Food Services Onboarding
On June 24, 2022, Providence Health Care welcomed the return of Food Services and 227 Food Services staff across five PHC sites: Holy Family, Mount Saint Joseph and St. Paul's hospitals, and Langara and Youville residences.
Read the full BC Government news release here.
New look, same service
There is no change to Food Services operations or service continuity; however, what is changing is a new uniform for Food Services staff. As PHC staff, Food Services staff will wear PHC-issued scrub-like uniforms and some may have lab coats or aprons. These new uniforms are in line with uniforms across the health sector, support provisions in the Facilities collective agreement and are similar to current PHC clinical staff uniforms.
Contact information
If you have any questions during this transition, please reach out to us at WelcomeFoodServices@providencehealth.bc.ca.
We also encourage staff to reach out to your union. If you have any questions or need help with a specific situation related to the health sector collective agreement, please email the Hospital Employees' Union (HEU) at return@heu.org.
Why is this happening?
The provincial government first announced its plans in August 2021 to repatriate commercial housekeeping and food service contracts under Bill 47— the Health Sector Statutes Repeal Act.
Bill 47 repealed the Health and Social Services Delivery Improvement Act (Bill 29) and the Health Sector Partnerships Agreement Act (Bill 94), which had facilitated contracting out in the health sector. Following the initial announcement, health authorities and PHC served notice under the terms of 21 commercial service contracts and have started a phased approach to repatriate housekeeping and food service contracts.
For more information about Bill 47 and the Ministry of Health's phased approach to repatriating food services and housekeeping contracts in BC hospitals, please read the below Government of BC News Releases:
Cleaning, dietary workers coming back in-house at B.C. hospitals (Aug. 30, 2021)
Seniors and patients to benefit from fair workplace legislation (Nov. 8, 2018)
