News & Updates

A MESSAGE FROM JEANNE MEYERS, HSA LABOUR RELATIONS AND LEGAL SERVICES HSA REPORT, DECEMBER 2013 As this issue of The Report goes to press, the Health Science Professionals Bargaining Association has reached a tentative agreement for a renewed contract running from April 1, 2014 to March 31, 2019. The proposed five-year agreement has a number of elements that I and...

A MESSAGE FROM HSA PRESIDENT VAL AVERY THE REPORT, DECEMBER 2013 HSA and other unions have been hunkered down in ceaseless and difficult negotiations for almost five years. The effort has expended enormous resources – resources that we need to focus on helping members deal with their daily workplace challenges. So when mediators approached HSA and other unions about early...

HSA REPORT, DECEMBER 2013 BY LAURA BUSHEIKIN By any standards, Edith MacHattie's job is immensely challenging. The school-aged children she works with as an Occupational Therapist at Surrey's Centre for Child Development are the most medically complex kids. "We focus on the most compromised. These are not just kids having trouble with handwriting," she says. "Most are in wheelchairs, some...

HSA members gathered in Richmond last week to consider HSA members’ priorities for the Nurses Bargaining Association. Wages and benefits are the priorities for HSA’s more than 1,400 registered psychiatric nurses who work under the Nurses Bargaining Association collective agreement. Members called for a fix to the Pharmacare Tie-in implement in the 2012-2014 contract, as well as for improved wages...

HSA members gathered in Richmond last week to discuss HSA members’ priorities for bargaining in the Community Social Services sector. Delegates to the bargaining proposal conference reviewed the bargaining proposals submitted by members through chapter meetings around the province. Improved wages and benefits are the priorities for HSA’s almost 800 members who work under the Community Social Services Bargaining Association...

HSA members gathered in Richmond last week to consider HSA members’ priorities for bargaining in the Community Health sector. Wages and benefits are the priorities for HSA’s more than 700 members who work under the Community Bargaining Association collective agreement. Members called for a wage increase on par with the cost of living, and a me-too clause that would ensure...

HSA will hold a telephone town hall meeting on Thursday, December 5, to update members on the tentative agreement reached earlier this month. The phone call is scheduled for 7:00 p.m. PST and will last an hour. You will have an opportunity to hear from your negotiators and ask and hear questions and answers about the contract. It's easy. You...

With more than 1,000 grievances over the implementation of the 37.5 hour work week last year, HSPBA and HEABC have agreed to give jurisdiction to arbitrator Vince Ready to design and arbitrate a process to expedite the grievances. A case management meeting will be scheduled early in the new year, and it is anticipated that hearings will begin shortly thereafter.

John Christopherson has been elected as the Regional Director to represent members from Region 5 on the HSA Board of Directors. Christopherson is a counsellor at the Vancouver Cancer Centre. He has served as an assistant chief steward, as a Constituency Liaison, and as a Member-at-Large and on many union committees, including most recently the Occupational Health and Safety Committee...

Registered psychiatric nurses represented by HSA have a lot of questions about pressure tactics currently employed by the BC Nurses Union and the Union of Psychiatric Nurses. Both BCNU and UPN have recently pressured members already represented by HSA, and we've been getting questions about whether it's possible to cancel these memberships. The deadline is now Depending on exactly when...