TORONTO, Jan. 30, 2019 /CNW/ – Canada’s largest union in the private sector supports the rights of all people to access public mental health care free from barriers.
“To mark Bell Let’s Talk Day, I encourage all people in Canada to demand strengthened access to mental health services through our public health care systems,” said Jerry Dias, Unifor National President. “Across the country, health care is in crisis. We must unite to protect this public good.”
In Ontario, Unifor members in hospitals and front line services are facing layoff due to budget shortfalls. According to the Canadian Mental Health Association, 1.6 million Canadians report unmet mental health care needs each year.
Ontario’s Progressive Conservative government says it is committed to strengthening the province’s public health system after the NDP leaked a draft of a government bill that calls for the dismantling of regional health agencies.
The draft bill, which has been confirmed as authentic by the PCs, would dissolve the province’s Local Health Integration Networks (LHIN) and create a “super agency” to oversee the health system.
With a deal set to expire in March, talks for a new collective bargaining agreement between unions and SaskTel kicked off Tuesday in Regina.
But just before that, the national leader of Unifor made it clear they won’t take a government mandated deal.
The province, said Jerry Dias, has mandated crowns give zero percent wage increases in the first two years of a deal, one percent in the third and two in the fourth, something they refuse to accept.
“Free collective bargaining is entrenched in Supreme Court rulings coming from where? Saskatchewan,” he said. “So if we have the right to free collective bargaining, I’m not allowing any government to take it away from us.”
It’s message he relayed to Doug Burnett, the new President and CEO of SaskTel, who confirmed he and Dias met Tuesday.
On January 29, 2017, six worshippers were killed, and many others injured during evening prayer at the Islamic Cultural Centre in Quebec City.
Their names were: Azzeddine Soufiane, Mamadou Tanou Barry, Khaled Belkacemi, Aboubaker Thabti, Ibrahima Barry and Abdelkrim Hassane.
Unifor rejects racism in all forms and remains committed to continuing to work vigilantly against Islamophobia and all hate-based violence in the workplace and the community.
To commemorate this tragic attack, communities across Canada are hosting vigils to remember the victims and stand in solidarity with the community.
Click here for a list of events and memorials taking place in Canadian cities that you may wish to attend.
In solidarity,
Christine Maclin
Director, Human Rights
Le 29 janvier 2017, six fidèles ont été tués et plusieurs autres ont été blessés pendant la prière du soir au Centre culturel islamique de Québec.
Les victimes sont: Azzeddine Soufiane, Mamadou Tanou Barry, Khaled Belkacemi, Aboubaker Thabti, Ibrahima Barry et Abdelkrim Hassane.
Unifor rejette le racisme sous toutes ses formes et continue de combattre avec vigilance l’islamophobie et la violence haineuse en milieu de travail et dans la société.
Pour commémorer de cette tragique attaque, des collectivités d’un bout à l’autre du Canada organisent des vigiles pour se souvenir des victimes et exprimer leur solidarité avec la communauté.
Cliquez ici pour consulter une liste des événements et des activités commémoratives qui auront lieu dans différentes villes canadiennes.
En toute solidarité,
Christine Maclin
Directrice, Les Droits Humains
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OSHAWA — Unifor stepped up its protests against the closure of the Oshawa GM plant with a barricade of GM’s Canadian headquarters on Wednesday.
On Jan. 23 between 5 and 6 a.m. Unifor workers from GM’s Oshawa plant, Durham GM feeder plants and Unifor retirees set up the barricade on Colonel Sam Drive in south Oshawa in front of the Concentrix building just west of GM’s headquarters.
Concentrix workers who showed ID were allowed through while GM headquarters employees were turned away.
Unifor Local 222 president Colin James said the goal was to pressure GM about the decision to close the Oshawa plant at the end of the year.
The head of Unifor has ruled out a potential boycott of General Motors in the campaign to save the Oshawa Assembly Plant.
Speaking at a union rally in front of GM Canada’s Oshawa office, Unifor president Jerry Dias says the union will never call for an outright boycott of GM products.
Autoworkers are rallying outside General Motors Canada headquarters in Oshawa on Wednesday to protest the impending assembly plant closure.
“Workers in Canada will not forgive GM if it continues with the plan to close the Oshawa Assembly Plant and decimate the wider community,” Jerry Dias, Unifor national president, said in a media release.
“For more than 100 years this Oshawa has built and supported General Motors. Today’s actions by Unifor members send the message that GM must reverse the decision to close the plant.”
The jobs of 2,200 Unifor members are on the line with thousands of additional spin off jobs at risk as General Motors (GM) announces restructuring with no product allocated to the Oshawa Assembly Plant past December, 2019. Unless this decision is reversed the plant, which has been manufacturing in Oshawa for 100 years, will close.
Two U.S. assembly plants and two smaller U.S. transmission operations are also threatened but Oshawa will bear the brunt as it accounts for 45 per cent of the workers affected by the restructuring plans.
The head of the union representing General Motors Co. workers in Oshawa, Ont. is urging Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to do everything possible to save the assembly plant, warning that the U.S. automaker is heading for a complete divestment in Canada.
GM is leaving Canada. Its only a matter of time, so we need to stop it today, Jerry Dias, Unifors national president, said in a press conference Tuesday after meeting with Trudeau and a number of federal ministers in Ottawa.
This isnt a situation where you leave GM building one vehicle in Canada, and somehow this is going to end up beautiful at the end of the day.