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Heather Smith congratulates UNA members for fight against pension changes

By United Nurses of Alberta May 6, 2014 11:58 (Last updated May 14, 2014 09:48)

But UNA president reminds members the battle against Bill 9 is not over

Members of UNA Local 314 at Keeweetinok Lakes Community held a rally in Slave Lake yesterday to convince their local PC MLA to negotiate, not legislate, the government's proposed changes to the Local Authorities Pension Plan (LAPP). Today, Finance Minister Doug Horner announced the Government would delay passage of Bill 9, a law that would impose drastic changes on the LAPP, until fall 2014.

Members of United Nurses of Alberta and other public sector unions deserve enormous credit for the lobbying effort that resulted in the decision by all parties in the Alberta Legislature yesterday to refer destructive changes to members’ pensions to an all-party committee, says President Heather Smith.

“This development is a true victory for our members in the Local Authorities Pension Plan and thousands of other Alberta public sector unions, but we need to remember that it is not a final victory and we will need to redouble our efforts to ensure that this bad law is not back in the future,” Smith said.

She noted that the change could not have happened without the strong support of all Opposition parties in the Legislature, and without the efforts of all unions in involved in the Labour Coalition on Pensions led by the Alberta Federation of Labour.

“We are fortunate that the immediate threat to our pensions has been put aside, but we are mindful that at least for now the government says it has not changed its position on pensions,” she reminded members. “So we will need to continue to remind the MLAs that represent us of the reasons why this is a bad and unneeded policy.”

Premier Dave Hancock and the three Opposition parties agreed last night to send Bills 9 and 10, which would have a significant harmful impact on Alberta pensions in both the public and private sectors, to the Standing Committee on Alberta’s Economic Future for public hearings. The committee will report back to the fall sitting of the Legislature.

This provides an opportunity to fix the many problems with the bills or to see them die on the order paper and not be passed into law.

If passed, Bill 9, the Public Sector Pension Plans Amendment Act, 2014, would have allowed the Progressive Conservative government to gut the pensions of front-line public sector workers, including UNA members. The impact would have been most severe for younger workers entering the workforce, and would have particularly severely impacted professions and occupations like nursing care that are dominated by women.

Bill 10, the Employment Pension (Private Sector) Plans Amendment Act, 2014, would have allowed private companies to arbitrarily introduce changes to private sector plans similar to those envisioned for public employees in Bill 9. 

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