In our most recent meetings with the employer (Nov. 15-17), your negotiating team drove an important point home to CBI: their over-reliance on casual positions isn’t good for front-line staff, and it isn’t good for clients. This is a widespread issue in the home care industry that employers must not ignore any longer.
Fortunately, for the first time since this round of bargaining began, CBI was receptive to our suggestion that we need more regular positions (filled on a seniority basis) and fairer schedules that give us the hours we need. Our proposed solution is a schedule based on a six-week averaging period, where the employer would be obligated to offer community-care staff a stable, average number of hours over a six-week period.
Right now, many of you are not getting the hours you need to pay your bills. Your income is unpredictable and unstable, which is alarming considering that most CBI clients, according to the company, need regular, long-term care. So, we are also proposing that the employer create regular part-time and full-time positions by re-distributing regular-client care hours across fewer staff.
Right now, CBI is trying to meet client needs by hiring more staff, but this is only creating more unstable positions. What we need is accountability from the employer. Community-care members are always on the road; we can’t see if CBI is actually giving assignments based on seniority or giving each employee the hours they need to survive.
While your negotiating team recognizes that home care is unique, that doesn’t give CBI the green light to keep us in perpetual uncertainty. Having regular positions (filled in order of seniority) combined with a six-week averaging period, would hold CBI to a standard, while still giving them maximum scheduling flexibility.
Hours worked should be hours paid
The employer could do a much better job of bunching clients together. Too often we find ourselves in one of two states: either rushing from one side of the city to the other with zero seconds to spare, or working long days with huge gaps of time between clients, so we only get paid for a small window of that working time.
Our community-care members meet clients where they are. We accept that the unique nature of our jobs sometimes requires a stop-start workday, or work week, but the employer can minimize the imbalances by bunching clients together better.
Moving Forward
CBI is at least starting to see things from our front-line perspective. For the first time since bargaining started, they committed to working towards regularizing scheduling for a significant portion of the bargaining unit. When we resume bargaining, they will provide proposals that address our priorities in a number of key areas, including:
- Hours of work
- Overtime
- Job postings (critical for Casuals who deserve a clear path forward to improve their position and stability within the company)
- Seniority
- Vacation
On Jan. 19 & 20 and on Feb. 9, 10, 22 & 23, your negotiating team will meet with CBI to continue our discussions and keep pushing for more regular schedules. Please continue to inform us of the problems you encounter with these current schedules; hearing from you reminds us why our bargaining demands are so important. Christine Wells, CBI Senior Regional Director, has also confirmed that you can email your supervisor and address any drop in your hours or a lack of hours with them. Please also cc. AUPE membership Services Officer Ben Kanee in these emails (b.kanee@aupe.org).
This is how we can keep our foot on the gas pedal and ensure the employer hears us. However, the only real solution to the problem of work hours is better contract language, and to achieve that we need to do more mass mobilizing. Please come out to our online monthly mobilizing meetings on the last Thursday of every month. The next one is Thursday, Nov. 25 at 7pm. Contact a member of your bargaining committee for the meeting link!
CBI HOME HEALTH NEGOTIATING TEAM MEMBERS:
Tina Laforce 587-335-2292 or cruisin4u2@shaw.ca
Susan Kyle 780-984-8355 or susankyle872@yahoo.ca
Alternates: Jean Lehune 780-221-4080 or mjlehune@gmail.com (also speaks Tagalog)
Rachel Darkoa 780-893-1774 or racheldk@hotmail.com (also speaks Twi)
AUPE RESOURCE STAFF:
Merryn Edwards Negotiator, 780-952-1951 or m.edwards@hotmail.com
Tracy Noble Organizing, 306-304-2859 or t.noble@aupe.org
Celia Shea Communications Officer, 780-720-8122 or c.shea@aupe.org