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The Hospital Employees' Union Strike and the Privatization of Medicare in British Columbia, Canada

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 October 2007

Benjamin Isitt  and
Melissa Moroz
Benjamin Isitt
Affiliation:
University of New Brunswick
Melissa Moroz
Affiliation:
Canadian Union of Public Employees
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Abstract

In April 2004, the Hospital Employees' Union (HEU) waged an illegal strike that mobilized sections of British Columbia's working class to the brink of a general sympathetic strike. Influenced by BC's class-polarized political culture and HEU's distinct history, the 2004 strike represents a key moment of working-class resistance to neoliberal privatization. HEU was targeted by the BC Liberal government because it represented a bastion of militant, independent unionism in a jurisdiction that appeared overripe (from the neoliberal standpoint) for a curtailment of worker rights and a retrenchment of public-sector employment. HEU also represented a direct barrier, in the language of its collective agreements and collective power of its membership, to the privatization of health services and dismantling of Medicare. The militant agency of HEU members, combined with anger generated by a constellation of social-service cutbacks, inspired rank-and-file workers and several unions to defy collective agreements and embrace sympathetic strike action. This revealed differentiation in the strategy and tactics of BC's labor leadership, and enduring sources of solidarity in labor's ranks.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Labor and Working-Class History , Volume 71 , Issue 1 , Spring 2007 , pp. 91 - 111
Copyright
Copyright © The International Labor and Working-Class History Society 2007

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References

NOTES

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56. “Hospitals: 27 surgeries cut on Island,” Times Colonist, April 25, 2004. This 2003 agreement would have limited contracting out to 3,500 jobs.

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60. “Hospitals: 27 surgeries cut on Island,” Times Colonist, April 25, 2004.

61. HEU Activist interview.

62. Ibid.

63. “The Terms of Forced Return,” Times Colonist, May 1, 2004; “HEU defies work order,” Times Colonist, April 29, 2004.

64. “Jobs on the line,” Times Colonist, April 29, 2004.

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73. Solidarity Vote ballot (2002), CUPE BC, in possession of authors.

74. “UBC Crisis Heats Up,” March 23, 2004, http://www.cupe.bc.ca/1280. CUPE president Barry O'Neill said the strike was “now a dispute between UBC, the government and the 67,000 CUPE members in BC.”

75. CUPE Activist. Interview by authors (hereafter CUPE Activist interview). Digital recording. Victoria, BC. May 20, 2005.

76. Resolution approved at CUPE BC All-Presidents' Meeting, December 15, 2003, Vancouver, in possession of authors.

77. CUPE Activist interview.

78. Ibid.

79. “Notes on CUPE BC conference call,” April 29, 2004, in possession of authors. O'Neill reported that eleven locals were committed to action on April 30 and fourteen more on May 3. Eighteen locals were “not sure,” while another eighteen did not respond. Two unidentified locals said “no” to the request for strike action.

80. “Labour crisis deepens,” “Strike domino topples wide range of services,” and “Tense standoff grips province, unions as 70,000 protest,” Times Colonist, May 1, 2004; “Pickets, Protests and Promises of More to Come,” Sun, May 1, 2004.

81. “Tense standoff grips province, unions as 70,000 protest,” Times Colonist, May 1, 2004.

82. “Strike plans were extensive as other unions were joining HEU,” Vancouver Province (hereafter Province), May 3, 2004.

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85. “Notes on CUPE BC Conference Call,” April 30, 2004, in possession of authors; also “Around the Province,” Sun, May 1, 2004.

86. CUPE Activist interview; see “Tense standoff grips province, unions as 70,000 protest,” Times Colonist, May 1, 2004.

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95. CUPE Activist interview.

96. “BC may avert massive labour shutdown,” Sun, May 3, 2004.

97. CUPE Activist interview.

98. “Deal leaves strikers furious, but union leaders urge return to work,” Times Colonist, May 3, 2004.

99. Muzin interview.

100. “Privatization curbed but BC health care workers still hit hard,” CUPE Press Release, May 3, 2004, http://www.cupe.ca/www/media/health_care_privatiz

101. “Hospital workers feel betrayed” and “Health workers feel ‘sold out’ by their union leaders,” Sun, May 4, 2004; “Hospitals rush to recover,” Times Colonist, May 4, 2004.

102. “Hospital workers feel betrayed,” Sun, May 4, 2004.

103. Ibid.

104. “Some hospital workers remain defiant,” CBC news online, May 3, 2004, http://www.cbc.ca/bc/story/print/bc_heu20040503; “Hospital workers feel betrayed,” Sun, May 4, 2004.

105. “It's time to cool down and focus on the sick,” Sun, May 4, 2004.

106. “Find new ways to resolve disputes: business leaders,” Times Colonist, May 3, 2004.

107. HEU Activist interview.

108. CUPE Activist interview.

109. Muzin interview. At HEU's next regular convention, held in Burnaby in October 2004, fifty delegates questioned the provincial executive's decision to call off the strike. Despite the tense debate, Muzin was re-elected president. Chris Allnutt, secretary-business manager and the union's lead negotiator, resigned prior to the convention. See “Sparks fly at HEU convention,” People's Voice (Vancouver), November 1–15. 2004.

110. McInnis, Harnessing Labour Confrontation, 192–93.