As public sector negotiations enter a crucial phase with the start of the school year, a summit meeting between the FIQ, Prime Minister François Legault and Treasury Secretary Sonia LeBel is scheduled for Monday.

The Canadian press has obtained a copy of a letter sent by Interprofessional Health Federation President Julie Bouchard to the heads of her local unions for advice. The president of the major union organization of nurses will be present, as well as members of the Executive Committee of the FIQ.

This meeting comes at a time of increasing pressure in the public sector. Negotiations to renew collective agreements have been going on for several months and unions are reporting little progress. Several unions are talking about holding meetings soon to give themselves a strike order.

FIQ is characterized by not being part of the cross-union common front.

And the FIQ, which represents more than 80,000 registered nurses, registered nurse practitioners, respiratory therapists and clinical perfusionists, is particularly advanced in its action plan. At the beginning of the summer, the Administrative Labor Court issued dozens of decisions affecting the maintenance of essential services in the event of a FIQ strike. That doesn’t mean the FIQ will go on strike, but they’re preparing their guns just in case.

And the pressure among the nursing staff is increasing. A few days ago a group of nurses from the operating room at Fleurimont Hospital in Sherbrooke staged a sit-in to protest an announced change to on-call shifts. Everything was finally settled by an agreement between the parties in an arbitration phase before the administrative labor court, but this episode shows that the nurses are fed up, can no longer stand their working conditions and that there is a shortage of staff.

In her letter to her local union leaders, the leader of FIQ mentions the strike. “The negotiations on our collective agreement are likely to quickly get out of trouble this autumn. As it was pending in June, we are prepared should we have to exercise our right to strike. We will take on board the demands of the health workers and it is up to Mr Legault to assign his team to take things forward at the negotiating table,” writes Julie Bouchard.

“Monday’s meeting will be a valuable moment to open the dialogue and bring in the voice of the 80,000 healthcare professionals we represent. You can be assured that I have every intention of reminding you of our priorities. With the reform of the health network and the heavy privatization of the network, many challenges await us, with all the implications this will have for our members. “We have always fought for access to free and universal public health care and we are best placed to tell the Prime Minister how to improve this network, ultimately for the good of the people of Quebec,” Ms. added.^Me Bouchard.

To see in the video