May 16, 1997
(Works, Services and Transportation)
Government and NAPE announce new direction with
respect to provision of highway maintenance operations
Lloyd Matthews, Minister of Works Services and Transportation,
and Dave Curtis, President of the Newfoundland and Labrador
Association of Public Employees, today announced that the
department, in conjunction with NAPE, will take a new direction
with respect to provision of highway maintenance and snow
clearing operations on the Avalon Peninsula next winter.
Earlier this week, the minister met with Mr. Curtis and
explored with him the main thrust of the privatization project.
Following that meeting, the department submitted a new proposal
to NAPE which offered to cease any further work on privatizing
its highways operations in favour of an alternate pilot project.
Mr. Matthews said: "I am pleased that this alternate
pilot project is acceptable to the Newfoundland Association of
Public Employees. It will see a joint management-employee
committee work together to identify a reasonable degree of
substantive savings in the form of productivity and service
improvements in our operations."
Mr. Curtis said: "We are pleased that the provincial
government has agreed to participate in this new initiative with
NAPE. We believe that jointly government and NAPE members can
continue to meet the objective of providing quality highway
maintenance in the most efficient manner without the necessity of
privatization.
"We have worked hard in conjunction with our members to
demonstrate that a new and innovative method of doing business is
best for the taxpayers, the employees and government. We look
forward to working on this project and we believe that the
success of the project may well serve as a model for other
government departments and agencies. We offer our congratulations
to the minister and government for being willing to move in new
directions which demonstrate a spirit of cooperation and
innovation."
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