Some 30,000 office workers in the health and social services network are awaiting the settlement of pay equity complaints dating back to 2010 and 2015. According to their unions, thousands of dollars are owed to each of them .
These workers, more than 90% of whom are women, work as administrative officers, medical secretaries, executive assistants, in the health and social services sector.
A petition to support them has just been launched on the site of the National Assembly, on the initiative of the trade union organizations which represent them: the Federation of Health and Social Services (FSSS), affiliated with the CSN, the Syndicat Canada Public Service (CUPE) and the Quebec Service Employees Union (SQEES), both affiliated with the FTQ.
The unions argue that “the tasks and responsibilities related to the job titles covered by these complaints have evolved significantly in recent years” and that the Treasury Board must take this into account in remuneration.
The principle of pay equity is to recognize the true value of typically female work. To do this, jobs are evaluated by weighing several factors. Where appropriate, salary adjustments are made. Subsequently, the maintenance of pay equity is verified every five years.
The unions claim that thousands of dollars would be owed to these workers.
“We saw it in the latest regulations (for other employees), it’s still good amounts that have been made in several job titles. In their case, for sure it would still be thousands of dollars that they have been waiting for. When we have been waiting for 12 years for a salary adjustment, even if it was only 1% that it would give more, we agree that yes, it gives thousands of dollars in return, “explained in interview Mélanie Gougeon, pay equity coordinator for the public sector at the FTQ.
The file is currently in the investigation phase before the Commission for Standards, Equity, Health and Safety at Work (CNESST), since there has been no agreement between the parties.
But as it seems long, the unions want to try to speed up the settlement of the file by discussing with the Treasury Board.
“The door is always open on our side, at union level. We are ready to discuss it. We have made approaches in this regard. We are available to work now to find a satisfactory agreement for (these employees of) category 3 of the health network, ”said Ms. Gougeon.
For its part, the Secretariat of the Treasury Board indicated that there had already been agreements with unions in 2021 and that despite these, certain individual complaints had been maintained.
Now, “thousands of maintenance complaints have been filed, by unions and employees, with the CNESST, which must investigate these complaints and will have to render a decision on them”, added the Treasury.
Given this investigation by the CNESST, the Treasury did not want to comment further.