Paul Bickford
Northern News Services
Published Monday, August 13, 2007

FORT SMITH - Unionized workers at Fort Smith's Trailcross Treatment Centre walked off the job on August 7.

The strike involves 17 workers jointly represented by the Union of Northern Workers (UNW) and the Public Service Alliance of Canada.

Pam Gallant, left, Nancy Devereaux and Shawn Smith, all child and youth care workers, were on the picket line on Aug. 7, the first day of a strike at Fort Smith's Trailcross Treatment Centre. - Paul Bickford/NNSL photo

The full-time and part-time counsellors and support workers took to the picket line in front of the now-empty treatment centre for children, aged 13-16, with social, emotional and/or behavioural difficulties.

The eight children at the facility were placed in foster homes by the Department of Health and Social Services prior to the strike.

The workers said they did not want a strike.

"This is the worst-case scenario, but we feel we've been backed into a corner," said Shawn Smith, a child and youth care worker.

Gayla Wick, the acting president of UNW, was on hand as the workers went on strike.

"I have to say morale is pretty good," Wick said.

That sentiment was echoed by worker Pam Gallant.

"We're focused," Gallant said, adding the workers are a close-knit group.

Issues at hand include wages, retroactive pay, overtime pay, and contract language on compassionate care and sexual harassment.

The workers have been without a new contract for 17 months.

Wick said it is hard to predict how long the strike may last, while adding the union would like to get back to negotiations.

She said that, of the 17 strikers, there are three couples, and only one of the 11 other strikers has another source of income.

The workers will each be receiving $50 a day in strike pay, although Wick said a call will be going out across Canada for other unions to offer more support.

While the strike officially began on Aug. 7, the workers were told by their employer to go home on Aug. 3 because there was no work for them with the children having been removed.

Bosco Homes, the operator of the facility, also served the union with notice of a lockout to begin at the same time as the strike.

"That has to do with wanting a settlement, rather than being jerked around," said G.R. (Gus) Rozycki, executive director and chief executive officer of the Edmonton-based, not-for-profit Bosco Homes. Rozycki said without a lockout, the union could have chosen not to strike until later or have the workers walk off and return to work, only to strike again at another time.

"We're not in the mood for those sorts of games," he said, adding he wants an agreement on a new contract.

"We're certainly disappointed it has come to this," Rozycki said. "We gave it our best shot at the conciliation process."

Last-ditch negotiations on Aug. 1 and 2 between Bosco Homes and the union failed to reach a new contract.

Rozycki said Bosco Homes would be willing to return to talks based on a consensus for an agreement reached on Aug. 1, before he said the union returned the next day with new demands.