“Pensions and workers’ livelihoods are too important to toy with. We cannot allow workers’ financial security to be used as a bargaining chip by elected officials. Withdrawing from the CPP in favour of a provincial plan carries significant risks and uncertainty. It’s not up to the Premier to gamble with people’s futures, simply because she thinks it might win her political points,” said Bea Bruske, President of the Canadian Labour Congress.

The Canada Pension Plan is tried, true and highly valued by Albertans. For a majority of workers in Alberta and across Canada, the CPP is the only workplace pension they have. In 2016, over two-thirds of Albertans indicated they supported an expanded CPP.

The CPP pays a secure, predictable, guaranteed benefit until death, and the pension is protected against inflation. At a time when fixed retirement incomes and private pensions have been eaten away by higher prices, CPP benefits rose 6.5% in January 2023. The CPP is fully sustainable and is currently being enhanced—it will be there for Albertans, for generations to come.

The CPP is fully portable, following workers wherever they work, regardless of how often they change jobs. Canada has bilateral social security agreements with over 50 countries, to ensure full eligibility for pensionable employment, coordination and
non-duplication. In addition to the retirement benefit, the CPP also includes death benefits, survivor’s benefits, and disability benefits.

“At a time with so much other economic uncertainty, we need to protect and preserve the valuable supports we currently have, like the CPP. We should be working to ensure retirement security for all Albertans and Canadians, not jeopardizing the few secure sources of retirement security workers do have,” said Bruske. “We are committed to working with the Alberta Federation of Labour and our other affiliates in Alberta to ensure workers are well informed on the advantages of remaining within the CPP, as well as the very real risks and disadvantages of withdrawing from it.”

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“We are happy to see the government prescribe a new standard that mean residents should be able to live in long-term care residences where they will receive the care they deserve,” said Bea Bruske, Canadian Labour Congress President. “But today’s announcement provides no mandatory obligation to use the new standard,” added Bruske.

A week from today, the Prime Minister will be meeting with the premiers to talk about health care funding. Canada’s unions believe it is crucial that long-term care be brought entirely into the public system and regulated under the Canada Health Act.

“In the first months of the pandemic, more than 81 percent of COVID-19 deaths were in long-term care and retirement homes. It is a tragedy,” said Bruske. “We need the government to act urgently to put a stop to for-profit ownership of long-term care homes. For-profit long-term care homes have fewer staff, fewer hours of care per resident per day, lower pay, and more job insecurity,” added Bruske.

Another pressing issue is the shortage of staff in long-term care homes. More for-profit residences will not solve staffing issues, they will only take care workers out of the public system into the private sector.

Canada’s unions are urging the government to act on its promise to table a Safe Long-Term Care Act to ensure that seniors are guaranteed the care they deserve, no matter where they live.

“Governments should keep seniors safe by removing for-profit corporations from the sector, requiring proper staffing and health and safety protections for workers, and raising wages and benefits as well as providing pension plans for long-term care workers,” added Bruske. “This is about strengthening and expanding our public care system—ultimately improving access for Canadians.”

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613-526-7426

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The images, the stories, the experiences of our seniors during this pandemic are enough to bring a grown man to tears.

In fact, it has.

Even Ontario’s Premier Doug Ford has, at times, become emotional while talking about the conditions in the province’s long-term care facilities. It’s a dire situation right across the country.

No one is doubting the sincerity of every single politician who is expressing frustration and helplessness at the pandemic’s scourge within these facilities. But we do have to question why it took the global crisis, hundreds of deaths and intervention by the armed forces for the message to finally get through: our system is broken.

It’s a message that unions and advocates have been communicating for decades. Long-term care should never have become the hodgepodge of private-public system it is today. This system has allowed for-profit agencies to take significant control, some of them led by politicians like Mike Harris who handed over 68% of 20,000 new spaces created during his tenure to the private sector. Ironically, Harris is now the Chair of the Board of Directors at Chartwell, a private company that runs many long-term care facilities.

Just over a year ago, the head of SEIU Healthcare joined fellow union members and advocates at Queen’s Park to call for better treatment and pay for workers in these facilities, which receive hundreds of millions of dollars from the government. By the way, the CEOs of these facilities have in the past received more than $9.2 million dollars of public money with nary a peep out of the same Premier who is now upset about the state of things.

The expansive growth of the private long-term care industry has led to a further devaluing of care work and driven down workers’ wages in order to boost corporate and shareholder profits. 

What we are witnessing is no accident. The horrific conditions that frontline care workers now describe occurred in spite of repeated warnings that have persisted for years.

