Unit 1 Bargaining 2025
May 14, 2025
Unit 1 Collective Agreement update:
The final version of the newly negotiated Unit 1 Collective Agreement (2025-2028) is still being reviewed by the Union and the University. The final version will be posted shortly. In the meantime, here are new wage grids with the negotiated increases for your information:
The Unit 1 Tentative Collective Agreement has now been ratified by the membership (88% in favour) and the University completed their ratification process on April 24, 2025. Therefore, the recently negotiated Collective Agreement for Unit 1 will come into effect on May 1, 2025. The final version of the document will be available shortly after the University and the Union have had an opportunity to review it for accuracy. In the meantime, please see below for the version that was shared with the membership at the ratification meetings that includes original language and the changes that were negotiated in bargaining.
The Unit 1 Chairperson and Workplace Committee would like to provide you with an update on the bargaining process:
Proposals Meeting
Thank you to all who were able to participate in the proposals meeting on March 18, 2025. At this meeting, the Unit 1 Chairperson, Meghan Forbes, shared the results of the bargaining survey including the top 3 priorities as set out by you, the members. The number one priority by far from the survey is an increase in our total compensation package including wages and benefits. Meghan also reviewed some language changes that are being proposed which will update and modernize some of the articles of the Unit 1 Collective Agreement. The members in attendance approved the Committee’s proposals and we will be moving forward with those as our framework for negotiations.
We cannot share any specific details about the proposals meeting online or in documentation as we have to keep this information confidential until we present it to the employer. If you have any questions about our proposals, please reach out to the Unit 1 Chairperson Meghan Forbes: meghan.forbes@
Bargaining Process
Your Unit 1 Workplace Committee will meet with the employer the week of March 31 to April 4 for a focused week of negotiations. It is our goal to complete negotiations during these 5 days. If a tentative agreement is not reached within that time, we will endeavour to meet with the University to come to an agreement prior to the expiration of our current collective agreement on April 30, 2025. While negotiations are underway, the Committee will not be able to provide specific details about the particulars that have been agreed upon or not as negotiations are a fluid process with the parties going back and forth with proposals and as such things can change.
Ratification
Once a tentative agreement has been reached between the parties, the Local will arrange for a ratification vote. We have determined that this will be an in-person ratification vote on campus which will be scheduled as soon as a tentative agreement has been reached. If that occurs within the week of negotiations, we will be scheduling the meeting for early in the following week (April 7 or 8 or shortly thereafter). You will be notified of this meeting with as much notice as possible.
We have explored all possible options to hold this meeting online or in a hybrid format, but have landed on an in-person ratification meeting to enable a smooth credentialing and secure balloting process for voting. To that end, we are working on a series of smaller in-person ratification meetings for our out-of-Hamilton members (Niagara, Waterloo, Burlington, and Collingwood Campuses). It is important that we deliver consistent information and provide members the opportunity to ask the bargaining team questions about the tentative agreement, therefore, an in-person evening meeting for members is the best way to overcome the challenges presented by an online or hybrid format for this vote.
In Solidarity,
Unifor 5555
Unit 1 Workplace Committee
Unit 1 represents the non-academic administrative, professional and technical employees at McMaster University
Unit 1 Members include the non-academic, administrative, professional and technical employees of McMaster University.
For those of you with concerns/questions, your first point of contact should be a Steward. Stewards should be able to answer questions you may have regarding your working arrangements or clarification on the language in the collective agreement and how it pertains to your specific situation. When contacting Stewards please understand that the phone numbers provided on this listing are their work locations, and if they are working they should not be discussing Union business during the hours they are to be working. It is generally a good practice to email the Steward with your questions or concerns, or if you require more information arrange a meeting time outside of the core working hours.
