Editor’s Note: While there were no picket lines on Thursday, as the article below states, they appeared at the Nanaimo Harbourfront branch and Creativity Commons in downtown Nanaimo on Friday.
There will be no job action today in the Vancouver Island Regional Library strike, which began Tuesday.
A BC General Employees’ Union (BCGEU) spokesperson emailed Cortes Currents, “We do not want to be in job action so, in order to minimize impact on communities, we are making plans day-to-day based on what we hear from the mediator and will update the community as far in advance as we can.”
A picket line went up at the Duncan Library branch at 8 AM on Tuesday and the job action at that branch ended at 8 PM on Wednesday.
The spokesperson stated that job action, including picket lines, could resume at any one of the Libraries 39 branches as early as Friday.
The librarians collective agreement with VIRL expired 15 months ago.
Negotiations are stalled around two points.
As the 46 librarians who voted in favour of job action explained in a joint letter,“Our wages are not aligned with the cost of living in our communities, yet the VIRL budget indicates a surplus for BCGEU staff. Given VIRL’s recent decisions to build and renovate branches, and to hire multiple non-union management positions, we believe VIRL is able to invest in its librarians, by allocating some of that BCGEU surplus for reasonable wage increases.”
They also stated,“VIRL management has refused to agree to many important proposals – including solutions to workplace violence and mental health impacts – without offering alternative solutions.”
Three of the librarians who signed that letter are the Manager, Customer Services Librarian and Youth Services Librarian for the Campbell River, Gold River, Sayward, Tahsis, Quadra Island and Cortes Island branches, which are all within the Strathcona Regional District.
In a press release the day before the job action at Duncan began, VIRL stated, “the British Columbia General Employees’ Union (BCGEU) Local 702 has counter offered with wage increases greater than those the union had previously identified it would accept.”
Last night, the union spokesperson informed Cortes Currents, “At this time, the union is still awaiting a response to our counter offer via the mediator.”
This article was originally posted on March 10 and republlished as part of the Saturday Roundup on March 12th.
Top image credit: Interior of a library by Noah Wulf (own work) via Wikimedia (CC BY SA, 2.0 License)
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