Urgences-Santé’s support staff is announcing a one-week strike, starting tonight.
Those 120 workers are ensuring the proper functioning of ambulance services of the Montreal Metropolitan Community (MMC), in particular the maintenance of the ambulance fleet and the medical equipment on board the vehicles.
Their last salary increase dates back more than two years, as their collective agreement expired on March 31, 2020.
“After more than two years of negotiations, no one will tell us we’re not patient,” said via press release the president of the Syndicat du personnel de soutien d’Urgences-santé (CSN), Marc Dulude. “The employer says he has no other financial leeway to offer us except impoverishment. Yet, he finds a way to hire subcontractors at very high prices to do part of our work, instead of investing in working conditions to fill positions internally. We’re tired of this lack of respect.”
“The pre-hospital sector is a chain with many links, and they’re all important,” added in the press release the president of the CSN, Caroline Senneville. “Support staff is the perfect example. After each shift, they must prepare each ambulance for the next team of paramedics. If there’s a delay there, it affects the entire chain, and it ends up having an impact on the response time of paramedics with a citizen who needs help, and on the quality of services to the population. That’s why it’s so important to adequately recognize their work.
The Fédération de la santé et des services sociaux (FSSS–CSN) represents 3,600 workers in the pre-hospital sector throughout Quebec. (B.L.)
translated by Alec Brideau
