Manitoba health-care aides perform some of the most intimate and challenging hands-on duties, but they are among the lowest paid in Canada; one who spoke in detail said their union let them down by tentatively agreeing to a four-year, 11.25 per cent wage increase.
Brayden Slipec reached out to the Free Press Tuesday because he wanted to share what the work entails and why he and other support staff, who are represented by Local 204 of the Canadian Union of Public Employees, rejected the latest contract offer.
Slipec, who works in urgent care at Concordia Hospital and the emergency department at St. Boniface Hospital, said aides are at the bottom of the pay scale and need a $6-an-hour increase to have a competitive and living wage.
Ruth Bonneville / Free Press
Brayden Slipec works in urgent care at Concordia Hospital and the emergency department at St. Boniface Hospital: “We have to work a lot harder and a lot longer just to get a decent paycheque.”
“We didn’t go to school for four to 10 years. I do respect that, but because we are on the lower end of that, we have to work a lot harder and a lot longer just to get a decent paycheque.”
Slipec said his job includes everything from changing patient diapers (“We call them briefs. It gives them a little more sense of dignity”) to checking catheters and vital signs during extremely busy times, he said.
At the start of his shift, he stocks IV carts and “resus” (resuscitation) rooms, he said. “If a code happens, it’s going to be disastrous if they don’t have what they need.” A code white is called when a patient is out of control; a code blue is when a patient is dying. Health-care aides may help with both, he said.
The code white can involve a patient with advanced dementia. “We want to make sure that they’re safe,” he said.
“At St. Boniface, we’ll get folks drunk or causing a scene or folks have mental illness or psychosis due to whatever substance — that’s a bit different,” he said.
“At Concordia, as a health-care aide, you’re required when you’re in urgent care to respond to all codes,” he said. “There is some emotional trauma that comes with it, at certain points,” said Slipec.
During a code blue at Concordia, he can perform manual CPR, whereas St. Boniface hospital has an automatic CPR machine, he said.
“We’re not asking for this wage bump because we’re greedy, but we’ve shown through the pandemic we’re willing to work harder and work longer.”–Health-care aide Brayden Slipec
Health-care aides can also escort stable patients who are being transported. For instance, there is no MRI machine at Concordia, so a patient who needs an MRI scan may be transported by stretcher service accompanied by a health care aide. “If the patient’s critical, then paramedics will come and get them,” he said.
“We’re not asking for this wage bump because we’re greedy, but we’ve shown through the pandemic we’re willing to work harder and work longer,” said Slipec.
He voted against the contract offer that was recommended by his CUPE Local 204. It was the same offer rejected by the Manitoba Government and General Employees’ Union, which represents health-care aides in the Prairie Mountain and Interlake-Eastern health regions.
“We need some assurance that we’re going to be OK.”
Slipec said aides’ wages haven’t kept pace with inflation. The average starting wage is $17.07 per hour. Minimum wage is $15.30.
Slipec makes $21.36 an hour and has worked 63 out of the last 70 days at both hospitals but is still considered a 0.7 full-time equivalent, and does not receive full-time benefits.
“Some of those were 16-hour days, some were at the same site. Some were working one shift at St. Boniface, then I’d race down to Concordia to start my next shift,” he said.
“I don’t want to be working my butt off and be in that working-poor category, but some of us are,” said Slipec, who figures his average take-home pay is less than $1,400 biweekly, after deductions.
“That’s not enough,” he said. “I’m working all these hours. How am I not getting more from it?”
At one time, being a hospital aide was considered a well-paying job, but that’s no longer the case, said Slipec.
“I’m very disappointed in both the province and my union,” he said.
CUPE has said bargaining sessions are set for this week and next.
Premier Wab Kinew, meanwhile, sent a message to aides Tuesday by saying he’s got their back.
“I love our health-care aides right across Manitoba,” he said when asked about Manitoba paying them the lowest wage among provinces.
“These are folks who do literal heavy lifting at the bedside each and every day and so many important jobs in the community,” Kinew said at an unrelated news conference in Brandon.
His government has added more aides to the system to lighten the workload and suspended the provincial gas tax to make it less expensive for aides to drive to work, he said.
“Our government has your back and we’re doing a ton of good things for health care aides across Manitoba.”
carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca
Carol Sanders
Legislature reporter
Carol Sanders is a reporter at the Free Press legislature bureau. The former general assignment reporter and copy editor joined the paper in 1997. Read more about Carol.
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