From midnight on November 8 to 11:59 pm on November 9, 80,000 nurses, nursing assistants, respiratory therapists and clinical perfusionists in Quebec, many of them from Vaudreuil-Soulanges, were on strike, a pressure tactic they haven't used in almost 25 years.

Meeting outside a CHSLD in Vaudreuil-Soulanges, Dominic Caisse, interim president of the Fédération Interprofessionnelle de la santé du Québec - FPSMO, agreed to talk to Néomédia. 

"Because our members provide an essential service, they can't all go out at the same time. So they go out one at a time during their shift to demonstrate. The Labour Court has ruled that 90% of essential services must be maintained during a strike. For example, in a small CHSLD like this one, if 10 of our members work the same shift, only one can go out at a time in turn," he explains. 

Like the other workers on strike earlier this week, the FIQ has confirmed that it will hold two more strike days on November 23 and 24 on the same schedule. 

"Negotiations are stagnating, there are no concrete proposals on the table. We began negotiations last December in anticipation of the end of our collective agreement on March 31, 2023, but we're still at the same point," he adds. 

What are the points of disagreement between the employer and the union? "The employer wants to impose a staff mobility clause on us. This means that one of our members, who has had the same position in the same establishment for years, could be sent elsewhere in the CISSSMO territory to another shift completely if this clause is added to our next collective agreement. There was a clause in our last collective agreement that allowed employers to do this, but under certain well-defined and framed conditions. But we're not talking about the same case at all." 

A better work/family balance and better pay conditions are also among the points of contention at the negotiating table. "Over three years, we'd like a 21% pay rise, but the latest government offer received at the end of October was for 10.3% over five years. Our wage backlog is 6%, and we'd like a 4% annual increase over three years. It's worth remembering that provincial elected representatives recently granted themselves a 30% pay rise," he concludes.