HEU members picket St. Vincent’s Hospital. Joshua Berson photo. TheTyee.ca

Less than four days into a strike by the Hospital Employees Union, B.C.’s Liberal government legislated an end to the job action taken by 43,000 health workers. Bill 37 imposes a 15 per cent wage rollback, a longer work week and no protection against the continuing contracting-out of jobs to low-wage, mostly American-based, private firms. The Bill received Royal Assent at 6:30 a.m. this morning after an all-night session.
As of noon today, HEU Secretary-Business Manager Chris Allnutt went on record, stating that health unions would defy the back-to-work order. “I want to be perfectly clear what the union is instructing members to do. You are to respect the protest lines until we decide that you should go back to work,” he stated at a rally held at Vancouver General Hospital. Mr. Allnutt’s address provoked cheers and chants of ‘General Strike’ from protesters.
Rumours have been rampant throughout the day that a general solidarity strike is imminent.
In an article published by the Tyee.ca, and written by Marjorie Griffin Cohen — Simon Fraser University Political Science professor, and Chair of the university’s Women’s Studies Department — the co-author, as well, of a recent study conducted for the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA), Dr. Cohen begins her article by writing …

By June, 6,000 health care service workers will have lost their jobs as government health care authorities contracts out the work the workers once provided. So it should come as no surprise that the provincial government also legislated striking Hospital Employees Union members back to work on Wednesday, following a three-day strike. The Liberals also cut their wages by 11 percent and increased hours of work in an imposed two-year contract.

The B.C. government’s previous legislation promoting health care privatization was also deeply troubling. It is destroying the pay equity gains that women doing support work in the health care sector have made during the past 30 years. The effect on wages and conditions of work has been stunning: wages in the areas that have been privatized have been cut almost in half and most benefits have been eliminated or drastically reduced.

The Canadian Union of Public Employees supports the argument Dr. Cohen makes in both in her Tyee.ca article and in her CCPA study. “Let’s be clear here,” says Paul Moist, CUPE’s National President. “If men held these jobs and if (Premier) Campbell weren’t determined to open up the health care system to foreign corporations, these workers wouldn’t be on strike and the Liberals wouldn’t be gutting their contracts.”

The Work Less Party of British Columbia was founded because modern Western culture’s work ethic — the idea that the worth of a human being depends on the work that he or she does — no longer serves our society well.
With vast increases in productivity over the past centuries, the Work Less Party believes that we no longer require every single person’s efforts to be directed towards our survival. And yet, the party says, it does not question the work ethic that drives many of us to work long hours at jobs that we don’t like, that provides us with little personal and professional satisfaction, that harms our health, that takes our precious time in exchange for mere consumer goods, that drives the economic engines of over consumption, and that ultimately leaves our planet barren.
The Work Less Party stands for the idea that a human being’s worth is inherent and not dependent on a job. The party believes that working less can, indeed, lead to making a positive contribution to society.
And working less, as if you didn’t already know this, is definitely a more way fun way to live your life!

Ten unions representing 43,000 B.C. hospital and long-term care workers began job action on Sunday with a ban on overtime, escalating to a full strike on Monday. The 10 unions represent X-ray and ECG technicians, biomedical engineers, trades, housekeepers, dietary staff, lab assistants, orderlies, licensed practical nurses, unit coordinators, clerical staff like medical transcriptionists and booking clerks, and group home workers.
The escalating job action comes as health employers continue to privatize health functions after unions refused deep concession demands. Health employers and the B.C. Liberal government continue in their refusal to put layoffs on hold during province-wide talks and move off their massive wage concession demands worth $900 million over three years.
For full background on the dispute (something you’re unlikely to see made available anywhere else, outside of VanRamblings or rabble.ca), watch this web video address from HEU Secretary-Business Manager Chris Allnutt from last Thursday’s press conference giving 72-hour strike notice.