...About the Decent Work and Health Network?

Transcript (PDF) available here.

We're back with a guest episode including friend of the pod, Yasmin, who joined us to talk about health care services, "post"-COVID, her work with the Decent Work and Health Network, and so much more. Yasmin shares her experiences with COVID as a health care worker in Ontario, we get to talk about how capitalism has broken everything, but do share some good news through the strides made by the Network. We hope you enjoy. <3

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Do The Kids Know? is a monthly series of discussions between community workers and educators, Prakash and Kristen, that unpack race, media, popular culture, and politics in KKKanada (That’s Canada spelled with three K’s) from an anti-colonial perspective.

Our goal is to bring nuance to sensationalist media as well as to uncover the ways in which white supremacy, capitalism, and colonialism is shaping our movements and behaviours. 

Keep tuning in to be a part of the conversation… don’t be a kid who doesn’t know!

Find us: @dothekidsknow (Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, TikTok)
Email us: dothekidsknow@gmail.com
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Artwork by Daniela Silva (instagram.com/danielasilvatrujillo)
Music by Steve Travale (https://stevetravale.com)

DTKK is recorded on the traditional and unceded Indigenous lands of the Kanien’kehá:ka and Algonquin Nations. We are committed to working with Indigenous communities and leaders locally and across Turtle Island to fight for Indigenous rights, resurgence, and sovereignty. 

Until next time. Stay in the know~!

Transcript

Prakash  0:16  
Hey kids, and welcome back to Do the Kids Know? This is the show where we talk about race, media, politics, and pop culture, in triple K Canada. This week, Kristen and I were joined by our friend Yasmin, from the Decent Work and Health Network, to talk to us about the state of health care services in Ontario, and the fight to make those working conditions better for healthcare workers across the board. We are going to jump straight into the episode without further ado, apologies for some of the audio issues. Regardless, it's a really good episode. So I hope you stay tuned. 

Yasmin  0:54  
So I don't know if I should like introduce myself a bit. 

Kristen  0:57  
Oh, my God. Yeah, we should do that. First. I'm like, we know who you are. So obviously, they know who you are. 

Yasmin  1:01  
I'm like, just like, Yes, I'm here. So I am a health and health worker, based in Toronto. And I am a speech language pathologist working in the public sector in the hospital, which has been challenging to say the least during COVID. We were the COVID relief hospital in the province. So that's been kind of most mostly what I've been doing in the health field for the past five years, or four years, I guess. And yeah, newer to Ontario. So I guess it's like important, as like a preface that I didn't know Ontario very well, before I moved here. And I know both of y'all are from here. And when I left Montreal, you were both like, are you sure? 

Prakash  1:58  
It was a choice. Yeah.

Kristen  2:00  
We did ask, yeah. Yeah, we did. 

Yasmin  2:02  
And this was like before COVID. This was like, are you sure you want to move to Ontario and I was like, Yeah, I'm from the East Coast. I'm just gonna keep moving more west. And so I've been here and slowly through just like not having adequate paid sick days at work while living through a pandemic and working like, with COVID patients coughing all over me. And just like everyone's sick, and then just seeing just, you know, people being so burnt out in the, in healthcare, I was also feeling so frustrated because I didn't know a lot about the laws. I wasn't into the politics. I didn't know what was going on. And so I by chance, found an online organizing meeting. Because everything switched to online with the Justice for Workers through the workers Action Center in Toronto, incredible community of organizers and activists who are really fighting the big fight for for decent work for all workers. So that includes like paid sick days, increasing the minimum wage to $20. And so through that, I found the group, Decent Work and Health Network, which is, which has their own space within those organizing meetings for health workers to use their, their voice. A lot of doctors and nurses and allied health have a lot of social capital and privilege in the health care system and they're able to advocate for better working conditions for precarious workers across the province. So that's that's what we do. We're a very small team of three people. And we work very closely with the Justice for Workers campaign and we kind of mobilize other health workers across the province to speak out about these issues on you know, through op eds, writing, talking to media also social media as well attending press conference like press releases, conferences, so that's I guess the high level work that the decent work and Health Network does. 

