A second week of negotiations between your multi-union Facilities Bargaining Association (FBA) and the Health Employers Association of BC (HEABC) included negotiations on a number of non-monetary and housekeeping items.

The week concluded with FBA committee discussions on how to increase the participation of Indigenous peoples in the health care workforce.

Those discussions come on the heels of a report issued earlier in the week by the First Nations Health Authority into the death of Keegan Combes, a young man from the Skwah First Nation, after delayed treatment for accidental poisoning.

The report recommends hiring more Indigenous health care workers in order to improve cultural safety for Indigenous patients. Similar recommendations are contained in the 2019 Addressing Racism investigation into anti-Indigenous racism and discrimination in B.C.'s health care system, and in the Calls to Action of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

Recruiting Indigenous health care workers is an important priority for the FBA. It is an important step in our work to address the impacts of colonialism on health care.

Negotiations will resume the week of March 7. All monetary proposals will be tabled later in March, after the majority of non-monetary proposals have been addressed.

Your bargaining committee is working extremely hard through nearly 200 bargaining proposals submitted by local unions and adopted at union bargaining conferences.

In solidarity,

Your Facilities Bargaining Association (FBA)