Special federal council June 12, 2025

Message from the President

During last week’s council, delegates rejected the employer’s proposed agreement on the Unique Seniority Recognition Process.

Why? Because enough is enough. The employer has failed to fulfil its commitments on several occasions in recent years. Union representatives clearly expressed their lack of confidence in a government that continues to push back deadlines.

They also demanded that the process applicable to Santé Québec employees be extended to private subsidized institutions and northern institutions. No one is going to be left behind.

Seniority is not a technical detail. It is a fundamental right that embodies respect for our career, our experience and our commitment.

I invite you to read this edition of the FIQ en action to fully understand the issues at stake. We remain fully mobilized to defend seniority and equal treatment everywhere.

Thank you for your trust, and for those who will soon be taking some time to rest, I wish you excellent well-deserved vacations.

Seniority recognition process: positions taken at the special federal council

Six months after the provincial provisions of the collective agreement were signed,  there is a major delay in deploying the unique seniority recognition process (PURA) (Letter of Understanding No. 32). Your union delegates gathered at a special federal council in Drummondville on June 12 to evaluate an agreement proposed by the employer party aimed at temporarily suspending certain provisions until September 30, 2025, until the seniority recognition process is complete.

Remember that Letter of Understanding No. 32 in the collective agreement sets out seniority recognition for:

• employees hired starting on March 19, 2024 who worked for an employment agency or as independent labour (IL);
• network employees who, due to an employment link with a network institution, will have accumulated seniority that wasn’t recognized in the past.

After taking stock of the issues and analyzing the options, the delegates rejected the employer’s proposed agreement. Since the employer has repeatedly failed to fulfil its obligations in recent years, union representatives do not trust the government to honour the proposed new deadline. Furthermore, they requested in solidarity that the process applicable to Santé Québec employees be extended to private subsidized institutions (EPCs) and northern institutions.

The FIQ will therefore return to the table to negotiate an agreement that will likely better handle these issues and compensate members for the delays in applying the seniority recognition process. Until then, affiliated unions will continue their actions to ensure that the collective agreement is applied as quickly as possible, in particular by filing grievances and sending formal notices to the network institutions.