Peter F

I guess a larger font is needed: Federal civil servants cannot cash out sick leave. Upon leaving the Federal public service any banked sick leave is lost. It vanishes into thin air. Not one dime is cashed out. ETA: Other accumulated leave is cashed out however. Unused vacation time is about the only one actually. Perhaps you are conflating the two into one.

The disability insurance kicks in no sooner than 13 weeks after the employee went off work. Now maybe that employee had enough banked sick time to pay him his full wage for 13 weeks or even longer. Once all that banked sick time is used up then the employee applies for disability insurance which henceforth, for the duration of the illness, will pay 70% of the wage they would normally have made. If the employee did not have enough banked sick time to carry through tip the 13 week mark then they are shit out of luck and get paid nothing until the 13 weeks have passed since the last day worked. At which time application is made for disability insurance and if accepted (as it usually is) they too go on 70% of their normal wage until the illness passes. Example: fellow I know who worked with the CG. Never took a day off sick for 19 years. All that untaken sick time was banked. Then the heart attack struck and he was off for 3-4 months for the bypass and a hip-replacement thrown in. When he recovered it was back to work without ever applying for the disability insurance because he enough banked sick time to keep him at his full pay throughout the period. Under the proposed system buddy would have used up his 5 day sick leave then be dumped onto disability and 70% pay on the second week in. Hellofaway to treat a loyal hardworking employee who never took a day off sick for 19 years. Cut his pay by 30% as if it was nothing. And yes, the present system is a hellofalot better than the majority of private sector plans. That is a good thing by the way. And, again, yes such afflictions are obviously 20% more common than in the private sector for the simple reason that employees in the private sector have shitty employment conditions and simply cannot afford to take long term disability when they elfin well should!

Yes, under the proposed new system where there is no banking of sick leave then at the end of the fiscal year I would expect a spike in use of sick leave by the unscrupulous 'use it or lose it' crowd. Then there is the evil temptation amongst to the virtuous for the same reason. IE: the new system will actually encourage abuse of sick leave allotments. But then what does the government care? They fork out less in the long term.

Addressing Moonbox and his worries about employee's abusing sick leave by taking vacations... Managers have all sorts of powers to control such things. They can actually require employees to bring in doctors certificates - believe it or not - to show they actually were in fact sick. Of course they can't do so retroactively but should the manager feel that a certain employee is abusing the sick leave benefit the manager can require medical certificates from that employee for all future sick leave taken. Such action results in one of two things: either the abuser is really sick (produced doctors note - and what manager is qualified to dismiss a doctors opinion?) or the use of sick leave by that employee significantly declines. So you see, there really is no need for governments to attack sick leave benefits. Managers have the capability and power to do so right in their comfy chairs.

It's a fundamental component of Canadian television. Course thats a remnant of the actual broadcasting age which the CRTC is slowly evolving from but limited by its mandate so it can't really evolve from anyways.

Oh yes, I agree. All they see is how many millions they will save by kicking employee's off of paid sick leave sooner. The PBO estimated paid sick leave costs the TB $871 million (2012-2013). The government has been hounding TB to cut costs and the ladder-climbers have targeted that money. The stupidity and resulting inefficiency matter not - only how much $$$ they can offer unto their overlords. ETA: and the present banking of sick time is what is stopping the RH Tony Clement from kicking employees of paid sick days - thus the demonization of it.

Well I suppose if laying in a hospital bed after bypass surgery is a vacation Then I guess you have a point.

Yes, but at least there would be no more abuse of sick leave and a reduction of absenteeism. Some manager will be able to wear that particular feather in his cap even when its destructive in the long term.

Yeah, thats a bit of a puzzle. How can they bank unused sick time when they are using it?

Exactly. According to Tony Clement Sharon is abusing her sick leave benefits and must be reigned in.

ah, I see the problem. You think Macleans is right on the money with their numbers. You are wrong. Macleans: What liability? 19000 employees phone in sick - and get paid sick leave for that day. They get paid what they normally would have been paid if they had come to work - the concept of paid sick leave again. They get paid the wages that have already been allocated and budgeted for. What liability has ballooned to the shocking amount of $5 billion by them taking sick days? Macleans: I don't know where Nancy Mcdonald got her figures from...probably Tony Clement... but the Parliamentary Budget Office disagrees (see: http://www.pbo-dpb.gc.ca/files/files/Sick%20Leave%20II%20_EN.pdf) According to them Federal Public Servants use 11.4 paid sick days per year on average. As has been mentioned elsewhere, Tony Clements figure of 18.x sick days includes unpaid sick leave and injury on duty leave. (see: http://www.pbo-dpb.gc.ca/files/files/Response_IR0126_TBS_Mod_Sick_Leave_Benefits_EN.pdf) ...but again this has got sweet dick-all to do with banked sick leave... Macleans: They will reduce exceedingly high absenteeism by not paying for sick days taken anymore. Tony Clements plan may actually work! Employee's are generally loath to take unpaid sick days, or any other unpaid days, off work - even when they are sick! Unpaid sick days means more sick people coming to work. Simple as that really. That being so then Tony Clements plan may actually have some sense. Unfortunately it doesn't deal with banked sick time (time not taken off sick - which is somehow abusive and leads to this exceedingly high absenteeism). Macleans: No shit Sherlock. Old folks get sick more often. Whodathunk?

