Employment security will enhance stability and quality services for the people who need them in a time of tremendous change and government cuts. The Health Sciences Association and other unions representing more than 15,000 community social services workers have made employment security and continuity of services a centrepiece of the bargaining associations proposals at the bargaining table. 

The unions' proposals on employment security include:

The Health Sciences Association is adding the unions voice to concerns raised by a group of concerned advocates for community living services and supports.

A new poll conducted for The Roundtable of Provincial Social Service Organizations confirms British Columbians support for restoring funding to community social services.

According to the Angus Reid poll, 65 per cent of British Columbians surveyed agreed current funding levels are too low for community social services such as daycare; seniors care, employment services, supports to families and children, help for vulnerable populations, and adult residential care.

Elections will be held during the next  six  weeks to select members to fill the following HSA positions for the coming year:

1. Chief Steward
2. Assistant Chief Steward
3. General Stewards
4. Occupational Health & Safety Stewards and
5. Labour Council Delegates (for chapters that are, or wish to become, affiliated to their local labour council).

In a unanimous vote last night, Vancouver City Council passed a motion calling for the restoration of the outpatient Domestic Violence Program at Vancouver General Hospital.

VGH closed the clinic in a surprise move this summer, with no consultation with emergency room staff or with the community.

HSA Region 4 Director Brendan Shields spoke in support of the motion on behalf of the union.

HSA has contracted with Viewpoints Research to conduct a survey of HSA members on issues related to current contract negotiations.

Your feedback is important and valuable to your bargaining committee. 

If you are contacted by Viewpoints Research in the coming week, we encourage you to participate in the telephone survey, which will take approximately 20 minutes to complete.

Please contact Miriam Sobrino at msobrino@hsabc.org at the HSA office if you have any questions or concerns.

Fraser Health Authority announced last week that it is reducing the number of Registered Psychiatric Nurses and RNs caring for seniors in residential care.

FHA is laying off approximately a dozen Registered Psychiatric Nurses, among more than 100 nurses to be laid off in FHA-owned and -operated facilities.

The FHA layoffs affect RPNs and RNs at these sites:

Hundreds of HSA members across the province participated in Sunday's Run for the Cure. Charmaine Nathan (medical radiation clinical educator, St. Paul's Hospital) brought her daughter. Send us yourphotos! If we use your photo on our website or in The Report magazine, we'll send you a gift package.

Send your photos to jdavis@hsabc.org 

Labour adjustment agreement reached in consolidation of diagnostic imaging services throughout Lower Mainland

HSA has completed negotiations with Lower Mainland health authorities for a transition to a region-wide consolidation of diagnostic imaging services. The agreement allows for the significant restructuring of services without displacements and layoffs of diagnostic imaging staff.

The fifth annual Sisters in Spirit Vigil will take place October 4 across Canada to honour murdered and missing Aboriginal women and their families.

Sisters in Spirit (SIS) is an initiative launched by the Native Womens Association of Canada (NWAC) to address the issue of the hundreds of Aboriginal women and girls who have either disappeared or have been found murdered in Canada over the past few decades. The SIS initiative has worked to identify root causes, trends and circumstances of violence that have led to these disappearances and deaths.