The Issue of Private Placement Agencies Must Be Addressed
- Interview, Denis Cloutier - 
September
2020. "Health Care is Dying. We Are the Solution" campaign of the
Interprofessional Health Care Federation of Quebec (FIQ).
Denis Cloutier is
President of the Union of Health Care Professionals for Montreal East
(FIQ SPS ESTIM). Workers' Forum:
What are your main concerns at present in terms of the situation within
the health care system? Denis Cloutier:
We are very worried about what will happen in January. I expect a new
increase in COVID-19 cases because of the holiday season.
The more physical interaction there is between people, the more the
virus is transmitted. The more outbreaks there are, the more pressure
there is on the hospital sector. Some staff end
up contracting the virus, they have to take time off work and then even
greater pressure is placed on those who remain, with all the consequences that entails. We're also in the
midst of negotiations with the Quebec government for the renewal of our
collective agreement. One of the major problems we have is with private
placement agencies. Historically, these agencies hired nurses at a
better wage than in the public network, with the nurses playing a
filler role. They could work far away from
home or replace nurses on a short-staffed night shift in exchange for
better pay. They were not employed by the government, but by an agency.
Nurses within the public network had better working conditions overall,
however they were paid less. As a result, personnel employed by
agencies represented a small percentage of total staff. There was a
certain balance within the overall network.  When the pandemic
struck, the Legault government adopted ministerial orders, including
Order 007 (March 21), which seriously affect us. It alters collective
agreements and allows the employer to move staff around at will, to
assign them day, evening, night shifts, or full-time work. This
ministerial order only applies to public network employees.
Agency work suddenly became very attractive because the public network
employer, for example, is now able to force a nurse who, over the years,
had gotten a good position in a local community service centre (CLSC)
on the day shift, to work the night shift in a residential and
long-term care centre (CHSLD), then hire a nurse from an agency, paid
more, to work that day shift in the CLSC, without having to work
weekends, nights, etc. There's no longer a balance.
We
are losing a large number of the staff to private placement agencies
who now offer not only better wages, but better conditions. The workers
who leave the public network are coming back to work as agency workers
and choosing their conditions. They can decide, for example, not to
work in the summer, or not to work for two weeks
during the holidays. As for the pension plan, although nurses who leave
have to withdraw from the Pension Plan for Government and Public
Employees (RREGOP), the agencies have increasingly grown and are
offering pension plans. I'm not saying they're comparable to the
RREGOP, but nurses consider that with the difference in wages they can
put money aside for their retirement. This is going
to become a very serious problem for Quebec because as far as our
University Health and Social Services Centre (CIUSSS) is concerned,
during the first wave of COVID-19 we lost around 300 nurses to the
agencies and have lost around 500 in total so far. There's a fear this
phenomenon will become even more pronounced during
and after the holiday season. There's a strong sense of injustice among
our members because nurses hired by the agencies are working alongside
them without being required to do overtime, etc.  This
inequity must be ended so that nurses can be drawn back into the public
network. I'm not by any means blaming individual nurses who choose to
go to work for an agency. However, this creates unfairness and the
system would be much easier to manage if all personnel worked for the
public network. There will always be disadvantages in
the network as the system operates 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
However, the best way is to spread the disadvantages over as many
people as possible.
My other big concern is with
everything having to do with our negotiations with the government. If
the Legault government were to sign a collective agreement acceptable
to us, this would send a positive signal. It would send a signal that
the staff is being listened to and valued. And it would also help curb
the COVID-19 pandemic. Jobs would
be more valued, more people would decide to stay. WF:
Do you want to add something in conclusion? DC:
The risk with Premier Legault's attitude is that we don't look reality
in the face. Although our demands are important, investments in the
health care system must also be increased. For 25 years now,
governments have all been following this zero-deficit line that a
hospital should not spend more than a certain amount of money, and so
on.
The buildings have gotten older and are in worse shape, the number of
patients under each nurse's care has been constantly increased, to the
point that it's becoming unsustainable. We need to broaden the
discussion and increase investments in the entire health care system.
This article was published in
Number 83 - December 10, 2020
Article Link:
The Issue of Private Placement Agencies Must Be Addressed - Interview, Denis Cloutier
Website: www.cpcml.ca
Email: editor@cpcml.ca
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