NEWS & UPDATES
May 25, 2020
Single Site Scheduling Strive Living Society (CSS) Sites - BCGEU
Single Site Scheduling Strive Living Society (CSS) Sites We are writing with important information about scheduling for employees affected by the Provincial Health Officer's Single Site Order. This e-mail applies to you if you work at any of the following worksites: Freedom Place, Hollypark Lodge, or Liberty Place. The Single Site Order restricts workers to working at only one Assisted Living, ...
May 22, 2020
Your union and WorkSafeBC guidance for re-opening - BCGEU
Your union and WorkSafeBC guidance for re-opening Over the past 10 days, your union's executive, component vice presidents and Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) team provided input to the Workers' Compensation Board (WorkSafeBC) as they developed guidance for sectors that are re-opening, as per the B.C. government's Restart Plan. We provided feedback on protocols and best practices to help...
May 21, 2020
Child Care Pandemic Pay - BCGEU
To All Child Care Professionals In our last bulletin to you we remarked on the recent acknowledgement from Premier John Horgan and Minister of State for Child Care, Katrina Chen, about the critically important work you do. Unfortunately, it appears that the competing financial obligations of the provincial government meant that child care professionals were not included as recipients of the re...
May 21, 2020
COVID-19 Update and BC Government Restart Plan for Members in Community Socia...
For some workers in the community social services (CSS) sector, your programs have maintained staffing levels throughout the COVID-19 pandemic; for others, your programs may have closed or changed service delivery methods or you may have been deployed to other programs. In any of these cases, entering this next phase under the BC government's Restart Plan will involve further adaptations and ad...
May 20, 2020
BCGEU releases investor brief calling on Thomson Reuters (TSX, NYSE: TRI) to ...
Ahead of the Thomson Reuters (TSX, NYSE: TRI) annual meeting of shareholders on June 3, 2020, the BCGEU has released an investor brief about its shareholder proposal, raising concerns about human rights impacts at the $8-billion software and media company. The Proposal asks the Thomson Reuters board to investigate and disclose whether it has adequately assessed and mitigated the reputational an...
May 19, 2020
Provincial government announces details of pandemic pay program for essential...
In mid-April the federal government announced it was working with the provinces on a cost-shared, temporary "pandemic pay" program to top up the wages of select essential frontline workers-under the cost-share, the federal government is responsible for 75 per cent of the funding and the provincial governments are responsible for the remaining 25 per cent. Ever since the initial announcement, yo...
May 19, 2020
BCGEU calls for expansion of B.C.’s pandemic pay program for essential workers
BURNABY, B.C. – Today the B.C. government released long-awaited details of a federal-provincial cost-shared pandemic pay program to temporarily top up the wages of some essential workers. The B.C. Government and Service Employees' Union (BCGEU) is calling on Victoria to expand the program to cover more essential frontline workers.
"The BCGEU pushed hard for this program to cover the broadest po...
May 19, 2020
COVID-19 Update and BC Government Restart Plan - BCGEU
Greetings to my fellow early childhood educators. Hopefully you saw Premier John Horgan's press conference on Friday announcing that childcare and education are entering Phase 2 of the government's Restart Plan. In that announcement, both the Premier and Minister Katrina Chen, Minister of State for Child Care, acknowledged the vital work performed by early childhood educators and child care pro...
May 12, 2020
May is child care month- thank you for all that you do! - BCGEU
May is child care month- an opportunity to honour the many professionals that work in early learning and child development.As an early childhood educator and activist, I've worked with many of you to advocate, agitate and fight for a child care system that works for everyone- for families, for children and for workers. And we have made some real progress with new supports and solutions.The last...
May 11, 2020
Fair Wages COVID-19 Update, Sectoral Component 3 - BCGEU
On April 24th we updated you about the efforts we have been making with respect to ensuring that you are safe while you are at work and also ensuring that you are fairly compensated for the important work you do each and every day in the community social services (CSS) sector. We know that you provide care and support to some of the most vulnerable members of society in British Columbia and the...
May 07, 2020
The Provincial Spring 2020 - BCGEU
Check out the latest issue of The Provincial
This issue has updates on our union's Equity, Inclusion & Diversity Strengthen All of Us roundtable, our COVID-19 information hub, the fight against massive rent increases and our union's new Affordable BC podcast. UWU/MoveUP
May 07, 2020
Restarting B.C. -- your rights and union news - BCGEU
Restarting B.C. -- your rights and union news
Yesterday B.C. was full of cautious anticipation as Premier Horgan announced the steps we'll be taking to restart the province safely.Throughout the past two months, many BCGEU members have been on the front lines of the pandemic, limiting the spread of COVID-19. At the same time, countless others have been providing vital public services that keep ...
May 05, 2020
Sign our petition to end for-profit seniors’ care in B.C. - BCGEU
Right now, 79 per cent Canada's COVID-19 deaths are connected to long-term care facilities and make up the majority of deaths in B.C. Many seniors and elders have faced the end of their lives alone and their families have been left to pick up the pieces. We have known since the start of this pandemic that elderly people are most at risk, but we knew the senior's care sector was in crisis long b...
May 01, 2020
A May Day message from President Stephanie Smith - BCGEU
May 1st is International Workers Day. Historically, it is a commemoration of the Haymarket affair, a rally that took place in Chicago on May 4, 1886 in support of a general strike for an 8 hour workday that had happened in communities across the United States three days prior. At the time workdays of up to 16 hours were normal-as were six-day workweeks, child labour, and workplace deaths and in...
April 30, 2020
Community Social Services workers delivering essential services every day - B...
Send us a photo of you at work! To tell the story of the important work that all of you continue to do, we have been running a very successful campaign on social media with BCGEU members sharing photos of themselves at work. We'd love to hear from you in Community Social Services!Please participate in our social media campaign by providing a photograph of yourself at work performing your essent...