Earlier this month, your BCGEU senior leadership met with the newly appointed Minister of Social Development and Poverty Reduction, Nicholas Simons. You may not know this, but he's a former social worker and one-time BCGEU steward. We look forward to working together with Minister Simons to create a culture where our members and their clients can thrive.
 
It was a very positive meeting. We raised key issues we've all been concerned about, including vaccine priority for frontline workers, and ongoing labour relations issues such as recruitment and retention, workload, violence in the workplace and sick benefits for CSS workers.
 
Our meeting concluded with your union leadership expressing tremendous pride in the work you do and noted the need for keeping you safe on the job, not just during COVID-19 time, but always. 

We have requested to the ministry to include our union in discussions related to the issues that matter to our members. We will keep you posted as we build our relationship with the new minister. 

In solidarity, 

Andrea Duncan
Vice-president, BCGEU Component 3