(Montreal) The FIQ and the other unions representing nurses file a complaint in court against the government against the repeated use of ministerial decrees to regulate their working conditions.
This is a complaint of obstruction of trade union activities, based on the Labor Code, filed before the Administrative Labor Tribunal.
The plaintiffs are the trade unions which had denounced in unison the “government by ministerial decrees” on November 8. The FIQ and the FIQP (private) are particularly concerned, since they represent more than 90% of nursing assistants in Quebec.
Ministerial decrees allow clauses in collective agreements, for example, to be suspended or to impose working conditions.
Under the rules that govern employers and unions, working conditions are supposed to be negotiated between the parties, which includes wages, bonuses and the like. Unions are what are called “bargaining agents” for the working conditions of their members.
The Labor Code specifically prohibits an employer from obstructing the activities of an “association of employees”, of a trade union.
During their press conference on November 8, these unions, for example, denounced the famous bonus of $ 15,000 offered to nurses to work full-time in the public sector and, above all, the strict conditions attached to it and which means that a nurse can lose her premium if she does not meet all of these conditions. This bonus and these conditions were not negotiated between the parties.
The Minister of Health and Social Services Christian Dubé had also responded to this exit, accusing the unions of being more interested in what union representatives receive this premium, rather than encouraging nurses to accept it. .
“Ignoring collective agreements and labor law and stubbornly deciding unilaterally, without the echo from the field: that’s enough! For us, only consultation is a guarantee of success, with all due respect to the minister ”, affirm the five trade union organizations in a joint press release explaining the filing of their complaint in court.
The complainants are, in addition to the FIQ (Interprofessional Health Federation), the Health Federation affiliated to the CSQ, the Health and Social Services Federation affiliated to the CSN, the Quebec Union of Service Employees (SQEES ) affiliated with the FTQ and the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) affiliated with the FTQ.