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FIQ (Fédération Interprofessionnelle de la santé du Québec)

Negotiations with the Government: the FIQ is prepared for all possibilities

The recent tour of Quebec health institutions by the members of the Executive Committee of the Federation produced important discussions with the members. What is the current state of the health network? Where are the negotiations at? How do you see things progressing? A number of issues were tackled, thus enabling a better understanding of everyone’s concerns.

Furthermore, the results of this tour have confirmed the findings of a survey carried out a little over a month ago. That, 93% of the healthcare professional members of the Federation maintained their support of their organization’s decision to not accept the government’s offers in June and to not continue the negotiations.

Moreover, a particularly disturbing fact is that if the current negotiations do not resolve the arrangement of work time issue, that 27% of the members are contemplating leaving the profession, 63% of them fear a professional burnout and 59% think that it harms their family life.

With such glaring statistics, how can Yves Bolduc claim that the recent actions by the healthcare professionals are only linked to the bargaining process? They are calls for help, Mister Minister! The healthcare professionals can no longer do it, they are at the end of their rope.

Some of them have refused to go to work, because they know in advance that their team will be incomplete and therefore not enough for the workload and, what’s more, they will have to work compulsory overtime. Go meet these healthcare professionals, Mr. Bolduc, and ask them if their protests are linked to their negotiations. Maybe you will finally understand that it is the only way left for them to make their employer act, so that he actually manages, which is what you pay him to do!

In such a chaotic context, should we see the change of minister for the Conseil du trésor as a glimmer of hope? That is what the FIQ decided to verify. So, the Federation returned to the bargaining table a few weeks ago, because the government agreed to remove certain restrictive pre-conditions that it was imposing.

The Federation will never drop the public and its members. Therefore, it was with a feeling of urgency that the FIQ resumed the talks with the Comité patronal de négociation. It is crucial that solutions be found for the arrangement of work time problems: an element that the government was closed to until now. The FIQ remains optimistic about reaching a settlement, because a failure will penalize the patients, the health network and the healthcare professionals themselves. However, the FIQ is continuing to prepare to offset an eventual halt to the negotiations with the management party. It is prepared for all possibilities.

So, once again, I am calling on the mobilization of the healthcare professionals, members of the FIQ. More than ever, you must make yourselves heard. Do not hesitate to denounce the feeble management in your institutions, whether regarding inhuman schedules or the abusive reliance on private healthcare placement agencies. Do it for yourselves, and also for your colleagues whose health is just as important as that of your patients.