Hay River (Oct 30/06) - Striking employees at the NWT's only addictions treatment centre will be taking their case to the NWT legislature today.

Twenty-two staff members at the Nats'ejee K'eh centre went on strike Tuesday morning, Oct. 24.

Today, the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC) union is chartering a plane to fly the employees to Yellowknife, where they will lobby MLAs for support.

Workers are striking because they have gone nearly three and a half years without a collective agreement, according to Todd Parsons, president of the Union of Northern Workers (UNW).

He said employees' patience has run out.

"It's unfortunate it came to this step," he said.

Employees on the picket line echoed this sentiment.

"Our consciences were taken advantage of," said David Poitras, an aboriginal cultural helper at the centre. He said they were close to a strike in 2003, but decided against it.

"We could not leave our clients," he said. "We could not have left and felt good about it."

The main issues in the agreement are wage increases and standardized pay for new jobs.

Employees at Nats'ejee K'eh make from $12.06 per hour as a cook's helper to $24.74 per hour as a treatment team co-ordinator.

The union declined to say what increases were desired.

Melvin Larocque, executive director of the centre, said that he and the centre's six board members have been working "diligently" on a proposal to present to the union.

He could not give a date for the completion of the proposal.

"Hopefully soon," he said. "We're doing some really tight number crunching."

He declined to give details of the offer.

However, Larocque said there are certain demands being made by the union that are unacceptable to the board.

These include paying for employees' gas to get to and from work, as well as paying for employees and their families to fly to Edmonton and back each year.

"We think public funds will be better spent on treatment programming instead of lining the pockets of staff," Larocque said.

The Nats'ejee K'eh centre is a non-profit organization and they have no say over their funding, which they receive from the regional health board, he said.

The five clients who were being treated in the centre have been moved to Action North, a treatment centre in High Level, Alta. They were bussed there on Monday.

Larocque said he then told staff members they could stay for the rest of the day or go home with pay.

Parsons said that constituted an illegal lockout.

Employees were "advised that they were free to go home around two o'clock and told to turn in possessions such as keys," said Parsons. "In essence that was a lockout."

Seventy-two hours notice is required for a legal lockout, he said.

Larocque disagreed. It was just preparation for the strike, he said, adding his actions were approved by the Canada Labour Relations Board. "As far as we know, it's officially not a lockout," said Larocque.

Employees said it was an upsetting day for the clients as well as themselves.

"One started to cry, another was angry, and another gave me a hug," said Poitras.

"I went to my room and I cried," said addictions counsellor Eloise Fineday. "My heart went out to the clients."

Employees have been walking downtown Hay River daily since the strike began. They are collecting signatures for a petition, which they will take with them to Yellowknife. They hope to have 1,000 signatures.