CUPE wants to know what Patrick Brown is doing with $8M-$10M in unspent wages for 150 unfilled positions: wage strike disrupts Brampton services

Following a breakdown in negotiations with the City of Brampton, CUPE local 831 members are officially on strike.

On Thursday, November 7, CUPE local 831, which represents more than 1,200 full time and temporary municipal employees in transportation, animal control, road maintenance and City Hall services, posted an announcement about the strike on its website.

Fabio Gazzola, President of CUPE Local 831, says the union has been working to renew its contract for close to 10 months, conducting approximately 30 meetings and presenting 10 proposals, yet the City has not displayed a similar sense of urgency. He pointed out that CUPE workers have experienced financial setbacks due to limited wage increases in their previous contract, while inflation and living expenses have gone up significantly.

Gazzola said one factor that led CUPE to strike is the excessive benefit increases management has received under Mayor Patrick Brown’s leadership, compared to his members. Brown launched a media campaign this week to attack Brampton’s CUPE leadership, routinely misleading the public, comparing recent contract increases in Mississauga without including the actual amounts that CUPE members there successfully bargained for.

According to Ontario’s public salary disclosure, non-union  benefits have skyrocketed under Brown. Benefit payments to all employees who made the Sunshine List (those who earned $100,000 or more) went from $660,614 in 2017, the year before Brown became mayor, to $1,035,740 last year. Benefits include lavish items such as car allowances and bonuses to non-union employees. 

"Management benefits are significantly better than ours,” Gazzola said. “Their vacation is better than ours, their ability to have flexibility in scheduling and (balancing) private life and when emergencies pop up or remote workplaces are better than us, right? So, all we're asking is some type of economic increase that covers the rising costs…What's being offered isn't even comparable to other municipalities." 

He also says it is unclear what the City is doing with millions of dollars contributed by taxpayers for union jobs that are going unfilled under Brown. 

“At the time of the strike the City had more than 150 CUPE vacancies. The workers don’t benefit from the approximately eight to ten million dollars in savings (annually) from those vacancies but have to take on the extra workload.”

A range of services to residents that are supposed to be carried out by unionized workers is suffering due to the unexplained vacancies.

The Pointer sent questions to the City regarding many of Gazzola’s concerns, such as the 150 vacant union positions, what is being done with as much as $10 million annually that taxpayers have already paid for those salaries and the shift toward non-union jobs with far less transparency. 

The City did not respond.

Critics have also pointed out Brown’s lavish spending since he became mayor, on benefits, perks and travel around the world for himself, his non-union staff, other councillors and managers. 

Recent media reports have highlighted trips by Brown and his councillor allies to Karachi, Dubai, Dublin, Anaheim, Lisbon and Detroit in just the past 12 months. Multiple sources said Brown was also in India, and according to expense records the Pakistan trip by him which also included another councillor cost Brampton taxpayers more than $92,000. 

When pressed he has claimed the lavish spending is for Brampton’s benefit, with few details or reports of any investments in the city as a result of his frequent travel. 

Staff in 2022 reported that more than $600,000 in contracts associated with a new Brampton University Brown promised (it has since been scrapped due to his mismanagement) was given to a close personal friend of his and a friend of his ally Councillor Rowena Santos, without informing council of the relationships. Much of the work was never done, despite the payments which were about three times what council had approved for the work, and when a majority group of councillors last term ordered a series of investigations into the matter along with a half-dozen other probes into questionable spending under Brown’s leadership, he took advantage of a councillor absence at a later meeting and cancelled the investigations despite the obvious conflict of interest.

He has also failed to explain his excessive social media spending paid for by taxpayers including for work that appeared to be for his failed 2022 federal Conservative leadership campaign, which he was disqualified from for allegedly violating spending rules. He charged Brampton taxpayers $35,000 for his own personal social media, much of which boosted his leadership campaign.

He also used City Hall staff for his election campaign.

Brown has been criticized for his lavish taxpayer funded spending throughout his career as a politician. In 2018, in just over two months during his time as an MPP he spent almost $300,000 as an MPP, about four times the average spending over the same period compared to 20 of the other MPPs who also departed. Brown made claims justifying his spending, but most of the reasons did not apply to the period in question. He then claimed it was because of his role as the PC leader at the time, despite reporting which showed that was not the case. 

Now, as he takes a tough stand on union negotiations with CUPE he is simultaneously handing out unsustainable increases for others. He just championed a 21.3 percent increase for the Peel Police operating budget (and wanted a much higher hike); much of it to support salary gains he has approved as a police board member which are far higher than what is being offered to Brampton’s municipal CUPE members.

Brown called the strike “unacceptable” on social media, claiming CUPE was offered a fair deal. Multiple sources told The Pointer he has not been in the country while making many of his recent comments, and had recently been away overseas on another trip. 

The size of his mayor’s office staff has also tripled compared to numbers during former mayor Linda Jeffrey’s term. 

Data from Ontariosunshinelist.com based on the province’s annual public salary disclosure, show the dramatically sharp rise in spending on salaries and benefits since Brown became mayor, driven by generous compensation for non-CUPE members paid for by Brampton’s taxpayers. 

In 2017, the year before Brown became mayor, the total salary expenditure for all those on Brampton’s Sunshine List was $90 million; last year it was $168 million.

