Council backs union's call for 'living wage'
Burnaby Now
March 11, 2009
By: Christina Myers

A city staff report on the impact of wage cuts in the health-care sector is being sent on to the province.

The report outlines the Hospital Employees' Union's Living Wage Campaign, in which the union protests wage reductions for housekeeping and kitchen staff at B.C. hospitals that came as a result of Bill 29 in 2002.

Those changes included a drop in housekeeping wages from $18.50 to about $10. The union has since negotiated an increase to $13.05 but with no pension and with reduced benefits.

"This is outrageous, the whole thing is outrageous," said Coun. Nick Volkow. "We can't just quietly let it go."

Volkow pointed to the loss of pensions and benefits as having serious impacts.

He also noted that the Living Wage Campaign calls on employers to pay a wage that allows workers to "live with dignity, self-respect and equality."

The report states that a living wage in Metro Vancouver, for a two-earner family with two young children, is a minimum $16.74 per hour for each parent working full-time, based on expenses such as housing, child care, food and transportation.