Héma-Québec nurses and nursing assistants, members of the CSN and CSQ unions, demonstrated Sunday in Montreal and Quebec City to demand better working conditions.
These members of the Syndicate of nurses and nursing assistants of Héma-Québec (CSN) and the Union of nursing staff of Héma-Québec (SPI-CSQ) demand above all wage parity with their colleagues in the public network.
They have been without a contract for almost four years, according to their respective unions, and denounce “the lack of respect for their employer in the context of negotiations for the renewal of their collective agreement”.
According to Fannie Cloutier, vice-president of the SPI-CSQ, Héma-Québec is trying to “exit” nursing personnel from the network salary scale to establish its own scale, a change that would have “tremendous repercussions” for workers.
“On a nurse’s career salary, it can represent up to $11,000 in lost wages, but for a licensed practical nurse, it can go up to $72,000. Separating Héma-Québec nurses from the health network means that they are less qualified and that they work less hard than the others,” she said in an interview.
The vice-president added that the duties of the Héma-Québec nursing staff were similar to those of nurses in the community or school environment, in particular with regard to the compulsory overtime worked “on a recurring basis”.
The “lack of seriousness and availability” of Héma-Québec’s management party would explain, according to her, the slowness of the negotiations, which have been underway since September 2020. The unions have also been in conciliation since January 2022 due to negotiations which “no ‘were not advancing at all’.
Reached by telephone, Héma-Québec management described these remarks as “surprising” given the offers that are currently on the table.
According to Laurent Paul Ménard, director of public relations and outreach at Héma-Québec, the company’s salary scales “have never been the same as those of the health network”.
“If we look at the situation at Héma-Québec, seven nurses out of ten reach the maximum of the scale, and this maximum is exactly the same as that of the health network, he specified in an interview. […] There may be a misunderstanding of certain things on the union side, but the parties will have to sit down at the table and understand each other”.
CEO salary is divisive
According to the CSN and the SPI-CSQ, these nurses have received “no salary increase since 2018”, while “the chief executive of Héma-Québec had a salary increase of 30% between 2019 and 2020”, which the unions call it shocking in the circumstances.
A table posted on the Héma-Québec website following a request for information made on May 18, 2021 shows that the salary of “Senior Executive 1” went from $271,067 to $349,803 between 2019 and 2020, which represents an increase of 29%.
Héma-Québec, however, denied this allegation, arguing that the “Senior Executive 1” was not the first officer of the company, namely the President and Chief Executive Officer, Nathalie Fagnan.
“There was no nominal information put forward by the union party, but if we are talking about the President and Chief Executive Officer, the correct information is that the salary increase was 5% for the years 2019 to 2020,” said Mr. Ménard, pointing out that it was “completely risky to embark on an ad lib interpretation. “.
He also added that contrary to what the unions were saying, the negotiations were not “at a standstill”, and that the negotiation meetings were continuing “at a constant and sustained pace”.
The CSQ union has already held a four-day strike out of its 10-day mandate, Nancy Landry, president of the nursing staff union (CSQ), told The Canadian Press in a previous interview ten days ago. .
The CSN union was then evaluating the possibility of “getting itself a new strike mandate”, added Vanessa Poirier, president of the union of nurses and nursing assistants (CSN).
As this is the health sector, any strike would be subject to the essential services provisions of the Labor Code.
“We are not at all closed to selling what we have left of the 10 days. We would much rather not have to go on strike, but if the negotiations are not progressing, we will not be embarrassed to use the remaining 6 days,” concluded Fannie Cloutier.
This article was produced with the financial support of the Meta Fellowships and The Canadian Press for News.