ATHABASCA – Members of the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees began a legal strike at an Extendicare continuing-care facility in this northern Alberta community today.

The approximately 30 members of AUPE Local 2424/009 took strike action as "a painful last resort" after months of negotiation with their Toronto-based employer proved fruitless, AUPE President Dan MacLennan said today.

"Residents and their families know our fight is not with them," MacLennan said on the picket line in Athabasca this morning. "Our fight is with a skinflint, Ontario-based company that doesn’t appear to care about its employees, its residents or the community they live in.

"Private, for-profit health care companies like Extendicare are being held up by some as a solution for the problems of the health care system," he said. "From what we have seen in this round of negotiations, companies like this should have no place in health care reform."

MacLennan said it is particularly troubling that the provincially funded Aspen Health Region is using Extendicare as a contractor and has done nothing to try to get it to take a more reasonable bargaining position.

The Extendicare/Athabasca employees have gone without a raise since 1998 and they have worked without a contract since July 2000, said AUPE Union Representative Steve Nimchuk.

In October 2001, they voted 100 per cent to strike if necessary to get a fair contract, but have continued trying to negotiate since then.

Nimchuk noted that Extendicare’s employees in Athabasca are being paid less that others doing the same work in the same community and other Extendicare employees in nearby communities.

MacLennan told the striking AUPE members their union is determined to see they get a fair contract and will do whatever it takes to get one.

For more information, contact:

Dan MacLennan, President, AUPE, 780-930-3301 or 780-910-8392 (cellular phone)
Steve Nimchuk, Union Representative, AUPE, 780-930-3341 or 780-919-4831 (cellular phone)
David Climenhaga, Communications Director, AUPE, 780-930-3311 or 780-717-2943 (cellular phone)

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