External outreach

ASSEP is a directly chartered local of our union, PSAC (Public Service Alliance of Canada), whose provincial affiliate is PSAC-Québec. We participate in the following councils:

CQSU : Quebec Council of University Unions
FTQ Regional Council of Metropolitan Montréal

We are also indirectly affiliated with union centrals (grouping of several unions):

FTQ : Québec Federation of Labour
CLC : Canadian Labour Congress

We intervene at all levels to bring our members’ issues to the fore!

For more information on the PSAC structure, including the difference between Components and Directly Chartered Locals (DCLs), visit the PSAC website.

Our major demands for our members:

better consideration for lecturers, especially with regard to professors
real consideration for post-doctoral researchers, namely by dropping all references to the term “intern” in their job descriptions
better funding for universities and research projects, including increased doctoral and master’s scholarships

Date	Location	ASSEP Delegation
July 7-8, 2023	Chicoutimi (Québec)	Sébastien Paquette – coordination Chantal Beaudry – external affairs Jeanne Joachim – mobilization and communication Ulrich Compaore – steward, finance oversight committee Azam Shirani Bidabadi – steward (observer)

The convention provided an opportunity to meet up with university sector locals from different Quebec cities: Montreal, Trois-Rivières and Quebec City. We were able to exchange information on our various local actions, and come up with new ideas to energize our sections!

To give more weight to our demands, we voted on coordinated negotiations, i.e. a set of elements that all CQSU member locals will include in their bargaining book (see bargaining process). The demands adopted are:

remove the term “intern” from all collective agreements for post-doctoral fellows, and replace it preferably with “post-doctoral researchers”, in order to have an accurate denomination in relation to the research work carried out
minimum salary of $50k for 2023 (with increments for 2024) for post-doctoral researchers, given gains already made in the university sector in the past years
annual increases of at least 4% for all units, considering inflation increases
raise the maximum number of hours that foreign student workers can work while maintaining their status to at least 480h per session

CQSU’s main challenge is the low number of member locals, which limits both its representativeness and its budget. The following measures have been voted to remedy this situation:

reduction in the dues charged to member locals, to 1.5% of their total dues with a ceiling of $3,000 (compared with 2.75% and a ceiling of $3,500 in the previous Bylaws)
set up a mobilization and communication committee (5 elected members + coordinator), with a dual mandate to :
contact non-member locals to encourage them to join CQSU
strengthen communication between member local sections
increase the budget for releases to $9,000, in order to have more time available for the mobilization committee (approximately 360 h over the year)
increase the political representation budget to $2,000, to allow for travel to locals as needed

Date	Location	ASSEP Delegation
June 2-4, 2023	Trois-Rivières (Québec)	Sébastien Paquette – coordination Chantal Beaudry – external affaires Jeanne Joachim – mobilization et communication Vincent Brouillard – work relationships for teaching assistants and persons in charge of practical work Guillaume Ricard – member (elected by the Assembly to attend this congress)

This convention is an opportunity to vote on the PSAC-Québec budget and to amend its constitution to improve its operations.

We were able to make the issues of the university sector heard on a national level: in fact, we were able to count on the support of union colleagues at McGill University and the Université de Montréal to increase the budgets allocated to actions in the university sector by our union (the PSAC) and improve our representativeness on its bodies!

For a complete list of resolutions adopted, consult the convention minutes!

These resolutions were amended and approved by the Annual General Assembly on November 24, 2022:

Protecting the status of post-docs as highly qualified personnel: post-docs may not be referred to as students, trainees or other inappropriate terms.
Representation of Directly Chartered Locals (DCL) on the National Board of Directors (NBD): addition of a spokesperson for DCL and improved representation at national level.
Listening to Directly Chartered Locals (DCL) on the National Board of Directors (NBD): addition of an observer, DCL spokesperson
Representation of directly chartered locals (DCL) at regional conventions: the presidency of a local with more than 700 members must be delegated ex officio
Costs of disciplinary investigations: that the PSAC be responsible for the expenses of the review committee
Representation of regional councils at the national convention: regional council members as ex-officio delegates
Health and safety conference: that an OHS conference be held in Canada every three years
Regional Federation Councils: The PSAC will cover the cost of membership in the Regional Labour Councils of the provincial federations of labour for Locals that choose to join.