In Solidarity,
Meghan Forbes
Unit 1 Chairperson
meghan.forbes@unifor5555.ca
905-525-9140 x27539
Aaron Geekie-Sousa – Unit 1 Vice-Chair / Unit 1 Workplace Committee
Hilary Jenkins – Unit 1 Workplace Committee
Robyn McColeman – Unit 1 Workplace Committee
Jeremy Sandor – Unit 1 Workplace Committee
Andrew Whitney – Unit 1 Workplace Committee
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Recent Posts
Unit 1 Members, The last few weeks have been challenging and as the COVID-19 situation continues to impact our communities, we expect those challenges will continue. Your Union has been working with the University on what the longer-term plans will look like. Members whose positions can be done remotely will continue to do so. If your remote workload does not constitute enough to maintain your regular hours you may be asked to take on alternative work to keep you fully employed. This could be training, project work or even duties assigned from other area positions. Members who are in roles that cannot be done remotely may also be assigned alternate work where possible. If you are not in a role where you can work from home or alternate remote work is possible your supervisor may ask you to begin taking vacation. We appreciate that no matter which situation you find yourself in, these solutions are not ideal. The impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic were unexpected and as such we are all working to find solutions that maintain our members income and benefits during this uncertain time. For those required to, using vacation will ensure your income and benefits continue throughout April. The messaging that we have received from the University is that any of these arrangements that are made in the next couple of weeks will be made reasonably with individual circumstances in mind. Using vacation time to keep income and benefit levels at the maximum amount, should be done in a thoughtful way. University leadership has assured us that they have directed supervisors to take this approach. If you feel that you are not being given reasonable options, please reach out to me so that I can address things as they come up. Often, these messages are lost in translation. We cannot help if we are not aware of the issues. The work your Union is doing with the University is on-going as we try to find longer term solutions that will support our membership until there is some return to normalcy on campus. The Unifor National COVID-19 webpage has a wealth of Resources and Fact sheets relating to various leaves that may be relevant to you depending on your situation. The Unifor 5555 website will be updated with Local and Unit information as details of the various steps being taken are confirmed. We also know that this situation is having an impact on many aspects of members lives outside of work, so we have compiled a number of resources relating to Mental Health, Addiction and Domestic Violence as well as some community support on our Mental Wellbeing Resources page. Members are also encouraged to reach out to me at sarah-kai.antanaitis@unifor5555.ca if they have questions or concerns. In Solidarity, Sarah-Kai Antanaitis Unit 1 Chair
Welcome to Unifor 5555 – Unit 1Welcome to Unifor 5555. This is an invitation to attend our next new member union orientation luncheon to be held on Wednesday 25 March, 2020 from 12:00 noon until 2:00pm at the Local’s administration office located at 86 Hester Street. Parking is free.As per article 25.02(b) of the Collective Agreement, new Employees are entitled to one hour immediately before or after their regularly scheduled lunch period to attend a Union Orientation Session.We would like to extend this invitation to all Unit 1 Members who are new within the last year and to any Unit 1 Members who have not yet attended a new member orientation. Please RSVP by calling Donna at 905-385-5554 extension 4 or via email at Registrations no later than 12:00 noon Wednesday March 18th 2020. Please speak with your supervisor and obtain permission to attend this orientation session. If you are unable to attend this session but would like to attend the next one please contact Donna and let her know.At this session we will walk you through specific Unit 1 collective agreement articles relevant to new employees, present information on Unifor and answer any questions you may have.When you contact Donna please advise if you have any dietary restrictions or if you require transportation. We are able to provide taxi vouchers at no charge to you.
In the midst of bargaining for Unit 1 last year, the Ford government tabled Bill 124, which among other things, imposed a 1% total compensation cap for Public Sector workers. The Bill passed first reading, but was not finalized as we were completing negotiations. As there was a possibility that either the Bill would not pass, or the provisions relating to total compensation could change, we bargained a .5% wage contingent wage increase that would come into effect in January of this year. Bill 124 did wind up passing with the 1% total compensation cap in November last year, meaning that we are still subject to the moderation period and the contingent wage increase will not come into effect. If anyone has any questions, please email Sarah-Kai Antanaitis.
Welcome to Unifor Local 5555’s new website! The new site has been completely redesigned from the ground up to help serve the members and the community at large, Just a quick tour: The Main page now works like a newspaper – get all the latest news from 5555. You will also see in the top menu links to everything on the website. The sidebar also has an events calendar where Local and local events can be seen. Units – Each Unit of Local 5555 now has it’s own dedicated page where you can find Unit specific information and documents as well as the latest news posts. Retirees – without our retirees fighting fo us in the past we wouldn’t be where we are today as a Local so they get their own page 🙂 Standing Committees – Each Standing Committee now has it’s own page as well with descriptions and contact info. Newsletters – Find and read all current and past editions. Contacts – The old website had contact all over the place so it has now been combined into one place to make things easy to find. All in all we’ve gone for a simpler design to make things easier and more logical to find. Enjoy!! Allan Fisher.
