 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.”
A general strike seems to be a distinct possibility and not a completely bad idea. The working people that Campbell has screwed over – they pay taxes too, by the way, Gordo – need a rallying point. It’s looking like they’ve found it.
I agree with sean. There is an excitement about this disobedience, as if the legislation were a last straw, a fuse to the fire. This BC govt has pulled us about recklessly, carelessly, without a plan, without a vision, only making life more painful for everyone while practicing a shit eating grin.