Last week and over the weekend, Licensed Practical Nurses, Health Care Aides and many other health care workers represented by the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees at public facilities throughout the province voted 98 per cent in favour of striking if a collective agreement can’t be reached in mediation.
The vote result must still be certified by the Alberta Labour Relations Board, AUPE President Sandra Azocar told an Edmonton news conference called to announce the tally yesterday. “But they voted overwhelmingly in favour of strike action because they are fed up with stagnant wages and unsafe working conditions that hurt workers, patients and Alberta’s public health care system.”
“We’re ready to get back to the bargaining table,” said Ms. Azocar, who was elected as the president of Alberta’s largest union on Oct. 24. Meetings with a mediator are scheduled today, tomorrow, Saturday and Sunday, she told reporters, and AUPE can’t legally give 72 hours’ strike notice until Nov. 17. “Our members would rather do their jobs, but they are prepared to stand up for what they deserve and to take job action if necessary.”
More than 15,600 health care workers – also including rehabilitation care workers, mental health aides, psychiatric aides, physiotherapy assistants, operating room technicians and orthopedic technicians – would be impacted by the strike, which notwithstanding the existence of essential services agreements between the union and health care employers would have serious impacts on the operation of Alberta hospitals.
This puts Alberta’s United Conservative Government in an interesting and potentially perilous spot. UCP leaders have just discovered that using the Charter of Rights and Freedoms’ Notwithstanding Clause to bludgeon striking teachers back to work and forcing them to accept a contract 90 per cent of the teachers had rejected in a ratification vote was not nearly as popular with voters as they seem to have imagined it would be.
Premier Danielle Smith has just returned from a Middle Eastern junket that appears to have been scheduled at least in part to keep her from having to debate Opposition Leader Naheed Nenshi in the Legislature or answer too many questions about the government’s heavy-handed use of the Notwithstanding Clause to end the Alberta Teachers Association strike.
But before departing, she told reporters that her government’s move against the ATA was “a very specific action we’re taking in this specific instance. … So I don’t think people should draw some sort of general application that this is the approach that we would take in every instance of labour action.”
Now, facing another very specific situation with a different union, against which the government would have to pass separate back-to-work legislation, Ms. Smith won’t reassure many voters outside the UCP base if her government goes and does it again.
Still, Finance Minister Nate Horner told reporters at the Legislature yesterday that he wasn’t about to rule out using the Notwithstanding Clause again. “I’m hesitant to ever take anything totally off the table. It’s a tool that the government has.”
True, but it’s a tool that may be proving dangerous to use, let alone overuse, what with petitions to recall UCP MLAs popping up all over Alberta, forcing the government to consider another embarrassing climbdown by repealing or amending its recall and petition laws, which not long ago it was heralding as a great leap forward in democratic practice. (Ms. Smith told the Legislature yesterday the government hasn’t drafted recall legislation … yet.)
In response to questions from several journalists at the AUPE news conference, Ms. Azocar said AUPE refused to be intimidated by the government’s action against the teachers. “Any time that we have governments that violate the most basic rights that we all have as workers, it’s always something that you have to consider,” she explained. “But I think this vote sends a very clear message.”
Both Ms. Azocar and AUPE lead negotiator Kate Robinson warned that the sides remain far apart. “The employer is offering 12 per cent over four years in terms of wage increase, and they even have some rollbacks on the table, specifically to wages,” Ms. Robinson said. “We are simply seeking wages that represent the work that is being done in the workplace by these health care workers.
“It’s been a long time without any wage increases that reflect the scope of practice for both our health care aides and LPNs,” she continued. “The government did settle with the United Nurses of Alberta earlier this year and gave them a significant wage increase, and that just puts our members even further behind.” UNA represents mostly Registered Nurses and Registered Psychiatric Nurses, who are once again on average the highest paid nurses in Canada.
“For our proposal for LPNs, it is that they be paid 84 per cent of what an RN is paid, and that is consistent with their scope of practice and what they are allowed to do in the workplace,” Ms. Robinson said. In Alberta, she added, LPNs are paid 67 per cent of an RN’s wage, while in Manitoba they are paid 81 per cent. Alberta LPNs “are in seventh place” nationally, she said, and only 12 per cent over four years will just widen that gap.
But Mr. Horner, who can direct the employers’ negotiations through legislation allowing to government to issue secret mandates to public-sector employers, rejected the AUPE bargaining position out of hand in a statement on the Alberta Government website.
