More than 230 health care workers at West Vancouver’s Inglewood Care Home will face potential layoffs this spring after the company subcontracted to provide staff announced it will end its agreement with the facility’s owner in May.
The move means an uncertain future for unionized staff at the residential care facility.
Most of them are care aides who provide personal care, including help with bathing and dressing, to seniors at the care home.
Now those workers will be laid off when the contract ends and will have to reapply for their jobs.
“They’re shocked,” said Bonnie Pearson, secretary-business manager for the Hospital Employees Union that represents workers at Inglewood. “There is a very high level of anxiety amongst the workers right now.”
The decision to end the agreement by the contracted care provider comes as the union is attempting to negotiate its first contract for workers and after the union issued strike notice in December.
It also comes while the Labour Relations Board has yet to rule on a de-certification vote that has been challenged by the union.
Last month, employees at Inglewood held a rally to protest what they said are low, stagnant wages.
Care aides earn about $16 an hour at the facility — about the same as what they were paid 20 years ago.
Dean Malone, director of operations for Carecorp — which provides services to a number of care facilities throughout B.C. — said the company’s decision to end the contract with Inglewood was unrelated to the union issues.
“It was a business decision,” he said.
None of the employees at the other sites where Carecorp provides support services work under a collective agreement.
Pearson said the changing of contractors is a situation that has been repeated often at Inglewood since workers at residential care facilities lost protection against contracting out of support services.
Since 2003, Unicare — the company that owns Inglewood — has had five different subcontractors providing care at the facility, including three providing personal care to residents, said Pearson.
Each time the contract for support staff ends and is started again with another company, the union's bargaining unit is dissolved and employees must reapply for their jobs.
“It is a rare situation where everyone is rehired,” said Pearson.
While contracting out of services is common at care facilities, the number of contract changes at Inglewood is unusual, said Pearson.
“There’s a real concern about quality of care,” said Pearson. “This is a bit of an unprecedented level of flipping.”
The union is asking Vancouver Coastal Health, which regulates care facilities, to look into the issue of frequently changing contractors at the care home, saying it causes disruptions for both residents and workers.
The health authority pays $11.6 million annually to Inglewood to provide the 235 long-term care beds at the facility.
“We think it’s time they took a look at this operation,” said Pearson.
Viola Kaminiski, spokeswoman for Vancouver Coastal Health, said their staff ensures health, safety and licensing requirements are being met at the facility.
A man who answered the phone at Unicare — a North Vancouver-based company that has owned Inglewood since 1991, along with a number of other seniors care homes — said nobody there was prepared to speak about the contract issue.
