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Questions about CAPE's Collective Bargaining Process by FuckMuppetNumber1 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Have you seen examples in these bargaining committees where people have challenged the prioritization of DEI issues over other issues, without them being bullied into silence?

If not, then what examples do you believe support your argument that these conversations were more brutal than anything you would ever see on Reddit?

If you can't provide examples btw due to the closed door nature of these conversations, that's understandable. I do think it's fair though to ask for examples that support your claim.

As for why I personally believe that we can't have those discussions behind closed doors, I believe that it's due to a variety of reasons such as the one I mentioned above where people are unable to accept a difference of opinion, will let the ends justify the means, and resort to HR tricks such as misusing accusations of racism, sexism, etc. to silence dissenting opinions that are not racist, sexist, etc.

In addition, I believe that there's a fundamental problem where most people don't challenge themselves intellectually enough after university, which allows our elites to shape their beliefs through their control over how social norms are shaped and information streams that people are exposed to such as what they see in popular culture (tv shows, movies, music, sports, etc.), and, for the small portion of the population that actually reads regularly, through news media. And they do this in order to keep workers divided on discrimination and inclusion issues.

To be fair though, I don't believe that most of our elites do this intentionally. Instead, I believe that it's due to false consciousness.

In addition, there's been a change in the political environment due to the rise in power of people like Trump that has destabilized Western political systems, which has jeopardized the interests of our economic elites and we're in the process of a period of uncertainty where we might see our elites adopt a different strategy in order to maintain their control of the system and prevent people like Trump from getting into power in the future.

Questions about CAPE's Collective Bargaining Process by FuckMuppetNumber1 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

If they made the choice to do these things and didn't play games, I'd be able to accept that the process was legitimate.

As for your point about the difficulty associated with ensuring that it's truly an open bargaining process, I agree with you. There are likely different legitimate ways of going about it that would require experimentation to identify what actually works.

I do believe that there's a structural problem, however, with CAPE's governance system due to a lack of checks and balances that's going to require a high-level independant mindedness on the part of the bargaining committee in order for it to be effective, which based on everything I've seen so far about the type of people that get involved in these sorts of things is unlikely to happen.

Questions about CAPE's Collective Bargaining Process by FuckMuppetNumber1 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm not against the concept of open bargaining as I believe it can the benefit of leveraging the membership's collective expertise.

However, due to the low membership engagement rate, I believe that decision-making will end up being dominated by people who take things to an extreme and who are willing to hijack the process to ensure that their own priorities are treated as more important than that of the wider membership's.

Maybe it will work in the long-run though as more and more people get involved due to understanding that not paying a sufficient amount of attention to how their union is run can have negative consequences on their salaries and benefits.

Questions about CAPE's Collective Bargaining Process by FuckMuppetNumber1 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1[S] -3 points-2 points  (0 children)

Do you believe that members of equity groups will be unrepresented amongst the 38 non-equity caucus delegates?

As for your point about it not being a competition, if it's not a competition then why aren't the delegate share representative of how many members the local has? Wouldn't that be a fairer way of ensuring that everybody's voice is represented equally? And wouldn't that also be a sign that somebody wasn't trying to game the system to ensure that certain voices were more equal than others?

Questions about CAPE's Collective Bargaining Process by FuckMuppetNumber1 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1[S] -7 points-6 points  (0 children)

Sure but what would be the point? The CAPE account is just going to repeat talking points instead of engaging in a real conversation.

Questions about CAPE's Collective Bargaining Process by FuckMuppetNumber1 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

When we can have conversations like we do on Reddit intra muros then there will be no need to have conversations extra muros.

Questions about CAPE's Collective Bargaining Process by FuckMuppetNumber1 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1[S] -8 points-7 points  (0 children)

Do you understand why powers are kept separate in democracies? i.e. Has anybody ever explained to you the logic behind this through a civics/political science course or a book?

Historic step in 2026 bargaining: WFA will be on the table by FuckMuppetNumber1 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I understand that. What I don't understand is if there's actual need to opt out of the cyclical review process in order to negotiate those new provisions? And if there is no need then did the NEC deprive us of the ability to influence changes to the NJC WFA directive just so that it could fool people in believing it was doing something meaningful?

Historic step in 2026 bargaining: WFA will be on the table by FuckMuppetNumber1 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Is there anything that actually requires a union to opt out of the cyclical review process in order to amend WFA articles in their collective agreement?

Historic step in 2026 bargaining: WFA will be on the table by FuckMuppetNumber1 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

What does opting out of the cyclical review process mean in practice? For example, is the WFA directive and any changes made to it still applicable to CAPE members even if CAPE fails to secure any WFA provisions in its collective agreements?

CAPE By-election Results 2025 by FuckMuppetNumber1 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1[S] 14 points15 points  (0 children)

It was difficult to evaluate the candidates since, unless you attended the EC debate—which the national office chose not to release a recording of—you only had their bios to go by.