After saying “we deeply value” the important work done by LPNs, Mr. Horner quickly pivoted to saying they’re asking for way too much. “I encourage the union to reconsider its proposal and return to the bargaining table with an offer that is reasonable and fair,” he said.
After devoting about 325 words to making his case to the public, Mr. Horner concluded by saying, “out of respect for the bargaining process, I have no further comment at this time.”
Offer that is “reasonable and fair” meaning what we are offering as govt or nothing … that’s how he “bargained” with teachers , it is how he will “bargain” with AUPE too! There will be no bargaining in good faith just bullying and a slammed down settlement again – the hubris of this govt is astonishing and their lack of democratic process is as well- FIRE THE UCP !!!
Marlaina won’t hesitate to use the notwithstanding clause to trample workers’ rights. She despises unionized workers and there hasn’t been any serious blowback (yet) to her removal of teachers’ right to collective bargaining. Besides, if the heat gets turned up, she’ll just book another taxpayer-funded vacation to somewhere warm for a few weeks until it blows over. She will find a way to cancel the recall campaigns too if firing the election commissioner doesn’t work. I really hope the RCMP are investigating the corrupt care scandal and aren’t just ragging the puck like they did with the Kenney election fraud case (alleged).
Dingy Smith cannot be trusted to do what she says, so be prepared for another and another and another use of the notwithstanding clause. It is odd that the only one talking is little Nate Horner, so why are the health minister and education minister sitting on the sidelines? Has Nate taken over all labor negotiations? Funny how the narrative goes, “we have no money for teachers, nurses, vaccines or health care”, but somehow they do have $11m to give to Westjet, $8m for profitable companies to hire young people, $14m for a pipeline nobody wants, $186m to start a program to kick disabled people off AISH. It appears so far this recall campaign has not fazed Dingy, but we will see what happens once it gets a little more momentum.
OA: Mr. Horner has in fact taken over negotiations in the sense that the secret-mandates legislation means that he owns whatever happens whether or not he put his oar in. DJC
This is what 15 years of wage suppression gets you, a year of discontent in the labour market. The AB taxpayers need to understand us “public servants” have fallen behind the rate of inflation by > 30%, in that period of time. Not to mention this UCP government has made difficult jobs, even more difficult by spreading disinformation to their knuckle dragging base.
The Great Kons of the eighties made sure that “Alberta Taxpayers” are non-union and low-wage. They’re not concerned about erosion of public sector unionized wages. Everyone just needs to work their sixty hours per week so that they can buy their passive income rental fourplex.
Yet these fools have no problem wasting taxpayers money on trips abroad, filing friends pockets and settling lawsuits with the coal companies that they created. Talk about treating Albertans like idiots that’s what they are doing.
Alan K. Spiller: I feel like the UCP and Danielle Smith are just like Ralph Klein. So bad in every way.
As long as the UCP government sticks to its usual lines (12% for everyone now), we know they will do what we expect them to do: use the notwithstanding clause, use it generously, use it at every opportunity against everyone. Danielle Smith did not travel to Saudi Arabia for nothing.
Soon grandma don’t be able to go to church on Sunday. If you think it’s bad now, just wait until Rob Anderson uses Danielle Smith’s new sheriff-police to kick down doors and arrest people without cause under the notwithstanding clause. It could be worse…not really.
There’s three ways Dani can use this situation to her benefit. To start with, she’s already used “notwithstanding” to strike-break so that fear, and all future union actions must reckon with that as her likely end game and plan to act accordingly.
She could use “notwithstanding” right away. Not likely because it will show her to be the tyrant she is whereas a bit of patient strategy, she can pull it out at a moment that’s opportune for her.
Or she could wait, let public resentment build then, yank the chain very hard.
Or she might just let the overwhelming fear of it build awhile…and let that do the work, for her.
Depends on how clever she is.
Once someone has slapped your sibling in front of you they don’t need to slap you next for you to know they some day do it to you. The fear is enough for you to kowtow to them. That’s what Dani set out to accomplish. That fear will break every union in the province.
Which is why it needed to be dealt with the first time it happened and we haven’t heard one word back from the teacher’s union about what they are effectively going to do against her.
It’s harder to gain territory back than defend it in the first place.
It kills me to say this but we have to keep in mind that Smith using Section 33 is very popular with a huge segment of the population in Alberta. Would using it again hurt the UCP beyond a typical news cycle? Probably not.
