Allied health workers represented by the Manitoba Association of Health Care Professionals (MAHCP) ratified new four-year collective agreements with the provincial government and public health-care employers last week after going nearly a year without contracts.
Tentative agreements were reached a few weeks ago, and allied health workers voted on those agreements over the course of two days last week. In January MAHCP members had voted 96 per cent in favour of a strike mandate.
“This contract was achieved through the resolve of frontline allied health professionals and their bargaining committee, who were willing to go on strike to demand change,” said MAHCP president Jason Linklater in a news release. “It is my hope that the new contract represents the first step in finally addressing chronic shortages of specialized staff and improving health care for Manitobans.”
The new agreements are with employers provincial Shared Health, the Winnipeg-Churchill health region and the Northern health region.
Workers will receive a general wage increase of 12.25 per cent over four years, retroactive to 2024 with a 2.5 per cent increase. They’ll subsequently see wages rise this year by 2.75 per cent, 3.0 per cent in 2026 and 3.0 per cent in 2027, plus a 1.0 per cent market adjustment.
The wage increases are “consistent with other recent health-care agreements, along with several improvements intended to enhance work-life balance and address workload and health and safety concerns,” says MACHP.
The contract also includes a $3 per hour step adjustment for most classifications, new rural and northern wage differentials, and wage parity for MAHCP paramedics with the City of Winnipeg paramedic services.
MAHCP says retention is a top priority as there are over 1,000 vacant allied health positions, and most positions require years of training because of their high degree of specialization.
Manitoba experienced a net loss of allied health staff represented by MAHCP in both January and February 2025 in Shared Health and the Winnipeg-Churchill and the northern health regions, says the news release. And this was the first “two-month streak of net loss since August 2023, under the previous government.”
Although the contract doesn’t address “significant issues” affecting retention and recruitment, it nevertheless is expected to help stem the loss of allied health workers from Manitoba and provide potential recruits with information about wages and working conditions – information allied health professionals assess when looking for a job.
“The new contract is the starting point to stop the bleed and keep more allied health professionals on the job while Manitoba trains and recruits more to fill the thousand vacancies that have built up in recent years,” said Linklater. “Employers must prioritize implementing the contract as quickly as possible before Manitoba loses more specialized allied health staff.”
The Manitoba Association of Health Care Professionals represents over 7,000 allied health members working 45-plus disciplines. Some MAHCP members are employed by Shared Health and work in the Interlake-Eastern Regional Health Authority.
