Unionized health-care workers say their strike will help build a better future for Saskatchewan’ s ill and elderly.
Although they asked for more money and better pension benefits, workers in Humboldt, Sask., said they went on strike over workload and patient care.
At the special care home there, unionized workers felt action had to be taken to improve staffing. They complained about night shifts with six people looking after 101 residents in a care home, and day shifts where full-time workers are not replaced for their whole shifts when they are sick or on holidays.
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The workload issue was referred to arbitration.
Monica Jonas said the work at the St. Mary’ s Villa care home in Humboldt is fulfilling but exhausting.
Jonas, a special care worker, was on strike in the town of 6,000, “where everybody knows everybody,” which she said makes it especially hard to leave the job.
Jonas was one of about 170 Canadian Union of Public Employees that walked off the job in Humboldt.
“My mother and my sister are residents of St. Mary’ s,” she said in an interview before returning to work last weekend for her second evening shift since the end of the six-day strike.
Jonas’ sister and her family crossed the picket line along with CUPE members who were given picket passes to care for relatives in St. Mary’ s. This also happened at other facilities.
“When I walked back into the place I had one of the residents shout ‘My girls, my girls, you’ re back, you’ re back. You know we needed you.’ Most of the residents understood why we walked out,” said Jonas.
“We were told by volunteers (in one section of the home) coming off the night shift that the eight of them were worn ragged by the end of the shift. We had to tell them that those eight people replaced only two of us.”
CUPE said under staffing in most districts is taking its toll on members and has begun to affect patient care.
Jonas said she and her fellow workers don’ t blame local or district management. They say the province needs to better fund health care.
“What can they do? They don’ t have enough money to work with. Let the premier sit for 45 minutes when he really, really has to go to the bathroom, after he’ s already put it off for a while. Then let him imagine what it will be like at 85. That is reality in our homes today. We can’ t get to them faster than that. This is no way to treat our seniors. They deserve more respect than that. The people of Humboldt know that,” said Jonas.
Staff at the Humboldt care home said they returned to a resident population in need of baths and a facility that needed cleaning, but the community volunteers had done much of the work of looking after those in need of care.
The administration from the Central Plains health-care district did not respond to requests for an interview.
Steve Foley, president of the CUPE Health Care Council, said the strike succeeded on many fronts.
“We secured major pension plan improvements and a process to deal with the workload issue. Members also will have paid family days and parity with other health care workers by the end of the agreement.”
