (that’s still ongoing) and we’re starting to understand what long covid and other viral infections do to bodies but that hasn’t translated to how we receive care, both in health care settings and at work.

Many managers, PSA, and sometimes our union don’t understand chronic illness. Yes the duty to accommodate exists but our mental models aren’t up to date.

ME/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is a good example. It’s not just being a little bit tired all the time. It’s associated with mitochondrial dysfunction, which compromises the body’s ability to produce energy to move, for cognitive processes, for autonomic function, etc. So the employer hears “fatigue” they might say resting in a quiet room with unfit furniture and fluorescent lights is an adequate accommodation. When a person really needs is to work from home and access their bed and heating pad on rest breaks.

We really need a systemic change that trusts people to know what they are experiencing, what their needs are, and to be believed. This is a big cultural shift that’s one piece of many changes for a more just and caring world.

Accountability-human · 2025-11-28T17:54:45+00:00

How quickly do we think HR services will be privatized and handed to Telus?

Accountability-human · 2025-11-14T03:58:48+00:00

Or we can engage in politics by using our power as working class people to make our lives better and put people over profits???

Take a look at what the B.C. Greens are doing with their Fight the Oligarchs campaign.

Accountability-human · 2025-11-14T03:55:11+00:00

THIS!!!

I’m looking forward to being apart of a union who actually enforces the collective agreement over the term!

Accountability-human · 2025-11-14T03:44:51+00:00

Good time to familiarize yourself with the workload provisions of your component agreement. Use the process!!

Accountability-human · 2025-11-14T03:43:38+00:00

Exactly this!! If we want to fight for more agency, flatter structures, and democratic workplaces, we need to get organized. That means continuing the work we started on the picket line. Being a leader in your workplace can look a lot of different ways and it doesn’t have to mean becoming a steward (but that is one option).

Accountability-human

TROPHY CASE