CUPE Newfoundland and Labrador says Budget 2025–2026 includes welcome investments in public services, but fails to address the key issue holding those services back: low wages.

“This budget funds projects—but it doesn’t fund the people needed to make those projects succeed,” said Stacey Lucas, Secretary-Treasurer, CUPE Newfoundland and Labrador and Regional Vice President. “Without fixing wages, this plan doesn’t work.”

The union says the province is investing in housing, long-term care, childcare, and post-secondary education—but ignoring the workforce crisis already limiting service delivery.

At Newfoundland and Labrador Housing, new funding to repair units and hire staff is positive, but existing vacancies remain unfilled due to non-competitive pay.

“You can’t expand services if you can’t recruit and retain workers,” said Lucas.

CUPE NL says this pattern is repeating across the public sector, where wages have effectively declined over the past decade. With most collective agreements up this year, the union warns that continued wage stagnation will deepen staffing shortages and undermine new investments.

In long-term care, the province’s plan to add beds raises the same concern.

“You can build new facilities, but without workers, those beds won’t be there for families who need them,” said Lucas.

The union also welcomed additional childcare spaces and supports for families but noted that demand continues to outpace supply—and that staffing pressures remain unresolved.

“Spaces don’t operate themselves,” said Lucas. “If wages don’t keep up, the system won’t either.”

CUPE NL is calling on the government to address the wage crisis as a central part of its plan to strengthen public services.

“If government is serious about delivering results, it needs to invest in the people who make those services possible,” said Lucas.

Delegates from across Newfoundland and Labrador will gather this week for the CUPE NL Convention, bringing together workers from across sectors to set priorities for the year ahead and strengthen the collective voice of public service workers in the province.

This year’s convention is being held during the “Year of Health and Safety,” with a strong focus on protecting workers on the job and ensuring that safe workplaces are treated as a fundamental right—not an afterthought.

Delegates will also take up key issues facing workers and communities across Newfoundland and Labrador, including:

• Strengthening public healthcare, with an urgent focus on recruitment and retention challenges that continue to strain the system and the workers who sustain it
• Advancing workers’ rights and fair wages, as the cost of living rises and workers demand respect at the bargaining table
• Promoting equity, inclusion, and anti-racism, to ensure that workplaces reflect the dignity and diversity of the communities they serve
• Building stronger communities through public services, recognizing that well-funded, accessible public services are essential to the province’s social and economic well-being

“Workers across this province are showing up every day in increasingly difficult conditions—and they’re doing it because they care about the people and communities they serve,” said Sherry Hillier, president of CUPE Newfoundland and Labrador. “This convention is about turning that commitment into action—setting clear priorities and building the strength we need to win safer workplaces, fair wages, and the public services our communities depend on.”

The convention will feature policy debates, workshops, and guest speakers, as well as opportunities for members to share their experiences from the front lines of public service work.

“At a time when public services are under pressure, this convention is about more than internal business—it’s about sending a clear message,” said Hillier. “Investing in workers is investing in communities. You can’t have strong public services without the people who deliver them.”

Women in Leadership Development (WILD) is a feminist leadership and skills-building union education program designed for Indigenous, Black, and racialized women and non-binary members of CUPE.

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This regionally-based program takes place over the course of a year, and includes:

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• A mix of in-person and online learning sessions
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Apply Today! Applications due March 27th!

Download the CUPE WILD Promotional Flyer to share with someone who should apply!

CUPE NL invites all locals to join them at the Delta Hotel in St. John’s on April 22 to April 24 for their 52^nd annual convention.

Registration will be held on Tuesday, April 21^st from 4:00 to 6 p.m. at the Delta Hotel. Locals are requested to make their own reservations, but a block of rooms, named “CUPE,” will be held for delegates at a rate of $149.00 plus taxes per night.

To send delegates, locals must have their per capita to CUPE National and CUPE NL up to and including March 2026.

For more information, please see the full Convention Call available for download here.

The Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) is deeply concerned about the decision by Memorial University Newfoundland (MUN) to address the university’s budget issues by closing campuses and facilities and cutting jobs, and the lack of transparency around the impacts of that decision.

While the announcement from MUN says there will be no immediate layoffs associated with this decision, CUPE has been told that positions will be eliminated.

“The university needs to be transparent with workers, with students, with the people of this province, about how these changes are going to impact the MUN community,” said Bill Kavanagh, CUPE 1615 President.

“Publicly stating that there will be no layoffs but confirming quietly that positions will be eliminated undercuts any critical response to the university’s decision-making. This move will eliminate jobs held by CUPE 1615 members, along with the valuable service they provide.”

CUPE 1615 represents administrative, instructional, and technical support staff at the St. John’s, Signal Hill, Grenfell, and Labrador campuses, and almost 40 CUPE 1615 members’ jobs were impacted when the Writing Centre, Harris Centre and the Office of Public Engagement were suddenly closed in July 2025, following the announcement that MUN has a $20M budget deficit.

“This decision is being framed as ‘real estate divestment’ when it is clearly a reduction of services,” said Sherry Hillier, CUPE Newfoundland & Labrador President. “At the same time, we’ve seen that closing campuses, reducing services, and cutting jobs has not helped MUN’s financial situation.”

Over the past 15 years, similar moves have reduced the membership of CUPE 1615 from nearly 1,500 workers to under 700. Notably, public funding to MUN has also been reduced by half since 2013.

“These budget constraint measures by the university are clearly a result of the provincial government decreasing funding to MUN,” continued Kavanagh.

Instead of cutting jobs, reducing services, and shortchanging students, there is a clear solution to MUN’s financial issues: Restore public funding to the province’s only public university.

“The answer is clear: our public university needs public funding,” continued Hillier. “Ordering a tuition freeze and not restoring funding is irresponsible at best, and at worst, a complete abandonment of the people of this province.”

CUPE is calling for intervention by the provincial government and an increase in funding to MUN, to ensure MUN remains a hub for accessible, world-class postsecondary education.

CUPE Newfoundland & Labrador represents 6,000 public workers across the province, including hundreds of workers at MUN in locals 1615, 3336, and 4554.

Parents and workers in Newfoundland and Labrador have benefited tremendously from investments in early learning and child care since the introduction of the program in 2021. Newfoundland and Labrador parents are now paying less than a third of what they were in 2021, making it much easier for families to get by and provide for the needs of their kids.

Working families need Newfoundland and Labrador to be a strong advocate for the continued success and expansion of the Canada-Wide Early Learning and Child Care program. CUPE NL remains ready and willing to work with government to ensure the program lives up to its original objectives.

As Education and Early Childhood Development Minister Paul Dinn heads into meetings this week with his federal and provincial counterparts from across the country, CUPE NL’s 6,600 members are calling on the Minister and Tony Wakeham’s PC government to:

• Triple provincial funding for early learning and child care to an annual investment of $130 million over the next five years to create more regulated child care spaces.
• Significantly increase wages for child care workers. The provincial wage grid should be bargained with workers and their unions, not unilaterally imposed.
• Ensure that Early Childhood Educators have pension benefits so that they can retire with dignity.
• Maintain restrictions on for-profit expansion and continue to incentivize for-profit operators to become non-profits.
• Allow the provincial government first right of refusal before the selling of any for-profit child care centre.
• Make further use of public assets like schools and universities to house new child care services.
  
  Sherry Hillier,
  President
  CUPE Newfoundland and Labrador
  :so/cope491

Annually, CUPE Newfoundland and Labrador awards the CUPE Newfoundland Labrador and Higgins Insurance Scholarship. There are 3 scholarships to be awarded in the amount of $1000 each.

Individuals who meet the eligibility criteria outlined below and who are planning to enroll at an accredited post-secondary institution in the 2026–2027 academic year are invited to apply.

Download complete application instructions, including eligibility requirements, along with the application form here.

