Job action escalates in BC

[tniuqs]

And now the additional fallout spreads the virus to the Nazi Occupation of Alberta:

http://www.calgaryherald.com/business/Alberta+unions+reject+wage+freeze+call/2109515/story.html

First EMS declared essential services er legislated then the "transition without a plan" reduce the number of dispatch centers to 3 from 26, hire more middle managers to promote well more committee meetings accomplishing nothing. Force EDM and Calgary to become members of a union they did not support now a frezze on wages and PLEASE check the link and comments in regaurds to the MLAs wage roll back.

I for one will fight this Conservative Government Tooth an Nail, and please send Stephen Druckett aka Mr. wing it back to OZ .. I will donate my Airmiles and a swift boot in the ass, and give assiephill a spare baseball bat to tune this arse up.

CALGARY - A provincewide labour battle is brewing after some of Alberta's largest public sector unions rejected Premier Ed Stelmach's call for a two-year vol u n tary wage freeze.

But Stelmach said Thursday he intends to "be very firm" with unions and do what he must to meet budget cut targets.

EXPECT FIRM BACK STELMACH!

During a television address Wednesday, Stelmach said he would be freezing salaries of civil service managers for two years and would be "asking the entire public sector to share in this effort."

After a Progressive Conservative fundraising dinner in Red Deer on Thursday, Stelmach said the government has had preliminary talks with union leaders. He added that getting public-sector workers to agree to a two-year pay freeze will help the province achieve its goal of returning to surplus in three years.

"We just said that we're putting jobs before raises. Inflation is very, very low. We have very low tax rates for people working in the province."

or MISMANAGEMENT FOR OVER 40 YEARS

"But at the end of the day, I'm going to be very firm," Stelmach added.

The Health Sciences Association of Alberta, which represents 18,000 medical workers such as lab technicians and paramedics, said Thursday its members have no appetite for renegotiating their collective agreements.

A GOVERNMENT BREACH OF CONTRACT.

The union has one contract, set to expire in 2011, that will provide most of its members a four per cent wage increase next year.

"This is the second government in a row that has mismanaged one of the biggest economic booms seen around the world," said Scott Pattison, union spokesman.

"Frankly, they should be talking to their constituents about how to get out of (a deficit) without cutting jobs or freezing wages."

One member of the union said Thursday the premier's comments were disappointing and demoralizing for medical staff, who fear the government is moving toward the public sector cuts of the 1990s.

"We negotiated those contracts in good faith and signed our names to them," said Pat Ennis, a registered orthopedic technologist at Alberta Children's Hospital.

"Why do they feel . . . it's in their ability and it's all right to even suggest breaking this contract? It's not OK."

The premier can ask for a two-year wage freeze all he likes, but Alberta's more than 33,000 teachers aren't volunteering, said Alberta Teachers' Association president Carol Henderson.

"We have an agreement," said Henderson. "We signed it in good faith and we intend to be in the classroom. When it comes down to it, is it a deal or is it a deal?"

Even before Stelmach's announcement, teachers had already forced Alberta Education into arbitration over a one per cent disagreement in this year's salary increase.

And memories of Klein's cuts have many teachers wary of agreeing to postpone future raises.

aka a LIEING PRICK!

Henderson was a Grade 3 teacher in the 1990s when the then-Klein government asked public sector workers, including teachers, to accept a five per cent wage reduction to preserve jobs. But the province went ahead with layoffs anyway.

Teachers who remained in the system still haven't recovered from that salary loss thanks to rapid inflation since then, she said.

"We were asked for the five per cent rollback to save jobs and protect students. But it was not true then and it's not true now," said Henderson. "This is a tax on teachers when education is a benefit to all Albertans and we should be paying for it equally."

The proposed freeze is an example of yet more cuts on the backs of workers when it was the provincial government that squandered the profits of the boom, said Dennis Mol, president of the Alberta branch of the Canadian Union of Public Employees.

Mol said his 31,000 members, which include everything from library staff and long-term care workers to education support teams and municipal employees, are still struggling to pay for higher rents, food and gas costs which were driven up in recent years.

