Campaign to maintain quality care for facility residents a success
The 23 care aides at Point Grey Private Hospital — members of the Hospital Employees’ Union (CUPE) who waged a high profile public campaign to keep their jobs and maintain quality care for the facility’s residents — have won their battle after their lay-off notices were rescinded late last week.
“This is a victory not only for the Point Grey care aides and the residents they look after but for quality seniors’ care everywhere in B.C.,” says HEU secretary-business manager Chris Allnutt. “The care aides know that contracting out is a bad decision for the residents because the commitment, stability and high care standards of an in-house workforce can never be duplicated by a low-wage, private contractor.
“It’s clear that upon sober second thought, the skill and experience of Point Grey Private Hospital’s long-serving care aides has been recognized as critical to the health, well-being and comfort of the residents and valuable to the successful operation of the care facility.”
Many of the care aides have worked at the private, for-profit, 51-resident nursing home for more than 20 years and both caregivers and residents consider each other to be “like family”. The lay-off notices caused anxiety and confusion among the facility’s seniors as they faced the loss of familiar and trusted staff.
Allnutt says that seniors across the province are dealing with a variety of upheavals generated by the Campbell Liberals’ reckless changes to health care that include long-term care facility and hospital closures, resident relocation and separation stresses, staffing cuts, reduced public community, home support and medical services, and increased treatment and prescription costs.
“Caring for our seniors should not be an industry where profits are more important than people. B.C.’s elderly deserve the best possible care provided by dedicated staff like the care aides at Point Grey Private Hospital,” says Allnutt.
-30- Contact: Margi Blamey, communications officer, 604-456-7094 or 604-785-5324