After a two-year wait, the federal Liberals unveiled a budget Monday that has several items specifically for Canada’s North.
The Liberals are promoting a new $10-a-day universal child care subsidized plan as the focal point of the budget, along with continuing COVID-19 measures.
That’s projected to cost $30 billion over five years, and will either make the childcare plans offered by the Yukon Liberals and the Yukon Party redundant or will complement them.
Another $18 billion is being directed to Indigenous communities and $17.6 billion for green development initiatives.
Twelve billion dollars goes toward COVID-19 support initiatives, which will be extended until September. The scale of the support, though, will begin to be cut in July to help wean people off the measures.
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The president of the Yukon Employees’ Union (YEU) is not happy with Premier Sandy Silver.
Last week, during an interview with the Star, Steve Geick said sources within the government had told him during a meeting that up to 60 per
cent of health and social services workers were off the job on Feb. 5.
During last Thursday’s weekly COVID-19 briefing, Silver and Dr. Brendan Hanley, the chief medical officer of health, were very critical of the figures Geick released and which were reported by the Star.
“It’s very upsetting,” Hanley said.
Silver said, “it’s simply not true that 60 per cent of continuing care workers were off the job last Friday (Feb. 5), and I think that’s irresponsible to spread misinformation and potentially stoking fears about the vaccine rollout.”
Over the weekend, Steve Geick, the president of the YEU, posted some startling numbers on social media.
“According to the YG Public Service Commission, roughly 60 per cent of Continuing Care staff were off sick yesterday, Friday Feb. 5,” he wrote on the YEU Facebook page.
“Group-vaccinated essential workers are dealing en masse with the side effects of their second shot of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine.”
Geick said today he received updated numbers that indicated the 60 per cent figure was for a specific location, contrary to what he had originally been told.
“I’ll bet that’s pretty close to the figure for the department as a whole, though,” he said.
Posted: Feb 09, 2021 6:00 AM CT | Last Updated: February 9
The Yukon Employees Union president said continuing care employees are being told to use their sick days should they experience symptoms after receiving their second dose of the Moderna vaccine, which he says is unfair.(Andrew Vaughan/The Canadian Press)
The head of the Yukon Employees Union says many continuing care staff are missing work because of side effects from the COVID-19 vaccine.
Union president Steve Geick said Tuesday there was a big spike in the number of continuing care workers calling in sick last week. He said 60 per cent of staff at the Thompson Centre in Whitehorse missed work on Feb. 5.