Around a hundred members of the Alliance of Professional and Technical Personnel in Health and Social Services (APTS) chanted “Santé Québec, this is not a gift” as they demonstrated in front of the offices of the new Health agency Quebec, Monday morning, in Montreal.
Updated yesterday at 3:52 p.m.
Katrine Desautels
The Canadian Press
The arrival of Santé Québec, which is now responsible for coordinating the operations of the health network, is causing discontent among large union organizations.
Monday’s mobilization aimed to denounce the establishment of the new state company which was made official on Sunday. “And today, from the first day, where are we? Well, the plane is still being built in mid-flight,” said the national representative of the APTS for the North of the island of Montreal, Sabrina Caty.
In the form of Christmas gifts, APTS members wrote down the wishes they have for the health network, starting with the wish that it remain public.
Speaking on behalf of all sectors of the city, Mr.me Caty read some of these requests, in particular to decentralize the network, to respect the autonomy of workers and to better promote the profession.
“We want our employers to be human. Enough of the bureaucracy and useless paperwork, we want to be able to provide human services and have our expertise recognized,” read Mme Caty upside down from a gift box.
A few moments after listing the wishes of its members, the APTS staged the famous character of the Grinch who came to ruin Christmas presents by throwing them in the air and stomping on them.
The APTS believes that the Legault government “turns a deaf ear to the wishes of workers in the health and social services network.”
Mme Caty gave a speech which seemed to motivate her troops, who sometimes shouted encouragement, sometimes booed remarks quoting Geneviève Biron, the president and CEO of Santé Québec.
« Mme Biron calls this administrative integration. It’s still a funny word to say “scrap” the network once again with a useless reform,” declared M. in front of the demonstrators.me Caty.
The APTS strongly criticized the 1.5 billion cuts recently announced by the government. “It’s a record effort that we’re asking of a network that’s already exhausted. As needs increase, establishments, CISSSs and CIUSSSs are asked to reduce, cut and freeze. And as if that were not enough, this extreme centralization makes Santé Québec a disconnected structure where decisions are made really far from the floor, without consultation with workers,” denounced M.me Caty.
For their part, it was by launching an advertising campaign that the Fédération de la santé du Québec (FSQ-CSQ) and the Centrale des syndicats du Québec (CSQ) chose to demonstrate their reluctance.
In their opinion, the arrival of Santé Québec will have little impact on care for the population, unlike the cutbacks and hiring freeze imposed by Quebec.
At the Confederation of National Trade Unions (CSN), we are talking about “chaos predicted”. The center believes that the birth of the agency is accompanied by a “cloud of uncertainty” and “improvisation” in a context of budget cuts.
Santé Québec is now the sole employer of 330,000 workers in the health network. She will have to coordinate the operations of the Quebec health network, notably surgeries, emergencies and budgets, in addition to being responsible for attracting and retaining staff.
The Minister of Health, Christian Dubé, reiterated last Friday that he would remain accountable for “the results to Quebecers”. He emphasized on the X platform that Santé Québec is one of the 50 measures of his Health Plan “which aims to separate operations from orientations, as several experts have recommended over the years.”
In an open letter published last weekend, Mr.me Biron acknowledged that the transformation of the health network “will realistically require a few years.”
However, she assured that it is “possible to do better”, in particular by gaining mobility, eliminating duplication of tasks, as well as sharing tools and best practices even more effectively.
With information from Mathieu Paquette.
The Canadian Press’ health content receives funding through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. The Canadian Press is solely responsible for editorial choices.
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