Outaouais’ public health and social services network (CISSSO) will be cutting 196 temporary assignment positions in the coming weeks, Le Droit reported Friday.

The organization insists these cuts will not affect healthcare services, nor make much of a dent in the $90 million it needs to cut to balance its budget by March, but are a necessary first step in reorganizing staffing structures to be more efficient.

There are 2,000 temporary assignments across the healthcare network, used to fill vacancies caused by maternity leaves, sick leaves, or empty positions while a hiring process is underway. They fill all job categories including nurses, technicians, maintenance staff and sanitation staff.

Mathieu Marsolais, director of communications for CISSSO, said of the 196 positions, the majority are orderlies, maintenance workers, sanitation staff, technical employees, and administrative employees.

“It was really, one by one, really analyzing it to make sure that we were able to stop some assignments without compromising the services,” Marsolais told THE EQUITY. He could not confirm how many of these assignments were in the Pontiac.

“I don’t think there will be a lot of impact because we’re keeping 90 per cent of the assignments running. It was an essential first step in a broader process of analysing our staffing structures which will take several months,” he said, emphasizing the main objective was not saving costs.

He said many of those whose position has been cut will be reassigned to one of the many other vacant positions across the network, but this will not be the case for all. Some people, however, will end up on a recall list and likely see a significant reduction of work over the next months.

In the fall CISSSO learned it, along with regional healthcare networks across the province, would have to balance their budgets by March of this year to meet new budget demands from the province’s healthcare authority, Santé Québec.

For CISSSO, this means cutting its projected spending by $90 million, or 6 per cent of its annual budget, in the next two months. While the organization has yet to provide many concrete details about how it plans to find this money back, Marsolais said the cuts to the assignment positions are not part of this project.

“Because the majority of staff will be reassigned, the actual savings won’t be that much, so we’re not counting on that measure to save money,” Marsolais said.

But Karine D’Auteuil, president of the local nurses union, Syndicat des professionnelles en soins de l’Outaouais, sees this as a cost saving measure.

“It’s absurd to see how the government treats the healthcare system like an accounting book,” she said in a French interview with THE EQUITY.

Her union represents about 10 people who will be affected by these cuts. She said the news came as a shock given that Outaouais’ healthcare network is already underfunded by about $200 million every year, according to a study produced by the University of Quebec in the Outaouais.

“These people, the hours that they’re working, their not surplus hours [ . . . ] It’s utopian to think that this will have any impact on the care of the population.”

Jean Pigeon, spokesperson for healthcare advocacy group SOS Outaouais, echoed d’Auteuil’s frustration with the systemic underfunding of the region’s healthcare network.

“We understand that the CISSS de l’Outaouais is forced to meet an obligation imposed by the provincial government, but this measure illustrates once again the scale of the challenges facing our region. With imposed cuts of $90 million and chronic underfunding estimated at $200 million annually, these decisions further weaken a region already in dire straits,” Pigeon wrote in a press release.

The coalition called on the Quebec government to act on a motion unanimously adopted in the National Assembly in Oct. 2019 that recognized the funding inequities faced in the Outaouais region.

“We are pointing the finger at the government, which continues to ignore the crying needs of our healthcare network,” Pigeon added. “This lack of action to correct funding inequities is a missed opportunity to improve accessibility and security of care for Outaouais citizens.”