Sgt. Rick Dubeau (r), chief negotiator for the North Bay Police Association, and William Ferguson, chairman of the North Bay Police Services Board. Photos and montage by Phil Novak.
Sgt. Rick Dubeau (r), chief negotiator for the North Bay Police Association, and William Ferguson, chairman of the North Bay Police Services Board. Photos and montage by Phil Novak. ____________________________________________________________
The North Bay Police Services Board trusts its rank and file employees enough to handle critical situations in the field, but not to talk to them fact to face about a contract, Sgt. Rick Dubeau says.
Dubeau, vice president of the North Bay Police Association and its chief negotiator, said the association filed for arbitration after a meeting Tuesday at the Best Western with a provincial conciliator and board negotiators failed to yield any results.
“I’ve been here for 20 years and we’ve never had to go arbitration before,” Dubeau said.
Unable to achieve He his negotiating team are trying to work out a contract for 86 sworn employees and 55 civilians. They're now working under a two-year pact which expired Dec. 31/'03, and are seeking wage parity with similarly sized municipal police services in Ontario.
The province now has 30 days to appoint an arbitrator, who will decide on a final and binding agreement after listening to presentations from both sides.
North Bay Fire Department fire fighters also went to arbitration and were awarded a contract that made their pay roughly equal to that of city police officers.
In the case of the police negotiations, Dubeau said, provincial conciliator Denise Wilson was unable to achieve any kind of breakthrough.
“We knew if the conciliator was able to convince the board negotiators to talk to us instead of just exchanging packages then we’d be able to go forward and iron out a deal,” Dubeau said.
“And we also knew if she wasn’t able to make them talk then it would be a disappointing day.”
Inaccurate comments Dubeau says the board has not wanted to talk and put forward the same offer yesterday that it did in May, “which was unacceptable to the association.”
Board chairman William Ferguson declined comment, saying the board and the association had agreed not to talk to the medi a about negotiations.
Dubeau places the blame for the failure of negotiations on Ferguson and Glen Christie, an outside lawyer brought in to represent the board.
“Mr. Christie made some inaccurate comments about the association to the conciliator and the chairman of the board agreed with them,” Dubeau said.
Not acceptable Christie, Dubeau said, had accused the police association of wanting to go to arbitration from the start.
“That’s not the case at all,” Dubeau said.
“We’d much rather talk than go to arbitration.”
Christie could not be reached for comment at posting time.
Dubeau said the only comment Ferguson made was ‘not acceptable,” when the association submitted a contract proposal.
“Again nobody on other side talked to us,” Dubeau said.
“We’re police officer regularly dealing with crises out on the road. If we know someone is trying to kill somebody we talk to them. But we can’t sit and talk to the leaders who have confidence in us, and that’s frustrating.”
Very childish Dubeau again pointed to Christie, adding other police associations that have dealt with him have run into the same problem.
“I talked to him and found his behaviour to be very childish,” Dubeau said.
“He would turn his body away when he didn’t like what I was saying or look up at the ceiling. It’s like he didn’t want to hear what you’re saying and pretending not to pay attention.”
Dubeau said police associations who were able to persuade their boards not to use Christie were able to settle contracts through negotiations.
Crunch time Now it’s a matter of wait and see, Dubeau said, since an arbitrator may even deliver a contract better than what the association is seeking, as was the case with fire fighters.
But morale among his members has worsened, Dubeau said, because of the impasse with the board.
“Last time in negotiations we just missed a work-to-rule action,” Dubeau said.
“But former chief Berrigan was able to bring both sides to the table and we did agree to a contract package. It’s down to the crunch time again and we’ll have to wait to see what decision the arbitrator makes.”
