CUPE 4000 rejects Travois’s offer
Sixty CUPE 4000 members at Travois Medical Transfer in Ottawa have turned down the employer’s final offer and are in a legal strike position.
The union agreed to put the employer’s September 16 offer to a membership vote. Two thirds voted against it.
CUPE 4000 President Bruce Waller said “At $11 an hour, we can easily say that our members don’t receive fair treatment for the work they do. We are simply fighting for liveable wages and decent working conditions.”
The union said it’s willing to go back to the table and hopes to avoid a service disruption.
A win for the people of Beloeil
Another public-private partnership (P3) may get wiped off the map, this time on Montreal’s South Shore.
This week, the residents of Beloeil came to City Hall to sign a petition demanding a referendum on a controversial proposal to build a recreation center using a P3. The response was overwhelming: no fewer than 1,080 people came out; twice what is required to force a vote.
Scrapped P3 meter contract bypassed city workers
Part of the scandal that’s engulfed a P3 water contract in Montreal is the money spent on contracting out jobs the city’s own workers could have done.
The city of Montreal’s auditor has issued a devastating report that spells the end for a scandal-plagued P3 water meter contract. In his report, the auditor says CUPE municipal workers could have done some of the work in-house.
The city paid to train and accredit hundreds of plumbers from private firms. But Michel Parent, the president of CUPE 301, says the city’s outside workers could have been trained and accredited to plan for, install, and maintain the meters.
Mayor Gerard Tremblay cancelled the contract – the largest the city had ever signed – this week.
Leaked report shows Alberta Premier misled seniors
Alberta’s conservative Premier Ed Stelmach government’s refusal to build more long term care beds is causing a crisis in seniors’ care, Dennis Mol said this week.
The CUPE Alberta President was commenting on a leaked government report planning the closure of long term care beds.
“Our members who work in long term care tell me that there are not enough spaces or enough staff to care for Alberta seniors,” said Mol. “Plans by the Stelmach government to build non-care spaces, and make seniors pay more for them are frankly heartless.”
Saskatchewan hospital employer’s monetary offer “insulting”
Negotiators for 25,000 Saskatchewan health care workers say the long awaited monetary offer from their employer, the Saskatchewan Association of Health Organizations, falls short of other public sector settlements in the province.
“It’s hard to believe we’ve waited so long for so little,” says Gordon Campbell, president of the CUPE Health Care Council. “This type of second-class treatment is deeply insulting to our members.”
The low wage offer is on top of concession demands, which are still on the table.
CUPE’s Health Care Council represents 12,600 health care providers in five health regions. SEIU and SGEU represent the rest.
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