Prakash  4:24  
some kind of like tragic irony in

Prakash  4:27  
Some kind of like tragic irony in the ways that especially within COVID like health care workers were like mobilized but also were like really like forced into doing all of this like extraneous labour to care for, you know, the general population but at the same time, we're not able to receive any kind of care themselves in terms of like, you know, very limited pandemic pay if there was that was a thing not being allowed to take like days off. Yeah, you know, many kinds of health care workers who are like, you know, not doctors like, I can't remember the word in English but like preposés or like orderlies, personal support, or personal support workers, a lot of migrant workers unpaid, not unpaid but underpaid, overqualified. And these people are usually seen as disposable and are treated as treated as such. And yet, often in the pandemic were labeled as like, guardian angels, or like indispensable heroes. And yet there's been no, there's been or like very few active policies or like, proposed bills that have really tried to give these people the same care that they have been giving everybody else. 

Yasmin  5:39  
I feel like I'm in a dystopian world, just seeing what it's like in hospitals and like, and then reading the news and hearing from people talk about what it's been like, throughout the pandemic, and even before the pandemic as like, you know, for example, like personal support workers, PSWs are so important to the care of so many, like elderly folks, for example, in in long term care, and about 98% of our what racialized women immigrant like immigrant migrant workers. So it's very predominant, that the most precarious workers who are like contract temporary, are racialized women in, in healthcare, and they're the ones that are the most exploited and had a huge proportion of, of PSWs and health workers who actually died from from the pandemic doing doing their work. So there was a lot of deaths in in different sectors and healthcare had one of the highest ones include, in addition to factory workers in Ontario. 

Prakash  6:57  
So it's easy to forget with, like the kind of poli-crisis that we're in, and the fact that like, COVID is like so really talked about and like COVID deaths and the ways that, you know, I think I read somewhere and if I can find this where it's all like quote it and if I can't, I'll just delete this whole part. But how like, there are more people being hospitalized or like dying now from like COVID-related illnesses, then there was in like 2021, or this time last year, but it's like, so not present in like, you know, current discourse we've like, moved on. But I think it's important that you like you like continuing continuing to do this work that like, even if we're not no longer talking about healthcare workers, as these like pandemic heroes, that we are still in this, the job conditions have not improved. If even though we've like, stopped talking about it as a society that, yeah, it is still, like ever present and important. 

Yasmin  7:53  
It really comes to show how the government plays a big role in how we perceive everything really. Like as soon as they stopped, you know, making COVID, a big, you know, a big healthcare crisis, folks thought it ended. But it just actually got worse. And we were seeing that in in the hospitals with the triple-demic. Where, like, kids, you know, were back in schools without masks, without filters. And you know, were getting sick every two to three weeks, because that's just what it's like being a kid. And their parents were not able to take them out of schools or take time off work to care for them because they don't have paid sick days or time off. And so we just spread so quickly. And our, our hospitals, especially the pediatric hospitals, were just, were just so like, overwhelmed. And kids were dying because they weren't receiving care or oxygen. And we weren't hearing about this at all in the news, because the government has kind of stopped reporting on it. So we don't know what's going on, because they've made it a non issue. Which is false, because you're right, there have been more deaths in 2022, than in the previous years. 

Kristen  9:09  
Is that something that the like network is working on, like making sure that despite this, I don't even know what to call it this like sweeping it under the rug, that folks are still aware of what's going on, and that they're listening to the voices of the people who are experiencing it and dealing with the fallout from this pretending that this isn't happening. 

