Sisters and Brothers,
We have had to temporarily close the Local Union Office due to the direction of the National Office and the Ontario Provincial Government. After the Ontario Provincial Government made their announcement about non-essential business must close the National Office engaged the opinion of the Union’s lawyer to determine if this applied to the Canadian Union of Postal Workers and their affiliate offices. Upon the opinion of the lawyer National decided to inform all Regional Offices and Local offices in Ontario to close their doors. The National Union has been attempting to get the Ontario Minister of Labour to give our Union an exemption to the order but as of the writing of this posting we have not received that exemption.
Brothers and Sisters I am not happy about this decision but I must abide by the direction of the National Office.
I want to ensure all of our members that the work of this Local is continuing. The members who are on any Union Leave are still allowed to go into the office, for a short time, to get any files that they are working on, make photocopies that they may need, fax items and check phone calls. These members will have to work remotely as per the direction of the National Office.
As always the Executive can still be reached during this difficult time.
If members are having issues we suggest that you follow this protocol:
1) Bring your issue to the attention of your Shop Steward/Health & Safety member in your location/shift. Your Shop Steward/Health & Safety member will try to answer any questions you have to the best of their ability. In cases where they are unable to answer your questions they will contact one of the Executive members to try to get clarification of the issue at hand.
2) At any time you can email one of your Executive Members if you have questions/concerns that either your Shop Steward/Health & Safety members are not able to deal with. The email addresses for your Executive are listed below:
President–Steve Hinschberger….shinschberger@cupw560.ca
Vice-President–Mike Bouchard…mbouchard@cupw560.ca
Secretary-Treasurer–Elizabeth Tonner…etonner@cupw560.ca
Internal Grievance Officer–Frank Thoms…fthoms@cupw560.ca
External Grievance Officer–Tom Spurgeon…tspurgeon@cupw560.ca
Recording Secretary–Amanda Goveas…agoveas@cupw560.ca
Executive-At-Large–Nancy Kingsley…nkingsley@cupw560.ca
Executive-At-Large–Maxine Barksey…mbarksey@cupw560.ca
Executive-At-Large–Dan Sevigny…dsevigny@cupw560.ca
Executive-At-Large–Chad Benki…cbenki@cupw560.ca
I am hoping that National will be able to convince the Ontario Minister of Labour that our Union is essential as we represent the members who are on the front lines for Canada Post Corporation.
I will post any new information with regards to this issue as it becomes available to me.
In Solidarity,
Steve Hinschberger, President, Local 560 CUPW
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