At least three techs still pursuing positions elsewhere
The union representing medical imaging technicians in the Outaouais has confirmed three of the technicians currently working in the Pontiac who had recently applied to higher paying positions in Gatineau and Ontario still plan to pursue these positions despite last week being offered salary bonuses intended to keep them in the Pontiac.
On Thursday, Gatineau MNA Robert Bussière announced via social media that the province had arrived at a new agreement with the Alliance du personnel professionnel et technique de la santé et des services sociaux (APTS).
In this two-year agreement, full-time imaging technicians in Pontiac and Wakefield hospitals will receive $18,000 bonuses as well as a 10 per cent salary increase during the summer period if they agree to work two and a half extra hours every week.
Part-time workers, of which CISSSO has said there are two in the Pontiac, will be eligible for these salary incentives if they make themselves available for 37.5 hours of work a week.
Technicians in the Pontiac and Wakefield hospitals were excluded from receiving these bonuses twice this spring, first when the province offered $22,000 bonuses to technicians in Hull and Gatineau hospitals in an effort to keep some of them from leaving for higher paying jobs in Ontario, and a second time when the province offered $18,000 bonuses to technicians in Maniwaki and Papineau hospitals to keep them from chasing the bonuses in Hull and Gatineau hospitals.
Late last month, after Wakefield and Pontiac were excluded a second time, CISSSO told THE EQUITY five of the six full-time technicians working in the Pontiac had applied to higher paying positions elsewhere.
After much outcry from local politicians, including Pontiac MNA André Fortin and MRC warden Jane Toller, as well as from community groups Pontiac Voice and newly formed healthcare advocacy coalition SOS Outaouais, the province decided to include Pontiac and Wakefield technicians.
But in a phone call to THE EQUITY on Monday afternoon, Christine Prégent, Outaouais representative for APTS, said the union is already seeing evidence that the $18,000 is not enough to keep some of the workers in the Pontiac.
“In Shawville, we’ve now succeeded at contacting three of the five technicians, and those three have told us that they will still exercise their move,” Prégent said in French, noting the $4,000 difference between bonuses offered to workers in urban and rural hospitals has left many technicians angry.
“For them, they are doing the same work as those in the urban centres, and should have equity when it comes to the new financial measures.”
On Friday Warden Toller celebrated the news of the extension of the bonuses to include the Pontiac in a Facebook post.
“It is believed now that we will have stability with our workers and medical imagery for all the Outaouais region!” Toller wrote.
But in a phone call to THE EQUITY, she acknowledged technicians would still have reason to follow through on their plans to take still higher paying positions in Ontario and Gatineau.
“I hope they will stay with us,” Toller said. “But at the end of the day, you can’t blame anybody for wanting to earn more money. What I do hope is that [the technicians] will know that André Fortin and I and the Council of Mayors are going to press very hard in this next year for this salary differential to be erased. We need the salary to be the same because a salary has the pension attached to it.”
Prégent confirmed these bonuses and temporary salary increases will not change how the technicians’ pensions are calculated.
“It is necessary we find a way to make permanent these measures,” she said in French. “Otherwise we’re going to find ourselves in the exact same situation two years from now, when these temporary measures end.”