Application must be complete on the scholarship form and must be received by CUPE Newfoundland Labrador no later than February 28, 2026, with all supporting documents for the application to be considered.

Applications with all supporting documents are to be mailed or emailed to:
CUPE Newfoundland and Labrador
15 International Place, Suite 102
St. John’s, NL A1A 0L4
Email: cfroude@cupe.ca

The Canadian Union of Public Employees predicts 2026 to be an incredibly difficult year to defend public services in Newfoundland & Labrador, without public pressure on the provincial government. CUPE members in every public sector are reporting attacks to our services through funding cuts, reduction of services, public-private partnerships (P3s), and the increased use of artificial intelligence.

“Our government is systematically deconstructing the public service,” said Sherry Hillier, CUPE Newfoundland & Labrador President. “From Memorial University preparing for ‘a smaller future,’ to costly private contractors in public housing amid the housing crisis, to travel nurses being the norm in our province—our home is under attack from within.”

In almost every sector of public services, CUPE is aware of job vacancies going unfilled for months, resulting in workers being overloaded and our communities being underserved.

The new ‘integrated’ ambulance system was supposed to improve response times, but the private company hired to manage the newly combined public and private service has not been able to address staffing shortages and publicly stated they don’t have a strategy to do so. For $560M in public dollars the province now has fewer ambulances out at any given time, rural communities reporting an increase in wait times and the many unfilled vacancies remain.

“Our government is trying to convince us that public services have no value. They are actively degrading those services, and they are misleading the public about the potential for public-private partnerships to improve the daily life of struggling communities across Newfoundland & Labrador.”

Amid recent reports of substandard care, poor conditions, abuse and evictions in the home care sector, we also know that private companies were given over $80M subsidize private facilities last year (an increase from $50M the previous year) by the province.

In childcare, over $400M has been paid to fewer than a dozen private companies over six years. Last year, private companies were paid approximately $400,000 per child for housing and care of children with complex needs.

Deloitte was paid almost $2M for a 10-year plan to addressing staffing gaps in healthcare and their report had completely fabricated sources. The Education Accord NL, another ten-year plan paid for with public dollars, was also found to have AI-generated content and fake sources.

“I urge our communities to heed the warnings of public workers,” continued Hillier. “We’re on the ground; we see the destruction of public services in our workplaces every day. When we hear about a new private contract instead of a new hire, when we are told to send members of our community to a government website instead of helping them access services, we know these are signs pointing to a difficult future for Newfoundland & Labrador.

The Coalition of CUPE Municipal Workers (CCMW) was founded in 2007 when locals from across Newfoundland and Labrador banded together in an effort to coordinate their efforts and create a more united front during bargaining despite their varying locations and employers. Today, this coalition consists of five locals in four municipalities: CUPE 1349 (Grand Falls-Windsor), CUPE 3034 (Conception Bay South), CUPE 2099 (Mount Pearl), CUPE 569 and CUPE 1289 (St. John’s).

Recently a campaign was launched highlighting these CUPE members and their work.

Check out the links below to view the photos and the video messaging used in the campaign:

CUPE 1349 (Grand Falls-Windsor)            Photos               Video

CUPE 3034 (Conception Bay South)        Photos               Video

CUPE 2099 (Mount Pearl)                          Photos               Video

CUPE 569 (St. John’s Outside workers)   Photos               Video

CUPE 1289 (St. John’s)                                Photos               Video

CUPE Newfoundland and Labrador President Sherry Hillier is calling out the town of Grand Falls-Windsor today for terminating a long-standing employee for executing her right as a Canadian taxpayer to participate in local elections. This move follows the local issuing their notice to bargain.

“Every citizen of Grand Falls-Windsor has the right to participate in and comment on local elections. Working for the town doesn’t suddenly take away that right,” said Hillier. “It’s absolutely shameful the town would use such an excuse to fire one of their employees and the local union president—and that’s just what it is: an excuse.”

CUPE will fight this termination by filing a grievance to arbitration for an unjust termination.