Settlement ends Lanark ACL strike
A ten-week strike at the Lanark County Community Living Association ended September 10, when CUPE 1521.02 members ratified a two year contract.
The strike began July 4.
The contract expands RRSP coverage to all employees, removes management’s contracting-out proposals, and commits management to flow ministry funding earmarked for workers in 2007.
Paul Moist in Thunder Bay for Labour Day
Paul Moist spoke to a crowd of Thunder Bay area union supporters at a Labour Day picnic about the recession and employment insurance.
“What I want to know is why over 60% of workers who pay into EI cannot access its benefits,” Moist said. “We are still in a recession and workers should have access to the fund they paid into, whenever they need it.”
Moist also called for more secondary production in the forestry sector and pension protection for workers whose companies go bankrupt.
New video for BC paramedics
BC’s striking ambulance paramedics have released a new video to make their case to the public.
“On strike to save lives” features some compelling interviews with members of CUPE Local 873 who have been on strike since April 1, 2009.
Under the province’s essential services legislation, paramedics must stay on the job and limit their pickets to administrative facilities only.
Visit www.cupe.ca/paramedics/873-strike-save-lives.
CUPE activists win 2009 Nova Scotia Workplace Education Ambassador Awards
CUPE Nova Scotia education activists have been awarded three of this year’s Workplace Education Ambassador Awards.
The awards acknowledge individual and group achievements in promotion and participation in workplace education programs.
• The 2009 Champion is the Glades Lodge Project Team – CUPE local 1259 (co-winner);
• The 2009 Alex McDonald Winner is Barbara Sutherland-Foote of CUPE Local 759 - Outside Workers, Cape Breton Regional Municipality;
• The Workplace Participant Winner is Heather Bryanton of CUPE Local 2525 - Clerical Union, Colchester Hants Health Authority.
CUPE Nova Scotia President Danny Cavanagh says, “I offer my sincere congratulations to these members. They have worked hard to achieve their goals and equally hard to help others achieve theirs.”
Ottawa patient transfer workers looking for first contract
Drivers and patient monitors at Travois Medical Transfer in Ottawa are days away from a strike over their first contract.
The 60 members of CUPE Local 4000 monitor patients and move them by ambulance between hospitals and other health care facilities in Eastern Ontario.
They’re in bargaining for their first contract, trying to change a workplace where the employer has demanded sixty hour work weeks and refused to pay overtime.
They’re looking for a reasonable wage and decent working conditions.
For more information, visit www.cupe.ca/action/travois
HEU welcomes more than 400 new members
HEU is 400 members stronger after hundreds of licensed practical nurses, care aides, hospital security guards, housekeepers, activity aides, clerical, dietary, laundry and maintenance workers voted to join HEU over the past few weeks.
In late August, More than 100 care aides, licensed practical nurses, activity coordinators, clerical and maintenance workers employed by Retirement Concepts at Kamloops Seniors Village joined the union.
Earlier in the summer, 139 health care workers employed by Osprey Care at The Hamlets in Penticton also joined HEU.
Care staff and support workers at the Nicola Valley Residence/The Florentine, an assisted living and complex care site in Merritt, also voted to become HEU members this past spring.
In early September, 150 hospital security guards at 14 acute care sites in the Fraser Health Authority won a year-long battle to join HEU.
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