A couple dozen people participated in a worker rally Wednesday at Bluewater Health in Sarnia.
Local Service Employees International Union (SEIU) spokesman Andy Brake says rallies were being held across the province to demand respect and fairness in negotiations with the Ontario Hospital Association (OHA).
"SEIU represents all your service workers," says Brake. "Emergency response, housekeeping, maintenance, food services workers... a whole wide array of workers here. We have 700 members here at Bluewater Health."
He says their contract expired December 31.
"We're here just to rattle the OHA a little bit. Let them know we won't accept these concessions," says Brake. "We're here to get a fair deal and we're not going to weaken the language of our contract."
Wednesday's demonstrations were jointly organized by SEIU Healthcare, the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), Unifor and the Ontario Council of Hospital Unions.
The unions represent 75,000 workers at 160 public hospitals in Ontario.
