FOR IMMEDIATE
RELEASE April 10, 2006
Support workers at
Community Living Mississauga strike for fairness
MISSISSAUGA – Support workers
at Community Living Mississauga (CLM), members of the
Ontario Public Service Employees Union, went on strike
today.
Fairness for part-timers and
a reasonable wage increase are the main issues in the
dispute, the first strike in CLM’s 26-year history of being
unionized. Two-thirds of the 360 employees are part-timers,
earning less than $15 an hour with no benefits.
Grace Mungal, president of
OPSEU Local 251, is skeptical about the claim from CLM’s
Executive Director Keith Tansley that lack of funding from
the province is the root of the problem.
“If funding were the only
stumbling block, then why didn’t CLM move on issues that
don’t cost it anything, such as scheduling rights for
part-timers?” said Mungal. “I think Keith Tansley and CLM
hide behind the funding problem, when lack of respect for
its staff and the important work we do is the real barrier
to a settlement.”
Mungal pointed out that it’s
difficult for staff to believe that CLM is in a funding
crunch when it has distributed a three-page document in
recent weeks, detailing a planned expansion of services,
including the purchase of more group homes and the rental of
additional office space.
The strike is affecting 1,500
to 1,600 individuals with developmental disabilities in
Mississauga and Brampton. CLM has shut down its day
programs, using managers and scabs to run its group homes
and apartments where 200 individuals with developmental
disabilities live.
“The managers only know these
individuals as a piece of paper in a file,” Mungal said. “In
our opinion, we don’t feel they’re able to provide the care
these individuals need.”
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For more information:
Grace Mungal, OPSEU Local
251 president (416) 697-2510
Pat Honsberger, OPSEU Negotiator, (905) 975-9243
Neil Fraser, OPSEU Negotiator, (289) 260-3520
Community Living Mississauga Strike Index Page
