(Quebec) The explosion in the use of agencies at the CISSS de la Côte-Nord is an “extremely worrying[e] » and « dangerous[se] “Which could lead to” service cuts “, deplore two health unions. They accuse management of having “lost control” and are calling for the establishment of an emergency task force.
Posted at 6:27 p.m.
The Fédération de la santé du Québec (FSQ) and the Syndicat des interveners de la santé du Nord-Est québécois (SIISNEQ-CSQ) denounce a “situation out of control” at the CISSS de la Côte-Nord which is going “straight towards a wall “. The anticipated deficit of the health establishment should reach 65 million for the current year, of which more than 65% is attributable to the use of agencies, reported The Press Saturday.
“When it is made that it is the members of the management themselves who report, in the media, their deficient management, it shows how badly things are going,” writes the president of the SIISNEQ-CSQ, Nathalie Savard. , in a press release. The union points out that 140 nursing and nursing assistant positions have been cut over the past two years.
“We are eliminating positions in our public network and we are spending tens of millions of public money to fatten private agencies,” adds Ms.me Savard. According to her, the difficult situation in which the CISSS de la Côte-Nord finds itself stems more from “poor management” of the establishment.
“We are talking about solutions such as the creation of a public workforce agency, to have recourse to fly in, fly out, but have we asked ourselves the question: why we have come to this ? “, asks in interview Mme Savard, who regrets that the union is not involved in the search for solutions. “We are no longer listened to in the health network, we are set apart,” she says.
The CISSS de la Côte-Nord did not wish to react to the statements of the unions on Monday.
The two labor organizations are requesting an emergency meeting with the CISSS de la Côte-Nord and the Ministry of Health and Social Services (MSSS). A proposal supported by the FSQ which calls for the establishment, for the Côte-Nord, of a joint working group.
“There is an urgent need to act. When I see that it’s pretty much all independent labor (ME) on the unit, where is the care stability? “, worries the president of the FSQ-CSQ, Isabelle Dumaine. “Particularly for this case, the government and the CISSS de la Côte-Nord have every interest in sitting down with us to find quick solutions in a fairly urgent manner,” she says in an interview.
According to the unions, Quebec must “rebuild more humane job structures, as existed before the Barrette reform, at a time when collaboration with the unions was real and sincere”. Mme Savard also wonders whether the CISSS Côte-Nord – whose facilities were merged in 2015 – is not too big when it serves a territory of 1,300 kilometers.
It is also necessary to put in place solutions so that the employees of the network choose to stay there and avoid creating “two classes of employees” with the use of agencies.
Towards the end of the bonuses
The unions deplore in the same breath that the Quebec state is spending “without counting” to use private agencies while the government is preparing to end the bonuses offered to workers in the public network on May 14. Minister Christian Dubé said last week, during the study of the budgetary appropriations of his department, that he had no intention of granting a new deadline.
Quebec had extended the bonuses related to COVID-19 by a month last April as the sixth wave swept through the network. Mr. Dubé indicated that the epidemiological situation no longer justified maintaining these premiums. This raises fears of the worst for the unions as the summer vacation period approaches.
“One of the advantages of the ME is that you give the availability that you want to give. The ME people take six or eight weeks of vacation in the summer. It’s not something that doesn’t exist. So, who will provide care this summer? It’s worrying, ”raises Mme Dumaine.