Yasmin  9:31  
That's a big, like a big part of what we do is we've been working on I'd say the biggest campaign is paid sick days because we just see how important paid sick days is to the well being of our community and workers not having paid sick days. Just use you know, there's likelihood of spreading disease in in workplaces, in schools, not being you know, decrease rates of vaccinations. There's also a lot of research in the states that's coming out showing that counties or cities that implement paid sick days have less suicide and homicide rates and are just healthier in general. And so we have with even having support from all the oppositional parties in, in Ontario have put out several bills have pushed for paid sick days to be permanent, legislated through the Employment Standards Act, and the Ford government has voted against this 27 times.

Kristen  10:40  
I am not surprised to hear that. But I'm deeply disappointed, you know? 

Yasmin  10:45  
Yeah, like if I feel like I was having this conversation with a friend the other day, like, if we didn't like it, if we couldn't do that, like implement paid sick days, or the government couldn't implement paid sick days, or sees it as a necessity for the safety of our, you know, community during a pandemic, when are they going to be moved by like, like, what are they going to be moved to implement it and care for community and not have the deaths of workers and their families on their hands? It's, it's like, it's really when you get to know just how evil politics and politicians can be. It's like, it's a lot to sit with. But the beautiful thing about organizing is that you just you keep, you just kind of keep pushing as a committee, like you keep, you know, doing actions keep kind of mobilizing health workers and community. So as as hard as it's been, I'm hopeful, if that's like, says anything, but it's, it's rough. 27 times for not like for being against paid sick days. 

Prakash  12:00  
Do you happen to know like, if this is like a Ontario's public phenomenon, or if there are other provinces or other places in the world that have like effectuated better Sick Day policies for healthcare workers or workers in general? 

Yasmin  12:11  
So there are several countries that have a lot better paid sick days I, for example, Germany has six weeks of paid sick days. And many parts of the states like San Francisco and parts of New York are have legislated I believe 10 paid sick days. I have to confirm that. But BC is the first province, I believe last year, that legislated five paid sick days paid sick, permanent paid sick days. The rest of the provinces so far have temporary paid sick days. So Ontario before the Ford government used to have paid sick days, and they scrapped that. They had two paid sick days and they scrapped that.

Yasmin  13:06  
And then it was actually through organizer like organizing, that they implemented the temporary COVID paid sick days that we have now, the Workers Income Protection Benefit, which is set to expire March 31 of this this year. So after that workers are left with zero paid sick days, but it's other provinces have not have had temporary paid sick days, but nothing that is permanent or legislated. 

Kristen  13:42  
I just... I'm a little sad. Because like, the best North America, like, let me not even the best Canadian example you gave was BC with 10 days. That's two weeks. That's there are 52 weeks in the year. So that feels... No, not... No. 

Yasmin  14:24  
Even considering like mental health and needing to take a personal day for your mental well being like that, that is also not being discussed or talked about either. And so it's just, it's shocking, like it's five days for an entire year. And that's like, that's like huge for us that they got five. Like we're pushing for 10 Because that's what research and like public health supports, but like even that is not enough.

Kristen  14:51  
And then I just went like are there other days or is it's the 10 days is, is all the days you could potentially have off that are paid. So like, what if I don't know, I have to take my kid to an appointment, you know, doctor's offices are open at the same time that I'm supposed to be at the office. The bank is open at the same time that I'm supposed to be at the office. You know what, if I need a surgery? I have to use my sick day to go and have my surgery and then recover from surgery. So I can't have the common cold any the other day in the year, like, you know, like, it's just, we're human beings. And that's not enough. 

Yasmin  15:37  
It's definitely not enough. And we've been also like pushing for 14 during pandemics, or like public health emergencies, because they give like when folks, you know, got COVID, the isolation at the very beginning was 14 days. And that's two weeks of work. So there's really not a lot of room for if you have a surgery, if you have a sick kid. Those are unpaid days for a lot of workers, especially in precarious jobs. 

Prakash  16:06  
Yeah, and if you're like a single parent household, or you have like several dependents, or you live in like a Toronto or Vancouver, or honestly, any college town in Canada, like it is so expensive just to live that like, who's out here being able to take unpaid days off? That's wild. 