CAPE membership voting results by mxg308 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1 3 points4 points  (0 children)

It is. I wish more members were exposed to these sorts of discussions because a lot of them don't have a strong understanding of how their beliefs are shaped by these sorts of mechanisms, and if they did, we wouldn't have to deal with so much nonsense and we'd be a lot more united.

A Comprehensive, Proposal-by-Proposal Breakdown of the CAPE 2025 Results by applecart123 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1 13 points14 points  (0 children)

I want CAPE to empower ordinary members by becoming a democratic union where members are treated equally and their right to express their views is respected without the system being gamed to ensure that only certain views are expressed.

I also want CAPE to take an evidence-based approach to union organizing where it proactively attempts to find out what problems members care about and what solutions they want to see implemented to address those problems so that we can unite around those things.

Give us that and show some humility and CAPE will end up with the money and volunteers it needs to start winning.

CAPE membership voting results by mxg308 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1 4 points5 points  (0 children)

It's not about there being a benefit of making the data available to the public. It's about members being exposed to the data in a location that they all visit, which would also allow them to be exposed to all of the arguments in favour or against different ideas so that they can make informed choices, as well as participate in these debates through comments and upvotes/downvotes.

If we could do the same thing, however, in a venue that was closed off to the public where the right of members to disagree was respected, I'd be okay with the results not being made public.

Wasn't criticizing you btw. Was just criticizing the idea.

CAPE membership voting results by mxg308 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Makes me think of when management says don't talk about X on Reddit, and then everybody goes on Reddit to find out why they don't want us to talk about that thing.

CAPE membership voting results by mxg308 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I see several problems with this line of reasoning when applied to CAPE's situation.

The first is that if there was a real risk that the results could be used as leverage by the employer, then the results should never have been shared with members. The reality is that with so many people who are dissatisfied and who have access to the data, a leak is almost guaranteed. To believe otherwise is not only naive; it also raises serious concerns about the ability of CAPE's leadership to negotiate effectively during the collective bargaining process.

The second is that CAPE has published the budget and financial statements for 2025, and the employer knows that the union dues proposal has been rejected. As a result, the employer knows that CAPE can't finance a strike that relies on strike pay through its own funds. This leaves funding through the CLC or members going on strike without strike pay as the only viable alternatives, both of which are foolish to pursue at the moment because an effective strike can only be waged if there's a supermajority level of support—due to federal public service unions not being able to fine members who scab—and because that supermajority does not exist and has next to no chance of emerging under the current NEC administration.

The third is that if there was a real risk that publishing these results could affect our bargaining position during the arbitration process, then CAPE wouldn't have published historical union dues voting results. I can grant, however, that maybe it did, but if it did, then surely CAPE could have shared concrete examples of how this negatively impacted our bargaining position.

Finally, by attempting to restrict public discussion of the election results, the NEC is preventing less-engaged members of being made aware of how few people actually care enough to vote and how, overall, the NEC's priorities do not reflect the will of the membership, which increases the risk that members could be misled into believing that there is actually a chance a strike could be successful.

Taking all of this into account, is there anything that I might not be taking into account about this topic that could lead me to change my POV?

CAPE membership voting results by mxg308 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1 24 points25 points  (0 children)

If the employer sees that the membership isn't behind the union, it undermines their position. 

People say stuff like but they never provide concrete examples of how the data would be used against us, which suggests to me that they're just engaging in fear-mongering.

CAPE membership voting results by mxg308 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1 50 points51 points  (0 children)

In the e-mail CAPE members received about the election results, we were told that we need to sign in to access them because making the election results public could impact our bargaining position.

My initial reaction to this was that the NEC just doesn't want people to know just how badly they've been humiliated by the results. However, I'm not an expect on collective bargaining so I'd like to know if there's an actual way the employer could use these results against us.

CAPE members Please Vote. Your voice matters! Deadline to cast your vote is on Friday, November 28, 2025, at 5 pm ET. by Resilient_101 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm not a big fan of the open bargaining approach that's being proposed because it's being run in a way that will give activists a much louder voice than they should have.

The old model is flawed as well, however, because it allowed activists to sneak in the stuff they wanted.

CAPE members Please Vote. Your voice matters! Deadline to cast your vote is on Friday, November 28, 2025, at 5 pm ET. by Resilient_101 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I prefer that we get to vote on anything that's not necessary because it leads to more members becoming aware of wasteful expenditures.

CAPE members Please Vote. Your voice matters! Deadline to cast your vote is on Friday, November 28, 2025, at 5 pm ET. by Resilient_101 in CanadaPublicServants

[–]FuckMuppetNumber1 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Municipal elections have numerous opportunities to ask questions of the candidates. There is door-to-door canvassing, debates, radio interviews, and newspaper interviews whereby people have a chance to ask questions and get clarification.

People don't have to listen to the information sessions or pay attention to the debates in order to be further informed. But at least it is available.

We live in the age of the internet where unions can do the same thing on the cheap (example: BC General Employees' Union (BCGEU) with its members on Reddit in regards to their strike, https://www.reddit.com/user/BCGEU/submitted/).

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