Sûreté du Québec agents rejected the agreement in principle by 59.38%, on September 15 .
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The Association of Quebec Provincial Police Officers (APPQ), which represents all 5,700 police officers of the Sûreté du Québec (SQ), was unable to relaunch negotiations after the rejection of the agreement in principle by its members, which planned salary increases of 21% over five years, Radio-Canada learned. x27;Quebec state is preparing to strike and disrupt Quebec public services if they are not already on strike, the priority of signing a new collective agreement for police officers of the Sûreté du Québec seems to have been neglected by the Treasury Board.
According to our information, the Quebec Provincial Police Association submitted a counter-offer on October 13 during a working session with representatives of the Sûreté du Québec management, accompanied by those of the Treasury Board Secretariat (SCT).
This counter-offer followed consultations by the union to understand what led to the rejection of the agreement in principle to 59.38% by its members on September 15.
The result of the vote would have had the effect of throwing a cold shower on the management side. No round of negotiations on the new list of union demands would be scheduled for the end of the year.
Following our members' refusal of the agreement in principle, we consulted our union structure in order to clearly identify what may have constituted an obstacle to its acceptance by the majority on September 15. Building on this exercise, we met with the Secretariat of the Treasury Board on October 13, confirms the APPQ in writing.
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The rejection of the agreement in principle between the APPQ and the government of Quebec has sowed astonishment within the leadership of the SQ staff.
According to the latest internal communication from the APPQ, the representatives of the Treasury Board have expressed certain reservations on the new union demands, taking into account the public service negotiations, which seem to be part of the challenges of our environment for the new agreement in principle, we write in a newsletter dated October 18.
The Treasury Board Secretariat asked us for a few weeks to evaluate our new demands, as well as their position in this regard. To this day, we are still awaiting their position.
A quote from an excerpt in writing from the Association of Provincial Police Officers of Quebec (APPQ)
According to our sources, union delegates hope in an optimistic scenario that they will obtain a response from the government by the holiday break.
L& #x27;APPQ clarified to its members that the recent counter-offer contained requests that had already been rejected by the Treasury Board Secretariat in July in order to conclude the agreement in principle.
With this in mind, the next talks could not take place until 2024 since the specter of strikes in public services has become the priority of the Legault government.
In response to the report, the APPQ declared that it did not consider the communication channels closed. The union executive insisted on expecting to obtain feedback on the government's position in the short term, in the coming days or even weeks.
The SQ police officers say they rejected the agreement in principle because, according to their interpretation, the distribution of bonuses and salary increases did not resolve the salary catch-up demanded for several years in relation to other police forces, such as the Service de police de la Ville de Montréal (SPVM).
Still according to our information, several documents circulated virally among private discussion groups of provincial police officers during the hours preceding the secret vote.
One of those which attracted the most attention is the summary of a statutory assembly of the Brotherhood of Police Officers of Montreal (FPPM), which was in no way written for the Sûreté of Quebec.
This internal message, of which Radio-Canada obtained a copy, presented the result of a ranking of police services based on their working conditions. The SQ found itself at the back of the pack among the 31 police forces in Quebec.
The summary from the Brotherhood of Police Officers of Montreal stated that the new collective agreement at the SPVM placed Montreal police officers 8th out of 31 police forces in 2023 and 2nd in 2026.
On the other hand, it was written that the SQ's agreement in principle placed the provincial police officers in 28th place out of 31 and, at the end of their agreement, in 24th place.
< p class="StyledBodyHtmlParagraph-sc-48221190-4 hnvfyV">Actuary calculations were based on hours worked annually and pension plans.
SQ police officers from different MRCs told Radio-Canada that the discussions became heated and heated.
The recommendations of the union delegates did not ;would not have been enough to have the agreement in principle adopted, to the amazement of the management of the SQ and the government of Quebec.
Appelled to react on the state of the negotiations, the office of the Minister of Finance, Eric Girard, preferred not to comment.
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