Representatives of the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC), the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada (PIPSC) and\u00a0the Canadian Association of Professional Employees (CAPE) held a\u00a0news conference on Parliament Hill Tuesday afternoon.<\/p>\n
Together, the three unions\u00a0represent more than 240,000 employees in the federal public service.<\/p>\n
Their leadership said the money should\u00a0go toward more staff and training within government departments\u00a0to help solve Phoenix-related problems.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“There’s been a lot of money put into technological fixes, we need now to go beyond that \u2026 we need the departments and agencies to have the human resources and training to help resolve these issues internally,” said PSAC’s national executive vice-president Chris Aylward.<\/p>\n
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PSAC’s Chris Aylward said there’s a clear need to focus on getting more human resources support and training for Phoenix pay problems in federal government departments. (CBC)<\/p>\n
“Budgeting more money to address the system’s ongoing problems is really the very least the government could do after a year with this problem-plagued system,” said PIPSC president\u00a0Debi Daviau.<\/p>\n
Daviau\u00a0added the sense she’s getting from her members is the problems will likely last six more months.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“We don’t quite see the light at the end of the tunnel yet, we don’t see a detailed plan that leads us to believe this problem will be resolved,” she said.<\/p>\n
Later in the day Public Services and Procurement Minister Judy Foote told reporters they’ll continue to put money into a Phoenix fix without mentioning a dollar amount.<\/p>\n
“We’re going to have to do an assessment of what our needs are, but we have continued to put in additional funding and as I’ve said before we will continue to look at the situation and take whatever measures we have\u00a0to to fix the problem,” she said.<\/p>\n
The federal government has not said when it will table its budget.<\/p>\n
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Minister of Public Services and Procurement Judy Foote said Thursday she expects the federal government will spend more money to fix Phoenix but didn’t know if it would end up being $75 million. (CBC)<\/p>\n
Union actions to date<\/h2>\n
In early February\u00a0PIPSC asked the Treasury Board\u00a0for emergency money because the Phoenix pay system failed to properly transfer\u00a0$1.7 million in union dues.<\/p>\n
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- Union asks for emergency advance over $1.7M in missing union dues<\/strong><\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n
And in January\u00a0PIPSC\u00a0called on the federal government to set up a temporary parallel pay system until Phoenix is fixed, and to give more employees access to emergency salary advances.<\/p>\n