Facilities are led by managers and owners who are looking after the bottom line, not the well-being of some of society’s most vulnerable. This has meant that workers are paid very little, forced to take on multiple shifts at different facilities and paid just under full-time hours so owners avoid paying benefits and therefore failing to adequately care for staff who take care of their clients.

“Private, for-profit services are necessarily more fragmented, more prone to closure and focused on making a profit. The research demonstrates that homes run on a for-profit basis tend to have lower staffing levels, more verified complaints and more transfers to hospitals, as well as higher rates for both ulcers and morbidity,” conclude Pat Armstrong, Hugh Armstrong, Jacqueline Choiniere, Ruth Lowndes and James Struthers in a recent research paper titled Re-imagining Long-term Residential Care in the COVID-19 Crisis.

It’s time to fix what is broken. The only way to do that is to take immediate steps to make private for-profit long-term care facilities part of the public health care system aligned with the principles of the Canada Health Act.

In fact, it is the exclusion from the Act that has allowed for the proliferation of private for-profit care in our country. We have repeatedly called on the federal and provincial governments to stop the funding cuts and to ameliorate the health care system so every Canadian can access vital health care services based on need, not an ability to pay. 

Whether you are worried about a loved one, or whether you or someone you know is one of the invaluable workers caring for Canada’s seniors, this is the solution we need.

Besides, we’re all ageing. Someday, it may be one of us on the other side of the window, looking out at a world that failed us.

Unless we act now.

Hassan Yussuff is the president of the Canadian Labour Congress. Follow him on Twitter @Hassan_Yussuff

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“Gender Equality Week was created to celebrate recent gains while reflecting on the work that needs to be done to improve gender equality and women’s rights across Canada,” said Marie Clarke Walker, Secretary-Treasurer of the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC). “With a federal election underway, we are asking political leaders to take this opportunity to prove their commitment to women’s rights and gender equality.”

Gender Equality Week runs from September 22 to 28, 2019 and was first introduced by the federal government in 2018 through Bill C-309, the Gender Equality Act. This year’s theme is #EveryoneBenefits and is inspired by the vision of a gender equal society and the benefits of advancing gender equality to women, men and people of all gender identities.

“On election day, voters will have the chance to reject the politics of division by voting for a party that stands firmly for gender equality and women’s rights,” said Clarke Walker. “We hope to make that choice much easier by asking candidates to distinguish themselves through concrete platform commitments.” 

The CLC’s plan for “A Fair Canada for Everyone” asks political parties to commit to taking action on five key priorities for working people and their families – actions that can make a real difference for women and help promote gender equality.

Women deserve good jobs, liveable wages and fair working conditions.

Unions are calling for action on pay and employment equity, access to universal, affordable child care and a federal task force on care work and care jobs.

Women deserve opportunities to learn and advance their careers. They deserve adequate support to balance work, family and personal time.

Women should not face barriers in accessing medication.

Many women do not have workplace benefits and face difficult choices when they or a loved one requires medication they cannot afford. Everyone in Canada deserves a universal, single-payer, public prescription drug plan that would guarantee pharmacare for all.

Women deserve retirement security.

Thanks to the persistent gender pay gap, senior women are among Canada’s poorest populations. After a lifetime of hard work (whether paid or unpaid), no one should have to struggle to make ends meet. Action on retirement security means improved Old Age Security benefits and a reformed Guaranteed Income Supplement.

Women must be at the centre of climate action.

The climate crisis will have a disproportionate impact on women and marginalized populations. Smart investments in a clean future will put people at the centre of climate action. Investments in renewable energy, clean technology and green manufacturing can provide a source of good, green jobs for women. Climate action can also include investments in social infrastructure to help create and support good jobs and resilient communities.

Women deserve a government focused on equity and inclusion.

Canadians need a government committed to challenging hate and intolerance in all its forms. They need a government ready to improve our immigration and refugee policies, track and report on hate groups, and commit to strengthening Canada’s action plan against racism.

They also need an action plan to implement the recommendations of the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

“The CLC’s election campaign outlines a plan that would promote gender equality and make a real difference in the lives of women and their families,” said Clarke Walker. “Everyone benefits if we unite together to challenge racism, welcome refugees and support real reconciliation with Indigenous peoples. This election we are demanding fairness.”

This Gender Equality Week, unions are calling on voters to attend local election town halls and debates to ask candidates what their party is prepared to do to promote gender equality and a fairer Canada for everyone.

CLC Secretary-Treasurer Marie Clarke Walker will be hosting a Facebook Live event on Wednesday, September 25 at noon EST featuring a conversation about what is at stake for gender equality in the federal election.

Voters can sign up for real-time election updates from the CLC as the campaign progresses.

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