Even though public health orders have been lifted effective July 11, 2021 in Saskatchewan, we all should remember that the pandemic is not ‘over’.
The reality is there is a portion of the population who are not vaccinated, there are low testing numbers, and there are rising concerns about new COVID Variants, so we need to remain cautious.
At the time of this message being posted, The Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA) still requires masking in all of their facilities.
The SHA and other employers are working on their reopening plans, as are we, and we will provide updates as they become available.
For now, the main offices remain closed to the public and anyone entering is required to wear masks and follow office safety protocols, Unit SEIU-West offices must continue to follow the safety guidelines put in place, and we are not holding in-person events.
These measures are being taken with the view to keep our members and staff safe and we will continue to take our guidance from the provincial pandemic reports, recommendations from the World Health Organization and the Public Health Agency of Canada.
These next days and weeks will be freeing without the requirement to wear masks in public.
However, we recommend that you do an assessment of the risks before you go without your mask:
We will keep our COVID webpage live and updated as we make efforts to implement a cautious return to normal operations in our offices.
Members are invited to use our website contact form with any alerts or concerns over the coming weeks and months.
If you are an SEIU-West member who works for the Sask Health Authority please see the memo below for the annual vacation process for cohorted employees. You can also click here for the previous memo on the extension of annual vacation timelines.
For Immediate Release - May 27, 2020
Saskatoon – The members of SEIU-West were happy to hear that the Ministry of Health and the Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA) were responding to concerns raised about the closure of emergency rooms (ERs) in a number of rural communities.
For Immediate Release, May 26, 2020
Saskatoon – SEIU-West leaders are pleased that the Ministry of Health (MoH) and the Saskatchewan Health Authority (SHA) have extended their agreement with the five health care unions to a set of shared health and safety principles in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.
For those working in the SHA, please read the following information – if you have issues resulting from this product change, please report the issue to your Occupational Health Committee (OHC) and use the SHA intranet site to log a product issue report.
As many of you will have seen, SEIU-West has sent out a joint call with CUPE and SGEU for our provincial government to establish recognition pay to health care workers for the incredible work being done during this pandemic. It’s important to recognize the extraordinary efforts that are being put into place right now, along with the skill and effort that each health care worker brings to the workplace every single day… regardless of the COVID-19 pandemic.
SEIU-West encourages health care providers to participate in a 3-minute on-line survey which focuses on employer communications, access to PPE, and mental health supports during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The survey was designed by Dr. Sean Tucker, an OHS researcher at the University of Regina, in collaboration with our union and other healthcare unions.
The purpose of the survey is to provide information to SEIU-West, the Saskatchewan Health Authority, and the Saskatchewan Association for Safe Workplaces in Health, with the goal being to improve health care worker health and safety during the pandemic. We anticipate the survey will be offered every 4 months or so. Findings will be shared with members.
In appreciation of your participation, Dr Tucker has provided an opportunity for you to enter a draw for 1 of 50 $10 Tim Hortons gift cards.
For more information about the survey and to participate, please follow this link: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/77CFT9K
SEIU-West is strongly supporting member participation in the survey.
Dear Honourable Premier Moe,
I am unsure if you are aware that CCAs in long term care, in many facilities, are working everyday with staff shortages, some are planned and some are unplanned. CCAs play an important role in providing quality of life to our seniors who are residents.
We provide personal care (this includes getting people up, bathing residents, personal hygiene needs, feeding assists & so many other care tasks) and most of the time we are rushed to do so, not because we want to get it done quickly, but because our help is continuously needed by others in wait.
In some circumstances, we are unable to attend to all of our residents. Did you know that we have CCAs who are required to work alone (for portions of a shift) to provide care in some instances? This is unsafe when it comes to Transfer, Lift and Reposition of residents. We also work alone on our night shifts. This is unacceptable! For some reason, the SHA has approved this.
How come we are alone while having the responsibility to take care of others? What if something happens to us, who helps us? Who helps those people if no one knows something happened to us? What if we can’t call for help in some kind of emergency situation? Unpredictability is always an ongoing concern in our line of work; some residents become agitated and can become violent. This is not a “Zero tolerance” workplace for hazards that have the potential to occur. Where is the OH and S priority and why is there no oversight to ensure that safe care is the priority?
You should also know that we now have cooking and cleaning added to our job duties. This is not because we have spare time to do these extra duties. And we have never received a pay grade upgrade for the added duties. This is simply so that the employer can eliminate the jobs that previously provided support in the care environment...and it was done to save money.
The health facility planning involved our positions providing personal care, and we are expected to cook the food ”restaurant style” with multiple different kinds of meals for people if they do not wish to eat the meal selected for us to cook and serve to the whole house. We also are responsible to take into account the different diets and textures; as well we are expected to provide at a temperature regulated rate. This is beyond stressful and not always realistic but that's just how that goes.
We need higher wages and we need more staff. We need to make sure transfers & lifts are always involving two persons. You need to fund long term care like you care about our seniors who are residents and bring more staff on the floor to improve their quality of life. We also need our support staff positions returned so that we have cooks, food service workers and environmental services workers. We are over-worked and underpaid; our residents need more time spent with them, not less. We need you to fix our underfunding crisis.
Finally, we have had no contract for 4 years - it's time to use your authority to ensure that we receive a fair offer from SAHO so that we can get an increase from our 2016 rates of pay.
Make this a priority. Our residents and my co-workers cannot wait any longer.
Respectfully,
Brett Berger