Dozens of managers since Brown became mayor, such as his hand-picked director of communications Jason Tamming, now enjoy five-figure benefits, much of it for their own taxpayer-funded vehicles. Last year, his benefits cost local property owners $19,171 (Toronto’s director of communications received $1,283 in benefits last year; Mississauga’s received $1,485) on top of Tamming’s salary of $197,561. He was previously let go by Niagara Region; he behaved corruptly in the “Inside Job” CAO hiring scandal there. 

These types of decisions by Brown, funded without any say by Brampton’s taxpayers, have raised concerns for years. 

Now, he is suddenly taking a hardline stance with the city’s CUPE members in the municipal labour force. 

“CUPE will not hold our city hostage,” he posted on social media. “This is unacceptable when CUPE was offered a fair, multi-year deal identical to the Mississauga agreement.”

In a response, one commenter pushed back against the mayor, blaming Brown for the current service disruptions.

“CUPE is not holding the city hostage; YOU are. Go back to the bargaining table and pay our workers so we can get our vital city services running again,” the user commented. “City management gives themselves a 6% raise, but the workers are being offered 1%; it’s ridiculous.”

Gazzola raised concerns with Brown’s claims.

“It’s unfortunate that the mayor is using Mississauga as an example, but cherry picking their situation for scenarios that are not comparable to Brampton.” Gazzola explained that contract increases being quoted by Brown from the neighbouring city do not, in many cases, include other benefits Mississauga’s CUPE members achieved recently when workers demanded and received wage adjustments as well as the economic increase. 

“During the same time span management in Brampton added 65 non-union positions in the last five years, at a much higher rate of pay and benefit contributions compared to union members.”

While Brown described CUPE’s requests as “holding the city hostage” he didn’t say a word this past Friday when Peel’s police chief demanded a 21.3 percent increase to its operating budget for 2025 (after a 14 percent increase last year) with the mayor even saying he wanted to see a much higher amount to be covered by Brampton’s taxpayers.

Meanwhile he has publicly stated Brampton residents should prepare for a long CUPE strike, which union members said was a bad faith move by Brown.

Gazzola stressed that the last thing his members want is to cause any hardship for Brampton residents, and that’s why efforts by CUPE have been made repeatedly over the last 10 months, but management failed to address the challenges for his members including the lack of fair compensation. Now, Brown is trying to suggest the strike could last a long time, a tactic to shift blame after failing to address problems management could have easily avoided by coming to the table.

In a press release from the City, officials announced Brampton Transit will be the hardest-hit service during the CUPE strike, warning residents to expect significant delays and disruptions. Transit riders are urged to consider alternative travel options, while the City assures that emergency services will remain fully operational as a priority throughout the strike.

CUPE employees on strike outside Brampton City Hall protesting unfair wages and benefits, compared to managers.

(Muhammad Hamza/The Pointer)

Since April 1, CUPE Local 831 workers for the office/outside, Professional Technical and temporary units have been without a contract, despite submitting nine proposals over 25 days to reach a fair agreement.

The union leaders stated in a press release that the City had demonstrated a "lack of urgency" in responding to their demands. Frustrated by the gridlock, CUPE filed a "No Board" report with the Ministry of Labour, setting the stage for a legal strike.

The Union’s local leaders are also pushing for a first contract for new employees in transit, supervisory, and service delivery roles. Despite 18 months of discussions with the City and 16 rounds of proposals, these positions also remain without a deal.

According to the City of Brampton website, transit is not the only department that will see disruptions as a result of the CUPE strike:

• The Building Division is operating with reduced services and the Brampton Building and Business Portal is temporarily unavailable for applying for permits or booking inspections. 
• Brampton will not be reviewing building permit applications.
• Enforcement and Bylaw services is operating with reduced services with responses focused on “vital services and safety-related complaints”. 
• Some recreation centres may be closed or operating with reduced hours. 

Sources have told The Pointer that under Brown there has been a concerted effort to shift positions away from the union. 

Gazzola shared examples like the $6.8 million taxpayer-funded tennis bubble for a private tennis club, which had contracts handed over to the club that restricts public access and includes costly winter maintenance work by outsourced services. These decisions fail to serve Brampton’s best interests, he said, and create a lack of transparency.

"You talk about accountability, but no one can deliver public services better than CUPE, whether it's the quality or whether it's costs," Gazzola said.

“Most recently, for example, the city spent $6.8 million in taxpayer money for a tennis bubble over on Church Street, and yet they flipped it over to a private company, Premier Racquet Clubs, to operate it. And yet, the public can only play tennis if they're a member of this private club. So what about the kids? What about seniors? What about adults, right? It's just mind-boggling that the City (the taxpayer) funds $6.8 million, and the community (whose tax money is used) can't even use that facility.”

He said that instead of focusing on what is best for Brampton, Mayor Brown and his administration should explain why they are not managing City services properly and are choosing to outsource at higher costs and lower quality.

"From my personal opinion, I think it's because they're lazy and they're not capable of doing the jobs that they got," he told The Pointer. "But they get paid well, so I'm not sure why they can't manage and do what's right and what's in the best interest of Brampton."

He also questioned why the more than 150 vacant union positions are not being filled, explaining that the employees are not available in the community to deliver services taxpayers have paid for such as bylaw enforcement, park maintenance and snow removal. He wants to know what the City is doing with the funds taxpayers already provided but are not going to the employees that are supposed to be in those roles.

"They seem to use those vacancies to fund other projects. What I don't know is (why) taxpayers pay taxes for staff, and I would imagine they want the staff out there.” He highlighted one of many areas of service that is suffering, causing significant breakdowns across the city.

“We know there's significant challenges with bylaw enforcement."

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