Friday, December 16, 2022

The Pandemic Hangover

Despite strong promises from provincial and federal governments that our healthcare heroes would not be forgotten, these members’ frustration and disappointment with the system continue to grow.

Guide Magazine

By Ian DeWaard, Ontario Director

I think back often to spring 2020 when our lives were first disrupted by travel shutdowns and isolation requirements—something we believed might last a few weeks. As we approach the three-year anniversary of the global COVID-19 outbreak, the after-effects of the pandemic continue to shape and alter the workplaces of our members.

This is no less true for our work as a labour union. Safety as well as fair treatment for workers continue to inform much of our advocacy, as does building proper plans for rebuilding and restoring relationships that were severed or impeded while the virus raged through our workplaces.

A lingering challenge for CLAC is the number of COVID-19 vaccine-related grievances that remain outstanding. Unlike other unions, CLAC decided quickly that it would support members whose livelihoods were jeopardized by vaccine mandates. Recent cases have only muddied the waters as to what arbitrators and the courts might do with the claims of terminated and suspended workers.

For our part, we’ve selected four test cases, each with unique features. One such case (a company-wide policy grievance) was decided in spring 2022 in favour of the employer. But that outcome left more questions than answers.

In the meantime, we hold dozens of grievances in abeyance while we advance these test cases, and while we wait for a consistent and reliable outcome from arbitrators. Increasingly clear is that most of the hard-line vaccine policies become less sensible, and more inconsistent, especially in view of the incredible staffing shortages faced in the healthcare sector.

No less a struggle is the ongoing mess of a payroll system long term care operator Revera launched more than two years ago. Reviewing remittances and responding to member complaints about lost vacation pay, missed pension contributions, improper wage rates, and unreported sick time has consumed incalculable hours from CLAC representatives, pension staff, and our legal team. This fall, we intend to take the amassed evidence of ongoing errors and mistakes back to the arbitrator to make one final push for an order to compel a company-wide third-party audit.

Over the summer, the United Steel Workers (USW) attempted to raid (or displace) CLAC at two sizeable workplaces, Holland Christian Homes and Tabor Manor. Our staff and stewards at both these care homes did an excellent job counteracting the hollow and misleading claims of USW, and in both cases, members elected to remain with CLAC.

A consistent factor in much of the raid activity we’ve faced in the last year is the sheer frustration and disappointment experienced by front-line healthcare workers, who are stuck in a system that remains woefully underresourced. From their vantage point, there has been little change or improvement to their work-life during or since the pandemic—despite strong promises from provincial and federal governments that these heroes would not be forgotten. When the machinery of the healthcare system appears so rigid and resistant to reasonable solutions, workers rightfully get very, very frustrated.

The pandemic impeded our ability to be physically present with members as they wrestled with impossible, and sometimes inhumane, working conditions. This separation from each other has only made worse their sense of isolation and abandonment.

To counteract the sense of disempowerment, and to demonstrate the strength that is achieved when we use our many voices in service to one clear message, CLAC staff and members have orchestrated two recent province-wide campaigns. The first demonstrated the hardship experienced by front-line homecare workers and was reported on in the last issue of the Guide.

A second, the Make It Fair campaign, began this fall and is directed at the corporations that operate Ontario’s growing number of retirement homes. Workers in this space, who are already paid significantly less than their counterparts in hospitals and long term care facilities, are attempting to bring attention to the wage disparity and to the paltry 1.5 to 2 percent wage increases on offer.
In the face of inflationary costs exceeding seven to eight percent and other private-sector workplaces offering four to eight percent single-year increases, CLAC has developed campaign materials and support that will enable workers to pressure these employers in their local communities and at their places of employment.

Healthcare bargaining in the coming season will be difficult, for the reasons cited above. There is growing unrest among workers in classifications who received no wage enhancement during or after the pandemic (housekeepers, laundry aides, cooks, dietary aids). Many of these workers have continued to work under the one-percent wage cap of Bill 124. Even workers not subject to that wage cap legislation are experiencing increases of only 1.5 percent.

These factors, in addition to the dismay and exhaustion of having worked through pandemic conditions, will undoubtedly lead to frustrated contract negotiations in the coming months. The CLAC representatives responsible for negotiations, as well as the union’s research team that supports our interest arbitration efforts, are preparing for an onslaught of cases in the coming 18 months.

In this work, we hear routinely from opposing legal counsel and arbitrators that CLAC brings punch and sophistication to its interest arbitration briefs and arguments. While the work is daunting, we are well positioned for these cases, with much credit due to the expert leadership of CLAC’s Research Team.

The shock and reverberations of the pandemic on your work-life remain very much front of mind for our union. Ontario needs a seismic shift in how care is resourced in hospitals, long term care facilities, retirement homes, and homecare. Much still needs to be done to ensure that working in healthcare is rewarding and attractive to current and future workers.

The Pandemic Hangover

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