Management at Health Sciences North has lost a grievance with CUPE Local 1623 over the job classification of a worker officially designated a maintenance generalist.
At issue was whether the worker was really a painter – which is a separate designation paid at a significantly higher rate of pay. HSN eliminated the painter job description in 2015, when the one person with that classification retired after 32 years.
The hospital determined it no longer needed to employ a licensed painter because “we don’t need a licensed painter to put paint on the walls, ” says the tribunal transcript.
So the maintenance generalist position was created in 2016, aimed at someone who could not only paint, but do other tasks as the need arose.
Management argued the painter classification has a number of training, apprenticeship and licensing requirements – such as mixing paint, using epoxy, reading blueprints and supervising contractors — none of which the person holding the maintenance generalist position has.
When it was pointed out that the former painter at HSN had done none of those tasks in the 10 years before he retired, management responded that wasn't the point.
“The significance of the painter’s qualifications is not that (the retired painter) actually used his specialized skills, but rather that the employer could have called on those skills had it wished to do so,” the transcript says.
But the union countered that the retired painter's primary job was painting, and that “99 per cent” of the current employee's tasks were identical.
So it came down to HSN's argument that the current employee didn't have the qualifications required for the painter classification, versus the union's argument that both workers are doing identical jobs, and therefore should receive same pay.
In deciding the case, the labour board arbitrator relied on a precedent in which a judge ruled employers can't save money by eliminating job classifications, and then have workers in lower-paying classifications do the same work for less money. Allowing that “would empty the job classifications of all meaning.”
And the fact the current worker is doing the same job was important, the tribunal ruled.
“For at least the past 10 years, the incumbent in the painter position had not used any of the specialized skills identified by the employer,” the transcript says.
“There may have been some value to the employer to be able to call upon a licenced painter’s expertise. However, as the specialized skills have not actually been performed for at least 10 years, they cannot reasonably be described as 'core' or 'central' to the painter’s work.
“For the reasons set out above, the grievance is allowed. The union has established that the (current employee) has been performing work beyond his own classification and within the ambit of the higher classification of painter. The (current employee's) work to date is essentially identical to the tasks performed by the painter and it relates to the core and distinctive aspects of the painter classification.”
