Last week, the Health Sciences Association of Alberta posted an update on their website regarding contract negotiations for workers employed by Associated Ambulance & Services (Whitecourt) Ltd.
Associated Ambulance provides paramedical services in over 20 locations in Northern Alberta and Central Alberta. It’s the second largest ambulance operator in Alberta.
HSAA represents over 300 paramedical and emergency medical responders employed by Associated Ambulance in the communities of Athabasca, Barrhead, Boyle, Edon, Evansburg, Hinton, Jasper, Nordegg, Rimbey, Rocky Mountain House, and, of course, Whitecourt.
Their most recent collective agreement expired in March 2025; although the first bargaining session with the employer did not occur until 6 months later, in September.
After the bargaining team—which consist of 2 advanced care paramedics, a primary care paramedic, and 2 HSAA labour relations officers—received feedback from workers, they “established a strong bargaining mandate grounded in [four] key themes”:
- Wages
- Core/Flex scheduling and on-call structure
- Shift premiums
- Psychological health and benefits coverage
In last week’s announcement, the workers’ bargaining team reported that they have reached a tentative agreement with the employer.
The proposed 4-year collective agreement includes a 12% wage increase over the length of the contract, which is similar to most public sector bargaining agreements over the last year or so.
| 1 April 2025* | 3.00% |
| 1 April 2026* | 3.00% |
| 1 April 2027 | 3.00% |
| 1 April 2028 | 3.00% |
| 12.00% |
This is much better than the 6.75% they got over 5 years in their previous collective agreement and definitely better than the 3 years of wage freezes in the contract before that.
| 1 April 2017 | 0.00% |
| 1 April 2018 | 0.00% |
| 1 April 2019 | 0.00% |
| 1 April 2020 | 0.00% |
| 1 April 2021 | 1.00% |
| 1 April 2022 | 1.50% |
| 1 April 2023 | 2.00% |
| 1 April 2024 | 2.25% |
| 6.75% |
Over the course of the last two collective agreements, the consumer price index in Alberta rose 24.79%, which effectively turned that 6.75% raise into a cut to real wages of 18.05%.
A raise of 12% will be sufficient to cover that shortfall, leaving these workers still more than 6 percentage points behind inflation. Plus, that 12% is spread out over 4 years, which means even more inflation.
For example, inflation since their last wage increase in April 2024 has already increased by 4.74%.
That being said, advanced care paramedics can expect to see a 4% market adjustment and primary care paramedics could see an 8.44% market adjustment should the tentative agreement be approved. Both adjustments would be effective as of the date of ratification, so they would not be retroactive.
As well, the tentative agreement, if ratified, would collapse the 12-step wage grid into a 9-step wage grid, which could result in some workers receiving an additional wage increase, depending on where they were on the previous wage grid.
Here are some other changes that would take effect if the workers ratify the tentative agreement.
On-call pay would increase from $3.50 an hour to $7.00 an hour.
Under the proposed changes, workers whose classification changes is assigned a higher salary scale would have their salary advanced to the step in the new scale which is at least 10% higher than the step on the scale of the classification held prior to the change.
The tentative agreement would introduce a new mentorship pay and a new preceptor pay, both of which would be $2 an hour, on top of what the workers were already being paid. The former is for workers who mentor a new worker, and the latter is for workers supervising, educating, or evaluating postsecondary students.
In the previous agreement, workers had to wait 1 tour before applying for short-term disability. This would change to 2 tours in the proposed agreement.
RRSP matching would increase to 6% after 6 years. It currently maxes out at 4%. Workers would get an additional $10,00 into their RRSP when they hit 15,20, and 25 years of service—that increases to $15,000 at 30 years, and every 5 years after that.
Associated Ambulance would provide 4 pairs of work pants. Currently, they provide only 3 pairs. As well, workers would be able to request a ball cap as part of their uniform, which the employer would provide.
The meal allowance would increase:
| Shift length | Old | New |
|---|---|---|
| 5–6 hours | $11 | $15 |
| 6–10 hours | $22 | $30 |
| 10+ hours | $33 | $45 |
The weekend premium would increase from $3.15 an hour to $3.50 an hour. As well, there would be a new night shift premium, which would be $5 an hour for active duty between 19:00 and 07:00.
The taxable spending account would become a flexible spending account and increase from $2,800 a year to $3,200 a year. It would not see any other increases during this contract, unlike the previous contract, which saw annual increases.
A psychological benefit has been proposed in the tentative agreement. This pilot would increase the benefit from $500 a year to $3,000 a year.
There would also be a new long-service programme, which would see full-time workers get a $5,000 lump sum payment when they have been with the employer for 15 years and $10,000 when it has been 20 years.
Massage therapy coverage would double from $500 per year to $1000 per year.
Voting on the new collective agreement began two days ago, on the 30th, and will end on Monday, the 6th.
