Tens of thousands of public sector workers took part in a march to protest the government Saturday afternoon.
Many unionized workers in the health care and education sectors and in the civil service have been without a collective bargaining agreement since the end of March. The workers say their budgets are being slashed and negotiations for new collective bargaining agreements are not productive.
“We see what’s going on in the public service. We’re trying to offer service to the public and the government’s saying the cuts are not affecting services. That’s not true,” said David Bernans, a vice-president in the Quebec government professionals union (SPGQ).
While unions say the Liberals’ plan to balance the budget comes at the expense of providing services to Quebecers, Treasury Board president Martin Coiteux said not addressing Quebec’s debt has an adverse impact on service delivery.
“We have to spend $10 billion a year on interest alone. That $10 billion isn’t available for services in the health sector, it’s not available for schools, for universities, it’s not available for an increase in public sector employee’s pay,” he said.
The civil servants are asking for a salary increase of 13.5 per cent, which Coiteux says isn’t affordable right now. But one protester says the government isn't meeting the unions halfway.
“There's no real listening to our solutions, to our offers,” said Martine Robert, who is negotiating on behalf of health care workers.
Vincent Geloso, associate researcher at the Montreal Economic Institute, says Quebec must balance the budget to encourage long-term growth in the province, but he warns the government’s plan to reduce spending increases to reach that goal might not be enough.
“If we look since 2008, most of the balancing has been done through tax hikes so at present it's hard to say what will happen with the announcement that the budget will be balanced next year. It’s very fragile, if something goes wrong with the economy it might return directly in the red zone and not be positive,” he said.
French school teachers held a one-day strike and marched through downtown Montreal Wednesday. The French teachers have already announced two more days of strikes in October and teachers at English boards have voted to take strike action. The Centrale des syndicats du Quebec (CSQ), a union that represents many of the province's teachers, and the Confederation des syndicats nationaux (CSN) unions now both have strike mandates.
