Daycare workers unionized with the CSQ have voted 85 per cent in favour of a “progressive strike” mandate.
The strike would start with the Centres de la petite enfance (CPEs) or public daycares, opening half an hour later than usual, then one hour, then two hours and so on, to reach half a day.
However, no strike notice has yet been issued, said Valérie Grenon, president of the CSQ-affiliated Fédération des intervenantes en petite enfance (FIPEQ), in an interview on Tuesday.
There are 3,000 FIPEQ union members working in daycare centres in the Montreal, Montérégie, Laval, Lanaudière, Abitibi-Témiscamingue, Chaudière-Appalaches, Quebec City and Eastern Townships regions. They are not all the CPEs in these regions since other union organizations are also represented there.
“This progressive strike mandate will be used as needed, depending on the progress of negotiations,” said Grenon.
There’s no question of an indefinite general strike “for the moment,” she added.
“We just wanted to start gradually, to slowly put pressure on employers and the government. If we have to go there, we’ll go there, but I don’t have that mandate in my pocket. And we haven’t scheduled any meetings to get it for the time being either,” she added.
Quebec is offering childcare workers a 12.7 per cent increase over five years. Given the shortage of workers in this field, it is trying to “optimize” the staff already in place to meet needs.
“The big issue is really workforce retention. They want to optimize the workers who are already overloaded to solve the labour shortage, which means reducing leave and increasing the tasks that workers already have in place. So, their solution is just going to exhaust our workers even more and make them leave the network. And we can’t afford to lose anyone at the moment,” explained Grenon.
Negotiations have only just begun, although the collective agreements expired on March 31, 2023.
–This report by La Presse Canadienne was translated by CityNews