While private sector employees were receiving wage increases "hand over fist" during that time, it was the public employees who had to make do with less.

To ask them to shoulder the burden of budget cuts now isn't fair, he said.

"This is a continued attack on the worker. They talk about having all these rainy-day funds . . . well it's beyond raining now. It's a snowstorm. But the government doesn't want to use them," said Mol.

The pledge to freeze salaries in order to save jobs also isn't ringing true with Alberta Union of Provincial Employees president Doug Knight, who says he's heard that line before.

But Knight isn't so sure how "voluntary" this wage freeze will be when the contract for 23,000 of his members runs out in August.

Knight is frustrated the premier used his television address to negotiate in the media instead of at the bargaining table.

If Stelmach truly wants to share the pain of Alberta's fiscal crisis he should be rolling back all of his recent 34 per cent raise, not just the portion he announced Thursday, Knight said.

Despite the chilly reception Alberta's public sector unions have given the proposed wage freeze, they will be under pressure from their members and the general public to take part, said University of Calgary political analyst David Taras.

"Public sympathy for teachers and nurses is normally very high. These are people who make great sacrifices all the time. But my sense is it's going to be very hard to resist the gravitational pull here," said Taras.

"We're seeing prolonged layoffs, prolonged unemployment . . . If it becomes layoffs versus a freeze, then the pressure on the unions is going to be to keep jobs."

The union representing registered nurses in the province is preparing to negotiate a new contract to replace an agreement that expires at the end of March 2010.United Nurses of Alberta officials said they have not yet completed work on their bargaining position so they don't know what their members think of the premier's comments, although they said wage freezes aren't usually popular.

"Generally, people don't like that idea, but the members decide what they are prepared to live with over the terms of the collective agreement and we act on their behalf," said Bev Dick, first vice-president of the United Nurses of Alberta.

GO GET THEM HEATHER, bring this G DAMN government to its knees !

Other stats of interest:

Freeze hiring in Hospital (sending all new RN/ RRT grads else ware)

Withdrawl of sigh-on agreements with graduating family practice MDs (Canadian trained) for rural areas ... cause we already have to many. insert vomit smiley.

AND make waiting lists even longer for hips, knees, and elective Angios) THIS for the very people that voted this clown show to power.

I officially declare Jihad

<end rant>

Edited October 19, 2009 by tniuqs

[rock_shoes]

Damn Squint. It looks like the Republik of British Columbia is spilling its rhetoric east faster than Stelmach and Campbell can cash their well deserved raises. Just don't all go on strike while I'm going to school next year . It's just about impossible to complete practicum requirements with everyone on strike. Saskatchewan is too flat for me and I'm allergic to newfie screech so heading too far east is out of the question. I say the entire west goes on strike. Shouldn't be more than a week before the entire canadian economy grinds to a halt.

[RavEMTGun]

Wow... what at terrifying look into your system... and yet I still would love to be an ACP in Whistler.

[tniuqs]

Wow... what at terrifying look into your system... and yet I still would love to be an ACP in Whistler.

You best check again, you couldn't afford a camping spot.

[rock_shoes]

Wow... what at terrifying look into your system... and yet I still would love to be an ACP in Whistler.

You best check again, you couldn't afford a camping spot.

Whistler isn't a designated ALS community anyway. The only time you will see an ALS provider in Whistler is if they are there for a pick-up as a flight crew or are in as "Special Operations". ALS coverage in BC is abysmal at best with the north having the worst coverage of all. The last ALS unit as you head north in BC is in Prince George which is actually in the centre of the province.

Edited October 20, 2009 by rock_shoes

[Quakefire]

Hey Rock_Shoes it isn't so flat is Saskatchewan, I moved from Calgary to Saskatoon and its alot better than the southern part of the province.

Most of our services are private (just kinda the way EMS started here) but we just became self regulated. So far the president in the PCP program head in Saskatoon, and a couple of the members at large and council members are instructors of mine so I think we are doing pretty good so far, I just hope we dont have the horror stories some of you do in a few years.

