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Government must respect patients and frontline workers transitioning to one health authority

"We want to work together to ensure that frontline workers, the services they provide, and the people they care for are not negatively affected during the transition to one massive health region." — Bob Bymoen, SGEU President

Regina (31 March 2017) — Saskatchewan’s 3 health care unions, Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), Service Employees International Union (SEIU-West) and the Saskatchewan Government and General Employees' Union (SGEU/NUPGE), have been collaborating on a proposal to present to government that would mitigate the impact on patient, client and resident care while the government transitions to one provincial health authority. This proposal calls for a formal bargaining council structure to help stabilize labour relations and negotiate with the new authority.

Bargaining councils provide structure to negotiate with several unions

"We want to work together to ensure that frontline workers, the services they provide, and the people they care for are not negatively affected during the transition to one massive health region,” said Bob Bymoen, President of SGEU. “We hope that our government shares this view and will work with our proposal to ensure this is a seamless transition for everyone.”

This proposal is not unique, as other health care employers and governments in Canada have similar agreements in place such as multi-union bargaining councils in British Columbia (since 1998) and in Nova Scotia (since 2015) where health care unions and government agreed to a similar structure.

Health care workers want to minimize disruption on patients

Under the current structure, people accessing health care services have witnessed the results of short staffing in acute, long-term and home care situations. For a decade, health care providers have been calling on the government to reinstate safe staffing levels. No one is confident that moving to one provincial health authority will ease health care providers’ workload or stress.

“We believe that going this route will minimize disruptions in service and ease anxiety that is being felt by health care providers across the province,” said Barbara Cape, President of SEIU-West. “We already do negotiate at a common bargaining table for many elements of our contracts.”

Many questions remain on direction for health care

Since the provincial government released its budget on March 22, many questions regarding health care funding remain. How will the actual changes to health care funding, and the additional funds from the federal government, improve the delivery of valuable public health services in Saskatchewan?

“We want the government to respect our members and their current collective agreements and rights,” said Gordon Campbell, President of CUPE Health Care Council. “Recognizing the existing union jurisdictions will lend balance to labour relations that supports the continuity of care provision within the new health region structure.”