DINE WITH AN ISLAND BREEZE AT BAJA BURGER SHACK LUNCH RUSH {page 17} TRYING TO BUTT OUT? FOUR REASONS TO KICK THE HABIT {page 16}
COMEBACK?
AMY WINEHOUSE TOUR ENDS ABRUPTLY DISH
OTTAWA
GREENER
LIVING presented by
{page 13}
Tuesday, June 21, 2011 www.metronews.ca News worth sharing. See pullout in today’s paper
Tory axe to fall on jobs
Postal. Strike
Nearly 300 cuts coming this year: Unions Federal economists, policy analysts and auditors will be first go
Letter carriers from Peterborough, Hernan Bravo, left, and Michelle Wroblewski, hold a banner at the “Push Back” rally in support of labour unions yesterday at the Sparks Street post office. JOE LOFARO/METRO
Rallying against back-to-work legislation More than 100 people surrounded the Sparks Street post office yesterday to protest back-towork legislation and the current lockout at Canada Post offices across the country. “It takes away our rights as Canadians, as postal workers, and as union members,” said Michelle Wroblewski , a letter carrier from Peterborough. For more coverage of the Canada Post dispute, see page 6.
The federal government will cut 687 Public Works and Government Services Canada jobs — many located in Ottawa — over the next three years, unions announced yesterday. Three major unions were notified Friday the exercise is expected to save about $100 million. Individual workers learned early yesterday afternoon their jobs were on the chopping block. Under collective agreements, the federal government will attempt to make other reasonable job offers, train employees to work in other areas, or offer severance packages for them to leave. The Canadian Association of Professional Employees (CAPE), which represents some 14,000 members, says 103 federal economists and pol-
icy analysts who work in the consulting services branch of Public Works, providing analysis for all federal departments, are to be cut. Although the department has offered an eight-week transition period in which to help employees find other work, CAPE president Claude Poirier said the cuts are worrisome. It raises concerns about what kind of scrutiny proposed legislation or program cuts will receive in the future, and the Canadian public should be concerned, said Poirier, that “we’re going to see more and more decisions made by this government on an ideological basis, instead of on a learned basis.” Poirier predicted much deeper job cuts are to come. TORSTAR NEWS SERVICE