{"id":904302,"date":"2026-09-21T16:43:28","date_gmt":"2026-09-21T16:43:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/904302\/"},"modified":"2026-09-21T16:43:28","modified_gmt":"2026-09-21T16:43:28","slug":"sask-health-minister-says-province-is-focused-on-avoiding-a-health-care-strike-not-preparing-for-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/904302\/","title":{"rendered":"Sask. health minister says province is focused on avoiding a health-care strike, not preparing for one"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Saskatchewan Health Minister Jeremy Cockrill says he’s not surprised by the result of a union vote that shows overwhelming support for job action if negotiations between the government and health-care workers falter.<\/p>\n

“I think it’s important to emphasize that strike votes are typically a part of the collective bargaining process.\u2026 What the results do tell us, though, is there’s a strong desire certainly from members,” Cockrill said in an interview with CBC on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

“The government echoes that sentiment that everybody wants to get to an agreement.”<\/p>\n

Members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 5430 voted 99 per cent in favour of job action, a move the union is calling the “largest strike vote” in Saskatchewan history. Of the 13,492 votes cast, 13,358 were in favour of the strike mandate.<\/p>\n

The local represents more than 14,000 members in clerical, technical, nursing, support and plant operations roles. On Tuesday, union members rallied outside Cockrill’s constituency office in North Battleford.<\/p>\n

Workers are still on the job and another round of bargaining is scheduled for next week. Even with the strike mandate from members, the union will have to sign an essential services agreement with the province to legally strike.<\/p>\n

Cockrill said the province is focused on averting a strike, not preparing for one.<\/p>\n

“Our time is better spent focusing on getting to an actual collective bargaining agreement,” he said.<\/p>\n

CUPE Local 5430 members have been without a contract since March 31, 2023, and have gone more than 4-and-a-half years without a wage increase, according to the union.<\/p>\n

Workers at Tuesday’s rally spoke about cost-of-living pressures and the lack of wage increases that have forced some to leave for other jobs or other provinces.<\/p>\n

\"CUPECUPE 5430 members rallied in North Battleford on Tuesday to demand fair wages and respect for frontline workers. (Jeremy Warren\/CBC)<\/p>\n

The Saskatchewan Association of Health Organizations (SAHO) bargains on behalf of the government.<\/p>\n

“Whether you work in health care or not, we’re all feeling the pressure of cost of living increases. SAHO did offer an interim wage adjustment early on in negotiations that was rejected at the table,” Cockrill said.<\/p>\n

In addition to wage increases and better worker retention policies, the union wants the province to back down from its proposal around worker mobility. SAHO’s latest offer would increase contract staffing and let the employer move workers to another region on short notice to fill short-term vacancies, according to CUPE.<\/p>\n

Cockrill said that’s not entirely accurate.<\/p>\n

“SAHO has been pretty clear that movement of employees would be voluntary. It’s not involuntary, as has kind of maybe been said by some,” he said.<\/p>\n

“The mobility piece has been a priority of SAHO throughout this round of bargaining with all of our union partners and ensuring really at the end of the day that there’s flexibility for the employers to ensure continuity of service for patients right across the province.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to this article Estimated 3 minutes The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":904303,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[49,48,84,392],"class_list":["post-904302","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-health","tag-healthcare"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/904302","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=904302"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/904302\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/904303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=904302"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=904302"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=904302"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}