Kristen  16:23  
And we saw this, like in the pandemic people not being able to take days off. Its the reason why, well, one of, one of the reasons why COVID spreads so quickly. I have to go to work. I cannot afford not to go to work. 

Yasmin  16:39  
Exactly, yep, add the you know, cost of living and inflation, cost of living crisis that we're also currently going through with like record breaking inflation, like folks, workers are there's a record number amount of workers that are living paycheck to paycheck that cannot afford to take a day off. And if I had to decide between feeding my family and going into work sick, I will go to work sick. And we try to like, especially as health health workers, you know, there's, there's a lot of you know, there can be a lot of shaming people for going to work sick or to spreading the disease, you know, spreading an illness or an infection. But I think it takes, you have to put yourself in that worker shoes. If you have to pick between eating and work, like not eating and staying home. Like that's not an option. You know, we a lot of folks don't have that luxury. And that's why it's so important that, you know, employers are paying for paid sick days and are are being legislated to because they won't. You know, why would Loblaws want to pay their workers when they can, you know, to take time off sick when they can make, you know, billions of dollars in profits a year. On the backs of workers.

Kristen  18:07  
I feel like we could spend a long time talking about how broken this entire system is. But I do want to spend some time talking about I don't know some successes that your network has had. Because you have had them. And so yeah, if you want to share some successes that network has had while you have been working with them. 

Yasmin  18:31  
I think the most beautiful thing is that we're all so connected to each other causes as well that impact Decent Work. One of the biggest ones is like we are supporting migrants getting status for all. So we work like we work like next door to MWACK, the Migrant Workers Alliance for Change. And they are supporting migrant workers fighting for, you know, better living conditions. Also, they are pushing the government to legislate permanent status and permanent residency for over 500,000 undocumented folks. And so as health workers like supporting that we came up with a letter getting folks across the country to support to support this has just been really powerful. The government hasn't you know hasn't has promised to legislate and to to move forward but they haven't yet. But that keep like that pressure on them as well, which is it's just connecting with other cop like groups has been really powerful. 

Yasmin  19:57  
One of the biggest wins is that just starting January, the federal government across the country has provided 10 paid sick days to all federally regulated workers. So that's about a million workers across the country, which is, which is incredible. 

Kristen  20:19  
Yeah, yeah.

Yasmin  20:20  
Which is like it's something, it's something that so folks who worked in, you know, post office or worked, worked in the government in Ottawa, or across the country, for example, who may have had paid sick days, but there are a lot of other other federally regulated workers that didn't have paid sick days that now do. There are flaws to the system, that it's an accruement model. So it's not giving them 10 days, it's every month, you gain one paid sick day.

Kristen  20:50  
Ugh.

Yasmin  20:50  
And then you know, so like, cross your fingers, you get sick, you know, in December, where you've collected all your paid sick days, but it's something. It means that now workers are not left with without any paid sick days. So that's like, that's a big win. And that came through just a lot of organizing. And like across the country, where folks are, you know, meeting with their MPPs, meeting with their MPs, and really talking to them about why it's important that we need paid sick days. So that's, I guess, a big win outside of Ontario, on just Ontario politics. I mean,

Prakash  21:31  
That's great to hear, you know, famously, health care is provincial and right now that there's like, been, like these secret discussions between provincial MPs, no, sorry, provincial premiers, and the Trudeau Government to try to, like each one hash out like a private health care deal, because the federal government is like resisting giving funds to the provinces to fund health care. And, you know, I can I will link more about this in the show notes, because I can't get into it. But yeah, it's like, you know, some of the most vulnerable workers, most of vulnerable people are not being employed full time by the federal government. And, like, I think, you know, I think we've talked about it before, but like union organizing is, you know, extremely important in terms of having like, a syndicate to advocate for your rights, including, like paid sick days and things that don't accrue over time. Because, um, yeah, I think they like the, you know, vacation, a lot of people like will start jobs that don't have vacation right away. And so, in lieu of when you do not have to have sick days or personal days, people will use vacation, but you don't have either or if they accrue you don't have the for a full year, I'm like, okay, cool, I will just stay super healthy for this year, while I start a new job and hope for the best. Like, it's just not feasible, it's not reasonable. And yet, we've just like, come to expect this as the norm when there are so many other models of other nations during this much better and also other organizations. 