Wait a minute...First off your macleans reference sucks; It moans about public servants taking more sick days than 'the norm' and provides examples from various provincial and municipal public services of (alleged) abuse but not one peep about Federal public servant (alleged) abuse. Then says that Tony Clement and the government are on the right track to end provincial and municipal workers abusing the system by reducing sick leave benefits of Federal public servants. Second off how is not using sick days accumulated (banked sick time) abusive?

So you're complaint is about the actual taking of sick leave and not the banking of sick days unused.

To enter into a rant... It seems to me that this whole banking of sick time is bad meme that Tony Clement et al are on about,, is a red herring. What is it they are truly after? The TB wants to eliminate the banking of accumulated sick time. The TB wants employees to accumulate a maximum of 5 days of sick time. The TB wants employees who are off work for longer than 5 days to be paid nothing at all for the first two weeks off then paid only 70 percent of their wages after that. It seems to me that good ol' Tony Clement wants to get out of paying full wages for time taken off sick. They have no intention or plan (nor can they to be honest) of reducing the amount of sick time taken - they merely want to stop paying wages for sick time. Thats the whole point of this exercise. Anecdote: There I was on the Union negotiating team across the table from the Management negotiating team. Management: You guys make way too much in overtime. Union: Stop scheduling overtime and your problem is solved. Management: We want to reduce how much you are paid for overtime because its killing us. Union: Hire more people and you won't need overtime anymore Management: We can't hire more people! It's bad management to have more employees than needed. Union: Okay, so why do you schedule overtime? Management: We still need the work to get done. Union: Ah. So overtime is killing you yet you absolutely must have it. Really what you want is we work the same amount of overtime just that you pay us less for it. This is the same as whats happening with the public service and TB now. There is no reduction of sick time taken just that it won't be paid sick leave anymore.

Oh wait...maybe i misunderstood. You mean anyone who takes a sick day must be faking it. You're not talking about not-taking-sick-days, which is how banked sick-days accumulate. You're talking about the actual taking of sick days.

Then banish it in those places where banked sick leave is cashed out. As it is Tony Clement and his conservative pals are going to town with the wrong folks. I will repeat: Federal Public Servants cannot cash out banked sick time.

The federal public service cannot cash-out banked sick days. Upon leaving the Public Service those banked sick days simply disappear. They are not paid for in cash. As such it is not an 'unfunded liability'. Since banked sick days vanish when not used the Treasury Board isn't on any hook for anything. When used by the employee the Treasury Board does not pay out more in wages it would have anyways . The employee takes a sick day and is paid the wages he/she would have been paid for that day. Otherwise known as paid sick leave. So its not an unfunded liability any more than wages-to-be-paid-this-year is an unfunded liability. It is true that various other public employees (municipal or provincial) can cash out some or all of banked sick-leave. Even some private companies have terms where they cash out banked sick leave....but not the federal public service. ETA: perhaps the RCMP or the military have a cash-out of banked sick leave upon retirement?

You mean in the private sector, everyone comes to work every day no matter what?

'mental health days' ? 15 days annually? I call bullshit

What BC says...very true. All sorts of things must be taken into consideration. And one other: Maximizing profit. Constructors have found that the consumer is obviously willing to pay such a 'high' price. Would anyone excpect the constructors to seek minimum profit?

Seems Harper was all hot and bothered to support just such a violation back in 2003 when the US was ignoring the Peace of Westphalia. Mind, the US congress never did ratify that one...

hmmmm. Good catch....

Really? So the state bureaucracy is looking the other way and refusing to investigate reports of rapes? I don't think thats in any way supportable. The point of this thread is Argus' typical spread the suspicion and hate of non-whites. We are to distrust Blacks but not whitey. We gotta do something about blacks raping white folks and prison aint good enough. Never mind white folks raping white folks lets just get ourselves in a knot about blacks raping white folks. Rape in general? not worthy of our efforts. Its the Black guys we gotta worry about. Even if his contentions are true - So Effin what? Are we to assume any black man is a probable rapist? Are we to deny employment to blacks for the safety of our white female employees? Is the race and race only to determine how we interact with others? Thats what Argus is up to. Justifying his racism.

What reproductive right? Lordy. If men have a right to reproduce then some woman somewhere somewhen must bear a mans child. Its his right, dammit, and if some woman somewhere somewhen refuses to bear his children well dammit she's in violation! Sorry, the best men can hope for is that some woman somewhere somewhen agrees to bear children for him. Thus no reproductive Right exists for males. Never has and probably never will.

But why should the male be given the option?