JE: Yes, the NWC is popular with much of the UCP base – as long as it is only used against “the woke mob.” That said, I stand by my conclusion that its use to crush the teachers was much less popular than the UCP imagined. Moreover, Albertans now have the example of the United States clearly before them, so we all know where this is going. DJC
It’s funny to see that Horner uses the same 2 billion number required to satisfy the nursing workers’ demand as he did to the teachers.
Her Finance Minister seems to saying something different now, but I suppose we’ll see if Smith’s earlier vague reassuring words are worth more than the paper they weren’t written on and if she will actually refrain from using the Notwithstanding clause again.
Smith may be more politically astute than her Finance Minister, or she perhaps realizes she will bear the consequences of the decisions of the government more than him. He may be in an area where voters are less likely to recall him.
It would be like adding fuel to a fire to use the Notwithstanding clause again so soon and would anger even more people, likely making the UCP’s recall problem even worse. It will be quite embarrassing if Smith has to quickly change the recall legislation to avoid the consequences of it and it would probably be quite unpopular with many of her more right wing supporters as well as others.
The UCP sure makes things worse, don’t they?
It’s their guiding principle of political action. Republicans, and their Canadian wannabe-equivalents, long ago absorbed the billionaire propaganda: businesses can do nothing wrong, and governments can do nothing right.
Danielle Smith and her fellow-boneheads are bound and determined to prove beyond doubt that they can’t do anything right.
On FB–
“Wednesday–Alberta government forces teachers back to work ,promising to hire 1000 teachers per year to lower class sizes.
Monday–Northern Lights Public schools lay off multiple teachers , affecting 12 schools. Students will now be moved into other classes, increasing class sizes.
The media doesn’t seem to have picked up on this yet.”
(unverified as yet)
But if it’s true, could be another reason why the ATA is taking the government to court . I watched Jason Shillings statement and what surprised me was the ‘lack of interest ‘ by the media during the following Q&A…
Sidebar— Peter Guthrie’s statement in the house was well said (the breakdown) .
And given what is going on with the federal Con party, his calling out the leader of the UCP ,is inline with the caucus calling out Skippy for his dictatorial leadership style.
And with the pushback by Democrats in the US, maybe the peasants are starting to wake up…..
When they keep saying you’re ‘woke’ , don’t be surprised by the awakening.
This another dare to Queen Danielle to invoke the NWC again. Let the court actions pile on. SCoC will be busy and wondering what kind of lunacy has taken over in Alberta. Of course, the next step that Smith wants to take is to abolish anything with “recall” or “referendum” written on it. Not that Smith cares, but there are plenty of UCP MLAs who are feeling the creep of recall from their own hopping mad voters. Of course, getting rid of anything that demands accountability from legislators will not sit well with the FreeDUMB crowd. But what does Smith care? She’s an f’ing lunatic and can’t wait to shove her head back up Mango Mussolini’s arse one more time.
The problem with claiming there are limits to how Section 33 can be used, is that that’s not what the plain text of the “notwithstanding clause” says. All it says is that Parliament or a provincial legislature (note that it doesn’t mention territorial legislatures) can declare that a certain piece of legislation applies “notwithstanding” Sections 2 and 7 to 15 of the Charter. Any suggestion of guardrails around that would have to be “read in” by the Courts, which as we all know is frowned upon by conservatives, as well as by some legal scholars.
Section 2 of the Charter sets out our “fundamental freedoms”, such as freedom of expression and of association. So Section 33 essentially makes Section 2 just a polite suggestion.
Sections 7 to 14 set out the legal rights we all have when facing the criminal justice system, while section 15 sets out equality rights — it’s our version of the Benighted States’ ill-fated Equal Rights Amendment. But, again, just as with Section 2, the “notwithstanding clause”, especially as it has come to be used by right-wing provincial governments in Canada, none of these guarantees are anything but polite suggestions that can be overridden virtually on a whim.
Note also that while one of the early proponents of Section 33 was then-Saskatchewan NDP Premier Allan Blakeney, worried that without it the courts might stand in the way of expansions of the social safety net — as happened during the Great Depression — the only governments that, to date, have ever used it have been conservative, and also that no federal government of any stripe ever has.
Why Canadians haven’t swarmed into the streets with torches and pitchforks to get it repealed is disheartening.