For immediate release: Friday, May 21, 2004

VERMILION — Members of the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees who work at Lakeland College have overwhelmingly ratified a new collective agreement under which their pay will increase by more than 11 per cent over the three-year life of the contract.

The agreement also contains other significant improvements that were popular with the members of AUPE Local 071/004, which represents non-academic employees of the college at campuses in Vermilion, Lloydminster and Sherwood Park, said AUPE Staff negotiator Wayne Trimble.

“Our members were extremely pleased with this agreement, as the strength of their ratification vote yesterday clearly demonstrates,” said Trimble, who negotiated the contract.

Under the terms of the contract, the approximately 220 members of the local will see their pay increase by four per cent in the first year of the agreement, another four per cent in the second year and three per cent in the third year, Trimble said.

Moreover, Trimble said, if the salaries of Lakeland College faculty members increase more than three per cent in the third year, the college has agreed that AUPE members’ pay will rise by the same amount.

In addition to pay increases, the collective agreement includes a boot and clothing allowance of $120 per year per member, an increase to four bereavement days, an increase in shift and weekend differential pay, paid time off between Dec. 24 and Jan. 2, and improvements in seniority provisions.

The agreement also includes a lump-sum payment equivalent to the pay increase for employees who are currently paid above scale, Trimble noted

The collective agreement will expire on June 30, 2007.

For more information, contact:
Dan MacLennan, President, AUPE, 780-930-3301 or 780-232-8392 (cellular phone)
Wayne Trimble, Union Representative, AUPE (East Central Regional Office, Camrose), 780-672-8877 or 780-679-5734 (cellular phone)
David Climenhaga, Communications Director, AUPE, 780-930-3311 or 780-717-2943 (cellular phone)