UPDATE: After this story was first published, CUPE and the provincial government agreed to return to the bargaining table Thursday afternoon. The comments in this story were made prior to that agreement being reached. The union says it’s hopeful renewed negotiations will lead to progress toward a deal.
Long-term care workers across Nova Scotia say they’re exhausted, cold, and soaked after nearly four weeks on rainy picket lines, with no clear end to the strike in sight.
Ty Loppie, CUPE Nova Scotia’s vice-president for the long-term care committee, says workers feel the seniors minister is not taking them seriously.
She says, “It’s very obvious that she doesn’t care about the workers, she doesn’t care about the seniors that are in long-term care, and she’s just been spreading a lot of misinformation.”
According to Loppie, Minister Barb Adams has been telling the public that workers don’t understand what’s in the deal being offered, but Loppie assures that everyone understood before taking action.
“They voted to go on strike because they didn’t like the deal. She [Adams] has gone out of her way to post the deal package in the workplaces and she’s still saying that the members don’t know what was in the package,” she explains, frustrated. “It’s so baffling, the disrespect that we’re experiencing. You would think as the minister of seniors and long-term care would care, but she’s ignoring us.”
‘What’s being offered is simply offensive and insulting’
Krista Sweeney, chair of the long-term care committee, says the strike isn’t about money, but about the toll chronic understaffing and low pay are taking on workers’ lives.
Sweeney says workers “spend their days caring for families and then go home worrying about how to care for their own. Starving and exhausted people cannot provide top-notch care, no matter how much they want to. That’s the heart of this issue.”
In a statement to our newsroom on Wednesday, Minister Adams made it clear she does not plan to return to the bargaining table any time soon.
‘We are here because this government refuses to sit down and make an agreement with long-term care workers’, says NDP
Meanwhile, Official Opposition Leader Claudia Chender hosted CUPE representatives at Province House Thursday morning where she criticized the provincial government’s handling of the dispute and its broader approach to long-term care.
Chender states, “Tim Houston has spent billions of dollars on Healthcare infrastructure, but he and Barb Adams don’t seem to think that the people providing that care are worth the investment.”
She added that many Nova Scotian’s initially trusted the government’s promise to fix health care, but that conditions have only continued to deteriorate.
“They’ve given the Houston government the benefit of the doubt and trusted that their promise to fix healthcare was moving forward, but five years in and long-term care workers face constant staffing shortages that impact the care.”
As of now, there is still no timeline from the province on when the strike could come to an end, leaving thousands of workers on the picket lines and long-term care facilities operating under continued strain.
