FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS: 2024 HSA Annual Regional Meetings and Bargaining Proposal Conferences

HSA is divided into 10 geographic regions. Every member belongs to a worksite-based chapter, and chapters are assigned to a region. The Regional Meeting is an annual meeting held in the fall, bringing together members from throughout the region. The regional meeting is an opportunity for attendees to receive updates on the work of the union. There will be reports from the President, the Regional Director, who represents members of the region on the board of directors, and staff. Updates and information is also shared by lead stewards from worksites around the region, as well as union activists: Members-At-Large, Constituency Liaisons and Labour Council Delegates.

In 2024, delegates to the Regional Meetings who are covered by the HSPBA collective agreement also elected delegates to the HSA HSPBA Bargaining Proposal Conference.

Lead stewards are automatic delegates to your region’s Regional Meeting.  If your chapter has more than 49 members, then additional members can be elected as delegates to attend. Chapters hold local meetings to elect delegates to attend and participate in the Regional Meeting. Contact your local lead steward for information about a local meeting to elect delegates. 

You can find your lead steward's contact information on the HSA website here: https://hsabc.org/find-your-steward

The HSPBA Bargaining Proposal Conference (BPC) was a three-day meeting held in Burnaby in November 2024.  At this conference, all bargaining proposals submitted by chapters across the province were discussed and prioritized by the delegates to this conference. In addition to setting the bargaining priorities, delegates to this conference elected HSA members to serve on the Bargaining Committee, which participates in face-to-face negotiations with the employer.

Members who were wished to attend the HSPBA Bargaining Proposal Conference, submitted brief written statements. Members attending regional meetings received all candidates’ statements and voted for the candidates they wished to send to the Bargaining Proposal Conference.  The number of delegates to the Bargaining Proposal Conference varies based on the number of members in the region.

HSPBA Bargaining Proposal Conference Delegates attended the Bargaining Proposal Conference in November 2024, where they reviewed and discussed all HSPBA Bargaining Proposals received from chapters across the province. They also set the prioritities for bargaining and voted to elect the members of the Bargaining Committee as part of the business of the Bargaining Proposal Conference.

By necessity, the details of negotiations must be treated as confidential. That’s because contract negotiation is set up as an adversarial process, with the employer on one side, and the union, representing the members, on the other side. The union is given no information about the priorities and conditions the employer will bring to the table. And if the employer were to have advance knowledge of what proposals we plan to bring to the table, and which of these are more important than others, they would have a significant tactical advantage.

The members who developed these proposals at chapter meetings also elected representatives who gathered at the bargaining proposal conferences earlier this month to discuss and debate the exact order of priorities. Those members have been instructed to keep these decisions confidential for the reasons above, but if you’d like to know more about the general direction of the decisions coming out of these deliberations, you can always talk to your steward or the local delegate to the bargaining proposal conference.

During the negotiations themselves, which are expected to begin sometime around the March 31, 2025 expiry of the current agreement, members will be kept up to date with regular bulletins. Those bulletins, however, will need to steer clear of information that could tip off the employer, so we will only be able to communicate general developments.

The HSPBA Bargaining Committee is composed of two members of the union’s Board of Directors, and members who are employees of each Health Authority, along with a delegate to represent members working for affiliate employers.  Along with the Lead Negotiator and other staff, the committee negotiates the next contract with the employer. The union bargaining committee is guided by the bargaining proposals and priorities set members at the Bargaining Proposal Conference.

The following member representatives were elected to the bargaining committee:

• Doug Herasymuik (Affiliated Employers)
• Jason Tan (Fraser Health Authority)
• Tiger Ye (Interior Health)
• Kyle Collins (Island Health)
• Mandi Ayers (Northern Health Care)
• Kirn Sanghera (Providence Health Care)
• Keiran Shoker (Provincial Health Services Authority)
• Gita Joshi (Vancouver Coastal)

Two members of HSA’s Board of Directors will also sit on the negotiating committee:

• Brooke Carter
• Jing-Yi Ng

The members at the Bargaining Proposal Conference elected the bargaining committee. 

You do not have to be a delegate to the Bargaining Proposal Conference to run for the bargaining committee, however it is strongly recommended that members who wish to serve on the Bargaining Committee attend the Bargaining Proposal Conference as delegates, as the discussion and deliberations at the Bargaining Proposal Conference are valuable information that informs the bargaining committee about the issues and priorities HSA members want their representatives in negotiations to focus on.

Any member may submit a nomination. All nominations were circulated to Bargaining Proposal Conference delegates responsible for electing HSA members to the Bargaining Committee. The deadline for written nominations was 5 p.m., Monday, October 28.

