100 PSAC members working at CBSA, their families, and supporters rallied at Peace Arch border crossing on International Women’s Day, sending a clear message to management: respect our work, respect our families.
CBSA recently informed a group of workers – the majority of whom are women – that long-standing arrangements that allowed them to balance their careers with family obligations are being cancelled on very short notice and for no real reason.
Management in BC has cancelled agreements that allowed workers the flexibility they needed to allow them to be responsive to childcare, eldercare, and other family related needs.
“This is an exercise in paperwork that does nothing to solve short staffing at CBSA.” said Mark Weber, national president of the Customs and Immigration Union, a component of PSAC, “Forcing women to choose between their careers and their families is unacceptable, particularly in the context of this current round of negotiations.”
More than 10,000 PSAC members working at CBSA are currently in negotiations with the federal government, where the employer continues to push for concessions that would weaken workers’ ability to juggle work and family obligations.
