Dear Health Care Member:
Your SEIU-West, CUPE and SGEU bargaining committees met with SAHO in Saskatoon on October 18 and 19 to resume bargaining a fair and equitable collective agreement for all of our members.
We believe two outstanding issues remain: monetary and the Extended Health and Enhanced Dental Plan.
The coalition bargaining committee heard you all loud and clear about ensuring the benefits members currently enjoy are continued into the future. New language for joint-trusteeship of all of the benefits is complex. Legal and tax implications need to be considered. We spent a great deal of time with SAHO focused on how the process of joint trusteeship would work: the establishment of a steering committee; what the committee’s work would entail and how changes would be negotiated and ratified by our internal processes. This was an extremely useful exercise to ensure there is complete understanding of this process by SAHO, the SHA and the provider union bargaining committees.
SAHO is to respond to our latest proposal that focuses on the two outstanding issues. We are working to confirm additional dates to continue our bargaining process.
We ask that you remain active in supporting your bargaining committee and continue to contact your MLA. Do not let this round of bargaining fall of the government’s radar; help us keep this issue front and centre in their minds. Healthcare workers are an incredible force for good across our society – and we need to remain proud of the work that we do as we work in solidarity.
In solidarity,
CUPE, SGEU and SEIU-West bargaining committees