In addition to the HSPBA Bargaining Proposal Conference, HSA held a Bargaining Proposal Conference for members covered by the Community Social Services, Community Health, and Nurses collective agreements. Negotiations for those contracts are not led by HSA, but by the union with the most members covered by the collective agreement. However, HSA has representation on the bargaining committee to ensure that HSA members’ interests are well represented in contract negotiations.

A joint Bargaining Proposal Conference for members covered by these collective agreements was held October 28-30, 2024. Delegates to this Bargaining Proposal Conference elected member representatives to serve on their respective Bargaining Committees:

Nicole McIntosh was elected to serve on the negotiating committee for NBA members. McIntosh has been an RPN for 19 years with Providence Health Care and worked in both Acute Adult Psychiatry as well as Geriatric Psychiatry. She has been a steward for 16 years, most recently as a steward at large for Providence Health Care, and current serves on HSA’s elected Board of Directors. This will be McIntosh's third time representing HSA members on the NBA negotiating committee.
 
Nancy Martin was elected to serve on the negotiating committee for CBA members. Martin is an employment placement specialist at Open Door Group in Sechelt and has worked as a general site steward, OHS steward and assistant lead steward.
 
Dawn Marie Goodmurphy was elected to serve on the negotiating committee for CSS members. Goodmurphy is a youth outreach worker at John Howard Society in Campbell River. A lead steward for 9 years, she is also the member at large for Region 1, and served at the bargaining table in the last round of contract negotiations.

Regional Meetings are open for participation by delegates of members from every HSA worksite, including private sector employers. 

The bargaining cycle for private sector employers does not line up with the public sector contract negotiations, so there is no need for a Bargaining Proposal Conference for members working for private sector employers at this time.

The final deadline was October 3, 2024.

Any member can stand for election to be part of the bargaining committee for their collective agreement. All nominations will be circulated to bargaining proposal conference delegates responsible for electing members to the bargaining committee. 

Delegates to this Bargaining Proposal Conference elected member representatives to serve on their respective Bargaining Committees:

Nicole McIntosh was elected to serve on the negotiating committee for NBA members. McIntosh has been an RPN for 19 years with Providence Health Care and worked in both Acute Adult Psychiatry as well as Geriatric Psychiatry. She has been a steward for 16 years, most recently as a steward at large for Providence Health Care, and current serves on HSA’s elected Board of Directors. This will be McIntosh's third time representing HSA members on the NBA negotiating committee.
 
Nancy Martin was elected to serve on the negotiating committee for CBA members. Martin is an employment placement specialist at Open Door Group in Sechelt and has worked as a general site steward, OHS steward and assistant lead steward.
 
Dawn Marie Goodmurphy was elected to serve on the negotiating committee for CSS members. Goodmurphy is a youth outreach worker at John Howard Society in Campbell River. A lead steward for 9 years, she is also the member at large for Region 1, and served at the bargaining table in the last round of contract negotiations.

Attend your local chapter’s bargaining proposals meeting. After it is discussed, members at the meeting will vote on the proposals, and proposals that are supported will be forwarded for discussion at the Bargaining Proposal Conference.

Individual proposals are not accepted. All proposals must be voted on and supported by members at local HSA chapter meetings before being forwarded to the union office for discussion at the Bargaining Proposal Conference.

If there are no HSA stewards at your worksite, contact the HSA office at @email for support to organize a membership meeting at your worksite to discuss and vote on bargaining proposals.

HSPBA: October 11, 2024

CSS/NBA/CBA: October 4, 2024

In addition to the chapter meetings for bargaining proposals, HSA conducts member surveys to inform delegates to the Bargaining Proposals Conferences about members’ priorities for bargaining. The surveys are conducted annually, with the most recent fielded in May 2024.

The Joint Health Science Benefits trust (JHSBT) was established April 1, 2017 to provide employee benefits to members of the Health Science Professionals Bargaining Association (HSPBA) and their dependents.  The Trust receives negotiated funding from employers and some contributions from employees, which it holds in the Trust fund for the purpose of providing group health and insurance benefits to eligible employees, their eligible dependents and beneficiaries. This change removed the provision and structure of health and welfare benefits from the HSPBA collective agreement.

The only area of negotiation through HSPBA collective agreement bargaining is related the level of funding to cover the health and welfare benefits provided by the Trust. (i.e., does more funding need to be negotiated to cover the cost of providing health and welfare benefits)

Any proposals related to health and welfare benefits submitted to the November Bargaining Proposal Conference will not be considered to take forward to HSPBA contract negotiations, but will be forwarded to the JHSBT Trustees for consideration. 

HSPBA has representatives on the joint Trust whose responsibility it is to represent the interests of members.

Stewards were sent an email bulletin with instructions for submitting bargaining proposals.