Veracity

Veracity

The dictionary describes veracity as follows: conformity to facts; accuracy.  Habitual truthfulness.  Synonyms: truthfulness, accuracy, correctness, exactness, realism, authenticity, faithfulness, fidelity…

And now for the rest of the story:

Some of us have been having conversations with members from our Health Care locals about the impending rationalization votes that are set to take place at some point this year.  We have asked what they believe will be the end results of this quagmire in which we find ourselves. There appears to be a large discrepancy in our members thinking about what these votes mean and the effect they could have on our membership and our collective agreements.  Some believe that there will be no changes and it will be business as usual and others are not sure what this means in the greater picture.  What are we (the MGEU) doing to assist our members in making informed decisions?

What Bill 29 actually says under Article 10(1) and 10(2) under the title “Negotiating a Revised Collective Agreement” is that, “the commissioner must, by order, designate a receiving collective agreement for the bargaining unit.”  Bill 29 then goes on to say under 10(2) Designation, “the commissioner must designate the receiving collective using the following rules:”.  What the rules state without printing them all out is that, “the receiving collective agreement is the one that governed the greatest number of employees at that time.”  We don’t want you to take our word for this, we would encourage all our members to get a copy of Bill 29 and read it for yourselves.  You may download Bill 29 off the internet or maybe we should be asking the MGEU to supply us with a copy.  (your Union dues working for you)

We believe there is a lot at stake here not only for the MGEU but also for our members in the Health Care votes.  An informed decision is a good decision.  We want our brothers and sisters to have the knowledge they need to make a decision that will affect their work lives once this boondoggle is over.  So, after reading all the literature we could find on the subject of The Health Sector Bargaining Unit Review Act – Province of Manitoba as well as all the literature being put out by the various Unions involved there are some conclusions to be made.

We hear that we are voting only on the Union that we feel will best represent us now, and in the future, but there appears to be a lot more at stake here than just this simple explanation.  We are continually hearing that collective agreements don’t matter, however according to Bill 29, COLLECTIVE AGREEMENTS DO MATTER, and it is imperative that all MGEU members know what the largest collective agreement will be, if the MGEU is successful in winning the representation votes in the city of Winnipeg and beyond.

Make no mistake that the largest collective in Winnipeg for the MGEU will be the present Home Care Collective Agreement.  What this will mean to all of our current facility support members is that the MGEU as well as other union members (if we win) will start to bargain from the Home Care Agreement.  This will mean that our members will have to fight for everything they presently have and to hopefully make new gains.  Is this a possibility with our present government who like to slash and burn everything we hold dear?

Let’s look at what other Unions have in way of their largest collective agreements and we may just find that the grass IS greener on the other side.  It appears to us that our claim to fame is the “one day” vacations in our current facility support agreements, but if we win that will be lost.  It should also be noted that Winnipeg is not the only location in the province that the Home Care Collective Agreement is the largest.  So, to our membership be sure you are making the right decision for yourselves when voting.

To our president, it is time to stop telling half-truths to our members and have some veracity in what information you are giving out, our members deserve nothing less!   To our brothers and sisters who will be part of the rationalization votes, do your due diligence!

A final thought.  It is interesting to note that our president says she is a Home Care Attendant from the Southern Health Authority so, one would think that she would have taken more of an interest in the community support bargaining.  She worked hard to establish the one-day vacation for the facility support agreement when she was a member of that group, so why has she not insured our Home Care members have a better collective agreement than they presently enjoy?  Interesting!