Faculty and support staff represented by the Federation of Post-Secondary Educators (FPSE) at the Nicola Valley Institute of Technology have ratified an agreement under the Shared Recovery Mandate.

Nearly 140 faculty and support staff working at NVIT to provide education and services that support student learning are covered by the collective agreement. The Post-Secondary Employers’ Association (PSEA) is the employer bargaining agent for all 19 public colleges, teaching universities, and institutes in British Columbia’s post-secondary sector. The union members, as well as the boards of NVIT and the PSEA, recently ratified the agreement.

Key priorities of the 2022 mandate include:

• protecting the services that people in British Columbia depend on;
• improving health care and preparing for future needs and challenges; and
• supporting a strong economic recovery that includes everyone in B.C.

These negotiations are focused on providing a fair and reasonable offer to public-sector workers that includes significant inflation protection, while ensuring that government has the resources to continue to invest in building a stronger province for everyone.

The ratified agreement includes:

• Three-year term – April 1, 2022, until March 31, 2025
• General wage increases (GWI)
  • Year 1 – a flat increase of $0.25/hour, which provides a greater percentage increase for lower-paid employees, plus 3.24%
  • Year 2 – 5.5% plus a potential cost-of-living adjustment to a maximum of 6.75%
  • Year 3 – 2% plus a potential cost-of-living adjustment to a maximum of 3%
• A negotiable Flexibility Allocation up to 0.25% in years 1 and 2 to support mutually beneficial outcomes for both parties
• Other achievements in this round of negotiations included the establishment of a working group to develop an Indigenous dispute resolution framework, using NVIT’s four key values as the foundation for collaboration, as well as meaningful improvements to benefits.

Currently, about 348,000 provincial public-sector employees are covered by tentative or ratified agreements reached under B.C.’s Shared Recovery Mandate.

Learn More

To learn more about public-sector bargaining in B.C., visit: gov.bc.ca/psecbargaining