Matthew Vanner

I’m a family person from rural Ontario who’s worked in National Defence as an IT for 20+ years and I am currently a team lead for desktop support technicians.  I have a wide variety of experience working on behalf of members as a PIPSC steward and activist.

15 years ago, I started in PIPSC with the DND National Consultation Team under the mentorship of Glenn Maxwell. Together we developed and delivered training for DND stewards that is now delivered to all PIPSC Consultation Teams.  As a current National VP of DND Consultation, I help lead a highly effective & organized team of 200+ stewards.

In 2020 I was a member of the PIPSC delegation for the Canadian Labour Congress lobby day and met with politicians to discuss the federal minimum wage, pension protections, and other important labour issues.

Later in 2020, as a direct result of my consultation work with the Director of Classification on the CS to IT conversion, I was offered a 1 year acting assignment to work within HR in DND.  That opportunity gave me invaluable practical knowledge of HR, classification, and management practices that I now use to support our members.

In the latest round of bargaining, I was chosen by the IT Executive to be a member of the IT Bargaining Team and also represented the IT Group on the PIPSC Central Table Bargaining Team.  As a result of that work, I’m now serving on the IT Training Fund Steering Committee and PIPSC\TBS Joint Consultation Committee reviewing the TBS Telework Directive.  I believe that work is work regardless of location and employer policies should not only allow, but also enable and promote telework across the government.

At the local level, I was NCR-Petawawa Branch President for 10 years and am currently the Treasurer.  I have recruited and mentored stewards and other executive members.  I’m privileged to have helped many members through their workplace issues with both informal resolution and grievances.

I find all this important work exciting and enjoy contributing my ideas, effort, and time to the union.  Work has changed and members’ lives and priorities have changed and the IT Group and PIPSC must evolve and adapt to meet the needs of the members in new ways or become irrelevant.  The pandemic taught us that the union must become far more agile to be able to address unexpected and changing challenges.  Most importantly I want to close the gap between our members and the executive so that it is easy for members to hear from and be heard by their group.