Health Care Support Services - Locals 413, 421 and 456 - Bargaining Brief

Updated: Jul 25, 2022
Approx. Number of Members: 3,025
Current Contract Expires: March 31, 2017
MGEU Staff Negotiator: Angela Bouchard
Elected Bargaining Committee Members: Shelly Rougeau, Local President, Interlake-Eastern, Local 413 Tanis Chwartacki, Chief Steward, Interlake-Eastern, Local 413 Robert Long, Chief Steward, Prairie Mountain, Local 421 Cora Meyer, Local President, Prairie Mountain, Local 456 Marilyn McIntyre, Chief Steward, Prairie Mountain, Local 456

LATEST BARGAINING NEWS

The Health Care Support Services - Locals 413, 421 and 456 Bargaining Committee and the employer moved on to wages and benefits talks in March 2022.

The Committee recognizes that members are anxious to conclude this part of the process, but are committed to giving careful attention to these issues and taking the time necessary to negotiate the best collective agreement possible.  This includes a review of the many memorandums at the back of the collective agreements, as well as discussion and referral of certain issues to a “multi-union” table.

Overview of Bargaining So Far

The HCSS Bargaining Committee met with the employer committee in April 2021 to talk about bargaining and how to proceed after significant delays, including the representation votes and the global pandemic.

As a result of the representation votes, negotiations must include the merging of a number of existing contract provisions into one collective agreement which will apply to all members in the new bargaining units. Overseveral months, the Bargaining Committee worked hard to review all applicable collective agreements in preparation for this work.

The Committee and the employer agreed to begin discussing a number of issues which have to do with employment processes common to all current agreements (but may be different in each), as well as essential service agreements for those facilities still without such an agreement. Proposals on other issues, including wages and benefits, were held back until the employer shares their full proposal package.

However, before bargaining began in summer 2021, the Health Care Support Services Bargaining Committee decided to ask the membership for a strike mandate.

Other unions which had been at the table had been treated unfairly and the Committee had every reason to believe that our members would be treated this way as well. For example, seniority rights were threatened and the employer refused to talk about wages and benefits.

For this reason, support workers in other regions were also asked to provide their bargaining committee with a strike mandate.

Votes were cast electronically (online) or by phone and counted on August 31, 2021.  

Health Care Support Service and Community Support members in Interlake-Eastern RHA and Prairie Mountain Health delivered resounding strike mandates to their Bargaining Committees on August 31, 2021, authorizing them to take job action should it be warranted.

Essential Services Agreements were signed off and the Committee remains ready to take job action should it be necessary.   

The Health Care Support Services - Locals 413, 421 and 456  Bargaining Committee then began meeting again with the employer on a weekly basis, working through “non-monetary” items such as contract language and working conditions. This was a time-consuming process because a number of different collective agreements were being merged.
 

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