Prakash  23:05  
I'm on the board of a very small nonprofit, but this year, they had they moved to a model of previously they all the employees, at least the full time ones had 10 paid sick days. But if other people would, even though they had vacation, on top of this, people would sort of like, save their sick days in case they got sick later on. And then suddenly, that the end of the year, they have all these sick days that they that they didn't use, and then they don't roll over. So this ended up becoming a problem were like, at the end of the fiscal year, everyone's just like off sick, quote, unquote. And so they decided to move to a model that was unlimited personal days. And, and this is a very small organization. So this is not to, like show any kind of statistical, you know, like facts or whatever. But just as a small anecdote that after the first year of when, I mean, the year is almost done, it'll be done. I think at the end of April, the fiscal year, we found that people were not the average of days off or like did not change significantly, in fact, with most people took less less than the 10 days that they were originally offered. And so that there just is this kind of corporate fear around like, Oh, if we like, give people an inch, they'll take a mile as if these corporations or even something like health care is not making like billions of dollars off of the backs of low wage employees. So its very frustrating.

Kristen  24:36  
That's actually the second organization that I've heard of that has unlimited health days, or unlimited personal days. The one that I know is not necessarily small, I'd say anywhere between 30 to 40, depending on how many contract workers they have at a time. And there's no abuse of the personal days. If they need a health day, they take the health day, and it's fine. It's fine. So, you know, corporate fear is real, but it's stupid.

Yasmin  25:12  
It is. And there's actually, it's really interesting because now we're starting to see a lot of data coming out of the states of places that are actually implementing paid sick, like paid sick leave. And the study, I believe, from New York a half to find it actually showed that no one abused the paid sick days, people were actually taking less than the allocated amount. 

Kristen  25:12  
Yup. 

Yasmin  25:14  
And it just, there's this big fear from corporations and business, big businesses, not even small businesses, but big businesses that are are scared that employees are going to abuse the paid sick days. But why like this fear? 

Kristen  25:57  
Why would they? 

Yasmin  25:58  
Why would they? It's because they also are, you know, is it because you you're you yourself as an as an employer, like, don't like, are exploiting your workers, so you believe they will exploit you?

Kristen  26:11  
Right? That's genuinely, that is what it for me? That is what I assume it is. Because anytime that I find that, like, folks are like, Oh, well, they're gonna do this. I'm always like, Why do you think that? Because you would do it? Because I don't think they're going to do that. So obviously, you would, if given the option, right?

Prakash  26:34  
That's like, babe, I think you're projecting but... 

Kristen  26:36  
Right? 

Prakash  26:36  
...that's on you.

Kristen  26:39  
Like, so you've spent decades exploiting your workers. So you assume your workers are going to exploit you back when really, they would just like the safety and security of being able to, you know, stay home when they feel sick. Stay home, when they're not able to work, I... but know that, you know, I'll still be able to pay my bills, even though I don't feel good today. That's all they want. That's literally all they want. Because, again, 

Kristen  27:04  
they're only work and they want to keep told the workers desperate in order to keep them money, you know, under pay you control worked, so that they need to work to live in these and work in these like atrocious working conditions. 

Yasmin  27:19  
It's all it's all a part of the system. And it's yeah, it's very frustrating.

Kristen  27:37  
And then, you know, at least Yasmin, and I live in Ontario, where our premier, 

Yasmin  27:41  
Best best friends. 

Kristen  27:42  
Loves these folks. Best friends with them. 

