Last month, the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees published an bargaining update regarding workers employed by Covenant Health in Banff, Camrose, Castor, Edmonton, Mundare, St Albert, Trochu, and Vegreville.
These workers include health care aides, rehabilitation care workers, nursing attendants, mental health aides, recreation aides, assisted living aides, and home support aides.
Their most recent contract expired last month.
According to AUPE’s update, the employer has proposed modest wage increases, as well as scaling back some worker benefits.
The employer wants a 4-year contract with 2% in each of the first two years and 1.75% in the final two years, for a combined increase of 7.5%.
In their previous 4-year contract, these more than 1,500 workers received a combined 4.25% over the life of the collective agreement.
In April 2019, the April prior to that contract, the consumer price index in Alberta was 143.7. By the time they received their most recent wage increase last April, the CPI had increased to 163.7.
That’s a 13.92% increase.
So, during the period that these workers received a 4.25% wage increase, inflation had grown by 13.92%, which means that their real wages—wages adjusted for inflation—had actually decreased by 9.67%.
It doesn’t take much math to figure out that the proposed 7.5% increase won’t be enough to make up for the 9.67% in lost wages.
And remember, that’s not including how much CPI has increased over the last year, or how much it’ll increase by the time the contract would expire in 2028. Not only would these workers still be behind inflation if they took this deal, but they’d be even more behind by the time their new contract would expire.
The workers’ bargaining team counteroffered with only a 2-year contract and much larger wage increases: 25% this year and 10% next year.
And while that may seem like a lot and significantly more than the shortfall I mentioned above, keep in mind that the contract prior the most recent one had two years of wage freezes and a 1% increase in the final year, so this 35% increase is trying to make up lost wages over several years, as well as protecting workers against inflation this year and next year.
As far as the scaling back of worker benefits, the workers’ bargaining tea reports that Covenant Health is focused on 4 main reductions.
First, they want to potentially reduce wages for workers transferring to a new position. For example, if a worker transfer into a new position and the salary in the previous position is more than that of the new position, they’d be dropped down to the lower salary after a year instead of keeping their current salary.
The employer also doesn’t want to pay out retroactive wages to former workers. This contract just barely expired; however, if negotiations go on for months (or even years) and part of the new contract includes wage increases, anyone who has left the company during that period wouldn’t qualify for the increase.
They’re also wanting to increase the number of shifts that part-time workers are scheduled for. According to AUPE, Covenant Health wants to schedule part-time workers for more than 6 shifts in a row of more than 10 shifts in a 2-week period.
Finally, the employer apparently wants to reduce the minimum number of hours between shifts to 15. Currently, workers are guaranteed 15.5 hours between shifts.
The next round of bargaining has been scheduled for the 11th and 12th of this month.
