Accept offer or else, Hydro One says

TORONTO, ONTARIO - Hydro One says it will lock out about 1,000 engineering and professional employees at the end of April if they don't accept a contract offer lengthening the workweek and cutting the pay scale for future employees.

The company, owned by the provincial government, has applied to the Ontario Labour Relations Board to force a vote on its latest offer to the Society of Energy Professionals.

Hydro One owns and operates the long-distance electricity transmission wires that carry power from generating stations to local hydro installations.

The society represents engineers, accountants and other professionals, including staff at Hydro One's main control centre near Barrie.

Hydro One is offering a three-year contract, with wage increases of 3 per cent each year. Current employees average about $85,000 a year, but can earn more with overtime.

Under the offer, future employees would start at a wage grid set about 10 per cent lower than the grid for existing employees, said society spokesperson Michelle Duncan.

In addition, all staff represented by the society would see their regular workweek extended to 39 hours from the current 35 hours, with no pay increase beyond the annual 3 per cent.

In a letter to society staff, president and CEO Tom Parkinson said the offer is "fair, balanced and reasonable."

A question and answer sheet accompanying the letter says the reduction in pay for new employees still leaves Hydro One "very competitive with other companies. We are confident we will have no trouble attracting excellent staff."

Salaries have been a flashpoint for Hydro One executives. Former chief executive Eleanor Clitheroe was fired after opposition politicians (including the now-governing Liberals) railed about her $2.2 million a year pay package and generous perks.

Parkinson is paid less, but his pay jumped 35 per cent last year, to $1,475,923.

The company warns its staff not to expect a better offer than the one on the table.

"If through the final offer vote process you and your colleagues ... reject Hydro One's final offer, you will be locked out on or shortly after the first legal date for a lockout," Parkinson says in his letter, signed "Tom."

"Any subsequent offer will not be better than the current offer," the question and answer sheet adds.

The two sides are in a legal strike or lockout position April 27.

Duncan said the society wants the government, as shareholder, to intervene in bargaining.