Waving flags and chanting, “public health care,” Unifor members braved the -30C windchill to march in Thunder Bay to send a strong message to the Ontario government to stop cutting services and privatizing health care.

Over 100 Unifor members, along with supporters from Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and the Ontario Nurses’ Association (ONA), rallied Feb. 24 in front of St. Joseph Care Group on Algoma St. N. as a precursor to Unifor’s two-day Northern Ontario Leadership Meeting (NOLM).

“There’s no question in my mind, if we turn over the ownership and control of our public hospitals to the private-for-profit clinics, we will lose our single-tier public health care system in this country,” said Kelly-Anne Orr, Unifor Assistant to the National Officers.

“We will not be able to stop user fees and we will not be able control the industry. We already face the most impossible challenge – to regulate for-profit in the long-term care industry and if we allow this to happen, it will be the peril of our foundation of our principles of our health care system: the right to equal access based on need and not based on how wealthy you are.”

Orr said Ontario Premier Doug Ford is rolling out a coordinated campaign, mass-marketed with the message that patients will only pay with their health card, that staff will not be transferred from public hospitals and that patients will have faster access to health care.

“It’s all untrue,” she said. “These messages are designed to confuse and soften public opposition. There is no question that there is a coordinated movement in Ontario, among all the Conservative-led provinces in this country, to privatize health care. We’ve seen it with Mike Harris privatizing home care and long-term care and now, the Ford government is finishing it off by privatizing the public hospitals.”

Representatives from the Thunder Bay Health Coalition, ONA, SEIU, as well as NDP Thunder Bay-Superior North MPP Lise Vaugeois spoke at the demonstration.

“[The Ford government] are setting things up so that large, multi-national corporations can come in here and make money off people when they are most vulnerable, it’s criminal,” said Vaugeois.

“They keep talking about the thousands of nurses they’ve hired. Have we seen any of those? Not one. [Health care workers] are so understaffed and exhausted, they’ve seen their peers leave because the government has refused to remove Bill 124 and hire the staff needed and pay them respectful wages.”

The spotlight on Ontario and Canada’s health care crisis continued at the Unifor Northern Ontario Leadership Meeting, which took place Feb. 24-25 in Thunder Bay, Ont.

Ontario Regional Director Naureen Rizvi kept the conversation on health care privatization and the need to mobilize not just union members, but their families and communities.

“People don’t care about the word, ‘privatization,’ not when they have to get to a doctor, not when they’re waiting for surgery for two years, not when their loved ones or children or spouses need care or access,” said Rizvi.

“As long as they don’t get charged, they’re golden. But we know that over time, privatization is going to destroy the system. And you will have charges, you just have to look down south to know that’s the case.”

She added the end result is that the health care system built on equal access which Canadians pride themselves on crumbles.

Later, Rizvi, Orr, and Unifor Local 229 President Kari Jefford expanded on the health care issue during a fireside chat, where members shared their own experiences.

“There is a huge opportunity for us to get gains,” said Jefford. “We get calls from members who are in crisis, who are angry, who are suffering…workers are tired and burnt out. It doesn’t matter what sector you’re in, people are feeling that. People don’t mobilize when they’re content, we can mobilize people when they’re angry.”

In her address to the participants at NOLM, Ontario Regional Council Chair Shinade Allder acknowledged that while February is Black History Month there are opportunities to celebrate and teach Black history year-round.

Allder spoke about how local Black Indigenous Workers of Colour (BIWOC) standing committee members have been involved in new programming that empowers Black youth, providing them skills taught by Black and Indigenous community leaders.

Unifor National Secretary-Treasurer Len Poirier told the NOLM participants that over 80,000 members have collective agreements that are expiring this year – the union’s 10th anniversary.

He also reiterated the union’s criticism of the Bank of Canada interest rate increases, as well as companies who are “drowning in profit” on the backs of workers.

“It should come as no surprise the sectors with the strongest increase in profits were also the source of the fastest price increases – products like gasoline, groceries, mortgages and building materials,” said Poirier.

“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know we have a big problem when so much of our economy is going to rich shareholders rather than the workers.”

Retiring Unifor National Representative Gary Bragnalo said it was inspiring to see that NOLM has grown to the size it is, with members coming to attend from all over Ontario.

“Without [leadership] support, we wouldn’t be here, telling the stories and talking about what’s going on in our workplaces, so we could all get together,” he said.

 

Bill C-228, An Act to amend the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act, the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act and the Pension Benefits Standards Act, 1985, would amend bankruptcy and insolvency legislation to give “super-priority” to funding the deficit of a pension plan.

“For too long workers have witnessed employers paying out corporate bonuses or paying creditors after declaring bankruptcy, all while the company’s own pension deficit is allowed to go unfunded. This often forces already-retired workers into poverty as their pension benefits are slashed,” said Lana Payne, Unifor National President. “It doesn’t have to be this way. All the Senate needs to do is to pass Bill C-228 as-is, which already received unanimous support in the House of Commons.”

Take action to protect pensions.

Les MacDonald, Unifor National Executive Board Retirees Representative, presented to the Senate committee on Feb. 15, 2023. He asked the Senators to respect retirees and pass the bill into law.

“In bargaining, pensions are a large portion of monetary conversations. Members end up making immediate sacrifices to their present wages in order to earn long-term, guaranteed retirement benefits. However, the current BIA and CCAA statutes do not offer any protections that can provide peace of mind at retirement for a pension that is being drawn particularly from a single employer defined benefit pension plan,” said MacDonald to the Senate committee.

Currently, if an employer has a defined-benefit pension plan and declares bankruptcy or insolvency, the plan needs to be wound up so that all pension assets are paid out. Pension plans may suffer from wind up deficits, a term that calculates the amount of additional money needed to fund the benefits to 100% for retirees on the date of wind up. Bill C-228 will put any outstanding amounts due to the pension fund wind up ahead of secured creditors, regardless whether the corporate entity declares bankruptcy or restructuring.

MacDonald drew on examples from Unifor’s own history and membership, where bankruptcy and insolvency of a company led to disastrous effects for retired workers, including the well-publicized Sears Canada bankruptcy.

“Eddie Lampert, Sears Canada’s largest shareholder, landlord and supplier doled out $6 billion dollars to buy back shares and dividends from 2005 onwards to profit himself, yet the company continued to carry a $260 million pension deficit that would have been extinguished easily, had Bill C-228 been the law in 2017.

“By end of Dec 2015, Sears reported 14,015 retirees with an average annual lifetime pension of only 5,141 Canadian dollars, literally $428 per month. While Unifor wasted no effort in representing our Sears retirees in insolvency, they were forced to settle with a 30% cut to these already low benefits,” MacDonald added.

Retirees earn their pensions during their working career. These deferred wages must be guaranteed, especially where the employer has every ability to pay their own pension deficits.

Add your name to the Congress of Union Retirees of Canada’s petition in support of this Bill, and tell the Senators to protect pensions.