Federal government union presidents happy with Liberal win

Two union presidents representing federal government employees are pleased the Conservatives were shut out of power last Monday.

Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) President Chris Aylward said the Liberal minority government is something they can “certainly live with,” which was first reported by The Hill Times.

Other major public service union President Debi Daviau, of the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada, told The Hill Times she wants the Liberal minority government to “reciprocate” after the support her union gave the party during the  2019 election campaign.

“The fact [these unions] regularly and openly attack the same party, in some cases even before that party has ever released any policy, does not suggest genuine neutrality,” said Federal Director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation to The Post Millennial.

“I’d also note that whenever government union presidents express relief, Canadian taxpayers may want to check their wallets. What is good for government union members is not always good for everyone else who has to bankroll those salaries!”

“We liked the fact that they did promise us that they would get back to us after the election regarding a fair collective agreement for our 140,000 federal public sector members,” said Aylward late last week.

The two unions representing government employees were renegotiating contracts before the federal election. They’re also negotiating a settlement with the Liberal government for the Pheonix pay system fiasco, which is estimated to cost $3 billion to fix.

About 228,000 federal employees still have problems getting paid properly to this day. The unions are looking to get monetary compensation for its members inconvenienced by the payment system problems.

“I think that there could be advantages to the balance of power situation with the NDP, because there are some priorities that the NDP have that we also hold, like pharmacare, but the Liberals have already sort of committed to moving forward with pharmacare,” said Daviau, who was relieved Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer did not become PM.

Unions were big spenders this federal election, including Unifor, which represents thousands of journalists and is one of the parties involved in deciding which news outlets receive part of the Liberal government’s $600 million bailout.

After the 2015 election government workers were criticized for clapping and being overall joyous when Trudeau visited them shortly after being elected into office.