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Workers rally outside Lethbridge’s Fairmont Extendicare against proposed cuts

LETHBRIDGE, AB – Members of the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees (AUPE) working at Lethbridge’s Fairmont Extendicare facility on the south side took to the streets Wednesday to protest proposed cuts to their working conditions.

The Ontario-based for-profit continuing care company has attempted to cut AUPE wages by 4%, slash health and dental benefits and retirement plans, and reduce sick time by 15%.

Union Vice President, Karen Weiers, says workers will not accept these kinds of attacks after tirelessly keeping others’ parents and grandparents safe from COVID-19 for the past year and a half.

“It’s honestly insulting that Extendicare is trying to attack working conditions at their care homes,” says Weiers.

Weiers and other protesters are urging Extendicare to offer better working conditions, to retain staff and attract more workers, not slash their benefits, which will only “worsen the labour shortage that plagues Alberta’s healthcare system.”

The employer has not yet responded to AUPE’s concerns.

Patrick Siedlecki
Patrick Siedlecki
Pat has been a mainstay in the CJOC News department from the time the station launched in 2007. He's been in the position of News Director since then and has been anchoring daily news casts as well as reporting and working behind the scenes. Community is important to him and keeping CJOC listeners and readers informed about what's happening across southern Alberta and beyond. Pat has been in radio broadcasting for the past 24 years, starting in Port Alberni on Vancouver Island in 1997 and then moving up island to Nanaimo for another few years before heading to Lethbridge in 2007. Pat grew up in the small Saskatchewan farming town of Foam Lake. After high school, he went to Western Academy Broadcasting College (WABC) in Saskatoon prior to moving to the island. Pat also spent several years broadcasting hockey in the BCHL as well as seven years as the radio voice of the Lethbridge Hurricanes in the WHL. Pat has been working at Cornerstone Funeral Home in Lethbridge as a Certified Life Celebrant and Funeral Assistant since 2016. News and sports have always been Pat's passion from the time he was a teenager and he's always been grateful to have had the opportunity to make that part of what's been a fun and long radio career!
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