Résolutions soumises par l’ASSEP dans le cadre du congrès régional triennal de l’AFPC-Québec de 2023 | 196.20 KB

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Date	Location	ASSEP Delegation
May 8-12, 2023	Montréal (Québec)	Sébastien Paquette – coordination

We had sent our coordinator to this congress, held in Montreal, to defend the resolution on protecting the status of post-doctoral fellows, already adopted at the January 2023 QFL congress (see below). Unfortunately, it was not debated at the convention, as other, more global, social issues were prioritized: the fight against systemic racism, the fight against the rise of the extreme right, and the right to unionize.

Protecting the status of post-docs as highly qualified personnel: post-docs may not be referred to as students, trainees or other inappropriate terms.

Date	Location	ASSEP Delegation
January 16-19, 2023	Montréal (Québec)	Sébastien Paquette – coordination Roxanne Gendron – union consultant Chantal Beaudry – external affairs Jeanne Joachim – work relationships for post-doctoral researchers Vincent Brouillard – steward

This 33rd convention was held at the Palais des congrès in Montreal, with some 1,200 union representatives from across Quebec in attendance.

ASSEP was able to have a prominent place thanks to the work of our coordinator (Sébastien Paquette), who was also on the resolutions committee, and ensured that the major resolutions for the university community were debated at the congress. Other members of the ASSEP delegation (Jeanne Joachim and Vincent Brouillard) had the opportunity to take to the microphone to defend them, and they were supported and adopted!

Finally, we elected Magali Picard to the presidency of the QFL, making her the first woman and the first aboriginal to hold this position.

For more information on the resolutions adopted, consult the report on the QFL website (in French).

These resolutions were amended and approved by the General Assembly on November 24, 2022:

Protecting the status of post-docs as highly qualified personnel: post-docs may not be referred to as students, trainees or other inappropriate terms.
Pink tax: prohibit discriminatory pricing based on gender, without inducing a general increase in the cost of products and services.
Cyberbullying: that cyberbullying be criminalized in the same way as psychological and sexual harassment.
Production and distribution of “green” energies: organize public consultations on energies, sensitize the population and municipal and provincial elected officials to the issues related to these energies, and campaign for the production, transmission and distribution of renewable energies in Quebec to be entirely publicly owned.

Résolutions soumises par l’ASSEP dans le cadre du congrès de la FTQ de 2023 | 244.36 KB

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ASSEP coordinator Sébastien Paquette was invited to appear before the Canadian House of Commons Standing Committee on Science and Research on May 4, 2023. He was able to defend the need to increase post-doctoral fellowships, as well as continuing to call for better recognition of post-doctoral researchers.

You can watch the filmed appearance at 12:05:00 of this video (with English interpretation)!

Date	Location	ASSEP Delegation
May 26, 27, 30 and June 3, 2022	Online	Sébastien Paquette – coordination Chantal Beaudry – external affairs

ASSEP put forward resolutions to improve working conditions in the university sector, in particular by taking a stand against unpaid internships, and by making proposals to perpetuate existing unions.

We also put forward several resolutions to improve the representation of university unions (which are Directly Chartered Locals, DCLs) on PSAC decision-making bodies, so that our issues are better heard!

It’s worth noting that the congress was carried out entirely in virtual mode, which greatly hampered its progress. As a result, very few resolutions could be processed.

These resolutions were amended and approved by the General Assembly on November 22, 2021:

Unpaid internships: that the PSAC lobby all levels of government to ban unpaid internships and practicums at all levels of study.
Securing certifications: that the PSAC help Locals in danger of revocation by the employer
Member list format: that the PSAC provide its Locals with membership lists in electronic format (Excel type)
PSAC Centre: added a note to prioritizing local services through regional offices
Representation of Directly Chartered Locals (DCLs) on the National Board of Directors (NAB): addition of a spokesperson for DCLs and improvement of their representation at national level. Addition of a SLCD committee to represent them at national level.
Representation of Directly Chartered Locals (DCLs) at Regional Conventions: the presidency of a local with more than 700 members must be delegated ex officio
Costs of disciplinary investigations: that the PSAC be responsible for the expenses of the review committee
Representation of regional councils at the national convention: regional council members as ex-officio delegates
Congress representation of Directly Chartered Local (DCLs) groups: addition of delegates for regional and national conventions

Résolutions soumises par l’ASSEP dans le cadre du congrès triennal de l’AFPC (national) de 2022 | 395.80 KB

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