Last week, your Community Social Services Bargaining Association (CSSBA) bargaining committee kicked off negotiations for your new agreement. CSSBA met with your employers – the Community Social Services Employers Association (CSSEA) – to begin the hard work of bargaining.
This round of talks is aimed at reaching a new collective agreement for you and more than 23,000 other community social services workers, including 1,500 HEU members, working in every region of the province.
The current collective agreement expired March 31, 2025. While we are bargaining, the terms of the agreement stay in effect until a new one is negotiated. So, it remains business as usual for you and your coworkers.
As we are at the beginning of the process, the two sides just began sharing our respective non-monetary proposals with each other. All monetary proposals, including a general wage increase, will be exchanged later in the bargaining process.
CSSBA represents community social services from eight different unions that work together to negotiate collectively for an agreement that covers wages, working conditions and health and safety for all unionized workers in the sector. The member unions of the association include the BC General Employees' Union, which leads negotiations, as well as the Canadian Union of Public Employees, HEU, Laborers' International Union of North America, Health Sciences Association, Christian Labour Association of Canada, United Steel Workers, United Food and Commercial Workers, and BC Nurses’ Union.
Leading up to last week’s session with the employer’s representatives, your bargaining association was working diligently to review proposals from members and finalize our bargaining priorities and negotiations package.
HEU’s Community Social Services members are encouraged to keep their contact information updated to stay informed on the bargaining process. Update your contact information at www.heu.org/change-contact-information.