January

Each chief steward from every hospital that SEIU Healthcare represents was invited to join our Hospital Workers’ Council to help transform our hospital sector and improve our relationships with our hospital members. This amazing group of leaders meet often to bring their members’ perspectives from across Ontario together to ensure everyone has a voice. The HWC was essential in 2021 throughout the central bargaining process and will continue to be critical to our success in 2022 and beyond. Thank you to the HWC for all your amazing work.

January 27

March 8

SEIU Healthcare, Unifor, and CUPE, unions representing 175,000 healthcare workers across Ontario, launched the “Respect Us, Protect Us, Pay Us” campaign. The healthcare sector is a predominately female workforce that faced endless hurdles during the pandemic. We called on Premier Ford’s government to stand with working women, and not on the side of a broken system that profits from their labour. On March 8, to show solidarity for our female colleagues and demand better working conditions, hundreds of members wore a “Respect Us, Protect Us, Pay Us” sticker in their workplaces.

March 23
A day before the release of the Ontario budget, hundreds of SEIU Healthcare, Unifor, and CUPE members organized a pandemic-safe action at Queen’s Park. We demanded that  the provincial government finally start treating you like the heroes you have always been and provide you with a properly funded healthcare system. Together, we marched from the University of Toronto to Queen’s Park making sure the public heard and saw our outrage.

SEIU Healthcare rallied in front of the Minister of Finance Peter Bethlenfalvy’s office in response to Ontario’s provincial budget. The budget failed to deliver the support you need like paid sick days, full-time positions, improved wages, and benefits. Despite your heroic service, Ford’s absent funding and lack of respect put healthcare workers and all those they care for in jeopardy.

June 14

Both SEIU Healthcare and OHCU-CUPE met virtually to discuss joint proposals and strategies to demonstrate a united front during negotiations.

Before Central Hospital Bargaining with the Ontario Hospital Association (OHA), SEIU Healthcare, and OCHU-CUPE members wore their “Respect Us, Protect Us, Pay Us” stickers to show that they stood in solidarity with their bargaining team and that we mean business!

Both SEIU Healthcare and CUPE presented comprehensive joint proposals and union-specific proposals. The OHA presented a shortlist of opening proposals that did not represent the respect, protection, and fair pay workers deserve. All of the proposals were crafted based on your feedback and experiences.

September 10

Before we returned to the bargaining table with the Ontario Hospital Association in September, SEIU Healthcare, and OCHU-CUPE organized an action out front of their office in Toronto. With an uphill battle ahead, due to Bill 124, you deserve a contract that reflects all your hard work and scarifies. Hundreds gathered to share that message with the OHA and the media.

Along with OHCU-CUPE, we met with the OHA and participating hospitals to begin negotiations. We took your top bargaining priorities to the OHA and refused to back down from our stance against accepting any concessions. Unfortunately, the OHA was unwilling to give you what you deserve in your next collective agreement and that forces us into mediation.

Negotiation broke down due to the OHA’s unwillingness to bargain fairly, especially when it came to health and safety policies you need to be safe at work. Your bargaining committee spoke about your challenges, the risks of working through the pandemic and extreme exhaustion, the realities of catching the virus, and a rising tide of patient and family member violence. Despite hearing horrific stories from the frontlines, key safety and workplace violence proposals were shamefully challenged by the OHA and hospital employers.

From December 7 to 12, hospital workers wore their “Protect Us” stickers and wrote postcards to Premier Doug Ford, with tens of thousands of postcards planned to be delivered to the doorstep of Queen’s Park in February.