Strike threatens to bring CRA to `standstill'

Public Service Alliance of Canada workers could stop working in mid-April

The end of tax season could become chaos for last-minute filers, as the majority of Canada Revenue Agency employees could go on strike in mid-April and grind the tax department to a “standstill.”

In addition, a large swath of the federal bureaucracy could be forced to run on only one-third of its staff in the coming months if ongoing strike votes at the country's largest public-sector union pass, as widely expected.

In late February, 155,000 Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) members across five bargaining units began casting votes on whether to give their union a strike mandate after well over a year of difficult negotiations with the federal government.

Of that number, 120,000 are part of what is called the core public service. About 100,000 of those are part of the “program and administrative services” group. They occupy key jobs such as federal program administration, information services, communications, secretarial services, office equipment, welfare programs, administrative and clerical services and data processing.

The remaining 35,000 are CRA employees, who are part of the Union of Taxation Employees group within PSAC, most of whom could go on strike just days before the April 30 deadline for filing income taxes.

“Basically, things will come to a standstill” if CRA workers go on strike, said Barry Casselman, who spent 40 years working at CRA and is now a tax preparer and founder of Casselman Forensic Accounting.

The final votes will be submitted by April 11. If the vote is successful, PSAC would have the ability to launch a strike with 72 hours' notice.

In recent weeks, PSAC and the federal government signed a series of agreements determining which employees would be considered “essential” and barred from striking.

In total, 100,000 of the 155,000 PSAC members would be allowed to strike, meaning a host of crucial services could be reduced to a skeleton staff.

Though there are hundreds of unresolved demands from both parties on the table, the key issue that has led to what mediators have described as a “logjam” is a dispute over salary increases.

PSAC is demanding a 4.5-percent annual pay increase for most members, but the government has offered a two-per-cent annual bump. CRA workers are pushing for even more, demanding a 30-per-cent wage increase over three years.

Only about 1,000 of 35,000 Union of Taxation Employees members have been deemed “essential” in the case of a strike. CRA employs roughly 55,000 people in total.

That means that if UTE members vote for a strike that is triggered by mid-April, a majority of agency employees could be walking out around the busiest time of the year for CRA.

UTE represents most frontline CRA employees, such as call centre workers, as well as most of those working in other CRA sections, such as debt management, auditing and enforcement, according to the union.

CRA did not respond to a request for comment by deadline.

In a statement, PSAC national president Chris Aylward called on members to give the union a “strong” strike mandate even as negotiations continue.

“We've been clear from day one that federal public services workers are prepared to go on strike to fight for decent wages and fair working conditions in the face of rising costs,” Aylward said.

In February, Postmedia reported that a key PSAC organizer called on the union's members to vote for a “destructive” strike to “shut down” the government to force it to capitulate.

The latest agreement between the Treasury Board Secretariat and the Public Service Alliance of Canada determining which workers are considered “essential” is a sign that both parties consider the threat of a public service strike to be real, said Patrick Groom, a certified labour law specialist at McMillan.

“Simply put, you don't go through the trouble of negotiating a non-essential services agreement unless it's absolutely necessary,” Groom said.

In a statement, Treasury Board Secretariat spokesperson Barb Couperus acknowledged that if PSAC workers go on strike, there will be noticeable service disruptions for Canadians.

“The Government of Canada remains resolute and focused on reaching fair and reasonable agreements at the table and avoid service disruptions for Canadians,” she wrote in an email.

“In the event of strike action, information will be provided to help the public identify the essential services that will continue to be delivered and those that may be disrupted.”

There is a final round of negotiations, aided by a mediator, scheduled for early April before the strike voting ends.