September 27, 2024
Sisters, Brothers, and Friends,
Your SEIU-West Bargaining Committee met with SAHO September 23-25 in Saskatoon to continue bargaining. The parties continued to discuss proposal packages they exchanged earlier in this round of bargaining.
Many of you have expressed how frustrated you are at how long bargaining is taking. Your Bargaining Committee shares your frustration. A main reason for the delay is that the Employer has not been willing or able to provide bargaining dates, nor has it responded to our proposals in a timely manner.
SAHO continues to stick to its original proposals. Quite simply, these proposals would gut your Collective Agreement. Hard-won Collective Agreement terms and conditions on matters like seniority, job security, and call-in would be weakened or eliminated, without any consideration or respect for all the members who would be affected. Your Union is maintaining the proposals that SEIU-West developed based on your feedback and bargaining surveys. What this means is that using the current bargaining process, SAHO and SEIU-West are not close to agreeing on contract language issues, let alone getting to a table to talk about the monetary proposals.
The Employer’s botched rollout of AIMS during this round of bargaining has not helped move us closer to an agreement. You have shared many examples of how you have been paying the price for the ballooning costs and Employer and government mismanagement of AIMS: payroll issues (such as inaccurate pay stub information), problems getting the equipment and supplies your unit needs, issues with education and training… All this has understandably undermined your trust in healthcare leadership.
Since the next confirmed bargaining dates are not until December, we are visiting our members across the province in October to talk about bargaining. We want to hear your stories and your frustrations. We want to make sure our members know what is at stake and what they can do to support our demand for a faster, better and fair bargaining process.
Why are we not going on strike? Because the Saskatchewan government has bound us to comply with the essential services rules in the Saskatchewan Employment Act (SEA). The SEA requires us to negotiate an essential services agreement with SAHO before we can take job action. The government has made it illegal for us to walk off the job until we can prove that we have reached an impasse with SAHO at the bargaining table, that a negotiated essential services agreement is in place, and that we have taken a vote of our affected members and received their approval to take job action.
A key event happening in the next month is the provincial election. This is a chance for us to demand answers from the people who control funding for healthcare. We need to ask candidates questions about what they are committing to do to make our lives better, to make sure we have a public healthcare system we can rely on, and to pay healthcare workers a wage that meets or exceeds the cost of living. We need to get out and vote in this election to send a clear message that healthcare workers deserve better!
Your participation in these events is crucial. We all need a collective agreement that pays a fair wage for the skills, abilities and professionalism we bring to our clients, patients and residents. The strength of the Union is in its members. We want to hear from you at our meetings and ask that you support the Bargaining Committee in its representation of your demands.
If you have collective agreement questions or issues, contact the Member Resource Center at 1-888-999-7348 ext 1, email [email protected], or complete the Contact Us form on our website, www.seiuwest.ca.
In Solidarity on behalf of the SEIU-West Bargaining Committee
Barbara Cape
President
SEIU-West
Your SEIU-West SAHO Provincial Bargaining Committee:
CHR: Janice Platzke (SEIU-West Treasurer) • FHHR: Brenda Berry, Barbara Bubyn • HHR: Colleen Denniss • SHR: Rhonda Bzdel, Chris Clark, Jeanne Javinal, Carla Saworski, Charlene Sarafin • Extendicare: Kevin Martin • Staff: Bob Laurie (Dir. of Bargaining and Contract Enforcement), Russell Doell (Deputy Dir. of Bargaining and Contract Enforcement • President: Barbara Cape
Click here for a printable version of this Bargaining Update
Don't forget your Bargaining Committee is hitting the road in October. We welcome you to participate in at least one of the meetings so you can get an update from and ask questions of your SEIU-West Bargaining Committee. Click here for a full list of dates and locations.