Yasmin  27:46  
The province is a business. It is a business. And I think like being a health worker who like yeah, into health care, because like, I want to work with people, and I love, you know, working and like, you know, trying to make a difference. But it's so it's so jarring to be in a healthcare system. And in the hospital, where at the end of the day, a hospital is also a big business. It's a big, you know, they care about the funding. They care about, you know, how much money is being spent your, like productivity versus like, actually patient care, because if you actually cared about patients, we would be doing our best as a province to keep all of the nurses to better staff, all of our hospitals, instead of saying, Oh, well, there's, you know, we don't know why nurses are moving to Alberta...

Kristen  28:43  
Yes, you do.

Yasmin  28:44  
...for better pay. Yeah. Oh, yeah, we do. We do. Like, have you talked to a nurse? So it's like it's so it's like it's all a system. Because now I think, Prakash, you mentioned the privatization piece. I think that's the the newest piece right now that we're dealing with, especially at the Decent Work and Health Network is talking about privatization and how that impacts decent work. And also like folks, folks, folks' health ultimately because when we privatize health care, it's the it's going to be harder and harder for folks to access care, but also it's going to drain the public health system and in some ways to try and fund this private system so they they're not going to really care much about what's happening in a lot of the public hospitals. 

Yasmin  29:45  
So like, for example, like if I was a nurse and I was being offered to work better wages, better hours less stress at a shiny new for for profit, surgery clinic versus staying in the hospital which is like underfunded, understaffed, like, there's so many patients. I wouldn't I wouldn't stay in public. It's not, It's not even a question anymore because it's like you, you got to put you first in a lot of ways. So it's like we can't be blaming workers for making the choices to move to a for profit system if it's going to be better for them.

Kristen  30:34  
Not when we've been taught. And we've been shown over and over again, that this fake thing called money rules everything. You can't show me that money rules everything and then chastise me for choosing money. What? You also chose money. What's happening? 

Kristen  30:52  
Yup. There is no ethical consumption under capitalism.

Kristen  30:59  
Exactly.

Prakash  31:00  
Well, on that depressing note.

Kristen  31:01  
What?

Yasmin  31:04  
I feel like we're trying to do the positives. And I just like, wee, coming back.

Kristen  31:08  
I mean, are we? 

Yasmin  31:08  
I swear... 

Prakash  31:09  
The truth is, every positive is just like it's a, it's a silver lining in a cloud full of shit. That is... 

Kristen  31:18  
Yeah. 

Prakash  31:19  
...raining down on all of us. And it sucks. 

Kristen  31:24  
I want to close with, despite how depressing this was, if there's one thing that folks are taking away from the work that you do from you, from our conversation today, what do you want them to take away?

Kristen  31:39  
There is hope through collective organizing. And I think for me, that's been super powerful, moving away from just doing like equity, diversity activism, which doesn't feel like there's really actions and we're moving towards a goal, a collective goal. But I think this just the organizing, get involved with an organization or group that really that is doing doing great work. I don't know if that's like, good enough, but the Decent Work and Health Network is a great organization. So and also the justice for workers, has chapters all across the country, in different provinces. So definitely get involved there, too.

Prakash  32:29  
If people want to get involved or know more, can you tell us where to find that information?

Kristen  32:36  
You can go to our so we're on all the social medias, but you can head over to our website decentworkandhealth.org and we also have got Instagram and Twitter. We're really active on Twitter, which I will send the links to and hopefully, yeah, if your health worker across anywhere across Canada, definitely reach out. If you're not a health worker, also sign up get our newsletters. Yeah, and let's organize and disrupt.

Kristen  33:12  
Love it. Yeah, and then that's it.

Kristen  33:16  
Thank you so much for having me. It's, it's I'm a big fan of this podcast. So this is really exciting.

Prakash  33:22  
We're a big fan of yours. And yeah, so people we'll keep in touch and stay in the know and then we will talk to you Kristen and I next month. 

Both  33:35  
Bye.

Kristen  33:48  
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Transcribed by https://otter.ai