Personally I think the unions should have challenged the courts order, with the labour laws in mind. The governments can't just ignore laws they dont like, didn't work for Nixon and shouldn't work for them either.

I wonder how much the public understands that yes the paramedics refusing OT may seem selfish to them at first, but it BC starts losing people due to burn out faster than it can replace them it might last longer than a weekend, or a week or even a month. I wonder if they are prepared to wait for the next graduating class to have even BLS coverage again

[tniuqs]

'Quakefire' date='23 October 2009 - 02:52 AM' timestamp='1256287948' post='227348']

Hey Rock_Shoes it isn't so flat is Saskatchewan, I moved from Calgary to Saskatoon and its alot better than the southern part of the province.

Go north young man, just over the bridge in Prince Albert and its Gods country ... but don't tell anyone its a well kept secret. ps move over I think I am going to join you .... and get away from this transition crap that we are enduring in AB.

Most of our services are private (just kinda the way EMS started here) but we just became self regulated. So far the president in the PCP program head in Saskatoon, and a couple of the members at large and council members are instructors of mine so I think we are doing pretty good so far, I just hope we dont have the horror stories some of you do in a few years.

Be damn certain that the SELF REGULATED part is entrenched in your bylaws as this is huge joke here in AB now with public appointees by government and an EMR as a President ? ACoP has not only fallen flat on their regulatory faces becoming a direct venue and being dictated to by government, this in 3 professions that I know of under HPA, Dental Hygenists, and Respiratory .... may god have mercy on Stelmachs ass if he tries with Nursing ...

Personally I think the unions should have challenged the courts order, with the labour laws in mind. The governments can't just ignore laws they dont like, didn't work for Nixon and shouldn't work for them either.

Well I sure hope that CUPE takes it higher to the Supreme Court of Canada, this equates to slavery ... there is essential services order but there is not an "STATE of EMERGENCY" sheesh, just wait till theres a MVC with an Ambulance and when they look to hours worked in the previous week and rest periods .. hey BC truckers hauling logs or big rigs are mandated to have rest periods .... and they have to keep records .

I wonder how much the public understands that yes the paramedics refusing OT may seem selfish to them at first, but it BC starts losing people due to burn out faster than it can replace them it might last longer than a weekend, or a week or even a month. I wonder if they are prepared to wait for the next graduating class to have even BLS coverage again

Just like we are seeing HERE in FREE Alberta a hiring freeze ... on damn near all HCW, AUPE was out in full force yesterday in Edmonton, because they want to place 300 or so mentally ill patients back into the community .... er cells / remand .

Pay Peter to save Paul phylosophy it just doest work .....

cheers

[RavEMTGun]

Whistler isn't a designated ALS community anyway. The only time you will see an ALS provider in Whistler is if they are there for a pick-up as a flight crew or are in as "Special Operations". ALS coverage in BC is abysmal at best with the north having the worst coverage of all. The last ALS unit as you head north in BC is in Prince George which is actually in the centre of the province.

Well I see that... but Whistler is just outside of Van by an hour... no ALS? Really?

What about Golden? Can I be an ACP there?

[tniuqs]

Well I see that... but Whistler is just outside of Van by an hour... no ALS? Really?

What about Golden? Can I be an ACP there?

Nope, not in Golden either the closest ALS to Golden would be either Kelowna or Prince George and by Air ... and the airstrip is between 2 valleys and kinda snug.

Type: Airport (Airfield)

Latitude: 51°17'57"N (51.299167)

Longitude: 116°58'56"W (-116.982222)

Datum: WGS 1984

Elevation: 2575 ft (785 m)

Runways: 1

Longest: 4500 × 75 ft (1372 × 23 m)

Typically the designated Citation 2 (based in PG) generally speaking not even consider a strip under 5 G ... the best bet is a KA 200 out of AB YYC.

take a look on a goggle world map.

In Revelstoke the EMS team BLS is or was housed in a Hotel last time I was there .

[RavEMTGun]

but... but... but... Canada is supposed to EMS perfected or something! State run! The answer to all our problems!

Crap... now what do we aim for...