Public sector: half of Quebecers disagree with government offer

The public sector common front revealed Monday that, according to a SOM poll, more than half of Quebecers believe that the nine per cent salary increases over five years offered by the government are not enough.

The vast majority of respondents (87 per cent) even say that the Quebec government needs to improve working conditions for its employees.

Almost as many believe that salaries should at least be indexed to the cost of living. Three quarters believe that public sector salaries should be equivalent to those in the private sector.

Few Quebecers (30 per cent) feel that the government handles negotiations with the unions representing its employees well.

Beyond wages, three-quarters of those surveyed stressed that better compensation for public sector employees would have a positive impact on service quality.

“These results confirm what we feel when we talk to people, that Quebecers value their public services and are well aware that working conditions leave much to be desired,” state Common Front representatives François Enault, CSN First Vice-President, Éric Gingras, CSQ President, Magali Picard, FTQ President, and Robert Comeau, APTS President, in a press release.

The common front is currently canvassing its 420,000 members on a mandate for an unlimited general strike. Voting will take place this week.

The collective agreements expired on March 31. Union demands were tabled in the fall of 2022, and Quebec tabled its offers in December 2022.

Québec is offering all government employees a nine per cent increase increase over five years, plus a lump-sum payment of $1,000 for the first year of employment. It will also to devote the equivalent of 2.5 per cent to “government priorities priorities”, so he presents his offer as equivalent to equivalent to 13 per cent over five years.

The Common Front, on the other hand, is calling for $100 a week or the equivalent of the Consumer Price Index (CPI) plus two per cent for the first year, whichever formula is most advantageous to the worker, then CPI plus three per cent for the second year, then CPI plus four per cent for the third year.

According to the survey, 56 per cent of Quebecers believe that union wage demands are not exaggerated. Nevertheless, 38 per cent find them generous, and half of them very generous.

The survey was conducted at the end of July among 1,089 respondents on the Internet.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published in French on Sept. 18, 2023, and translated by CityNews.