THUNDER BAY – Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU) president JP Hornick is calling the province’s current state in corrections a “crisis.”
Thunder Bay correctional, probation, and parole officers held a rally outside the Ontario government building on Red RiverRoad on Tuesday to call on the province to offer a fair deal that addresses chronic understaffing, overcrowding, and unsafe working conditions.
“We have a group of workers, about 9,000 workers who work in the correctional bargaining unit, everything from adults, youth, parole, probation, inside the walls, and they’ve been bargaining for over 10 months, and the employer has steadfastly refused to entertain any of their solutions for the mental health crisis, the understaffing crisis, and the retention,” Hornick told Newswatch in an interview.
The correctional bargaining unit’s collective agreement expired on Dec. 31, 2024. Hornick said that two weeks ago, the province tabled a three-year collective agreement with a 3.75 per cent increase in wages over three years, “that doesn’t even keep up with the rate of inflation,” and no mental health supports.
Hornick noted that violence in correctional institutions in the province has risen by 445 per cent between 2012 and 2024, and “the employer comes up with nothing to address these key issues.”
“We have a crisis, and we’ve seen 12 suicides in the past few years in this sector, and that is something that needs to be addressed,” Hornick said.
Shawn Bradshaw, OPSEU Local 708 president and correctional officer at the Thunder Bay Correctional Centre, said the OPP considers six officer suicides an epidemic.
“We’re at 12 (in Ontario), so it is just an epidemic in corrections. We’re asking at the table for more mental health supports on top of the general stuff, benefit increases, which are not forthcoming, wage increases, which are not in keeping with inflation, and pension increases. We have some pension adjustments that are the worst, some of the worst, in the country for correctional officers and law enforcement officers,” Bradshaw said.
Tony Rojik, OPSEU Local 737 president and correctional officer at the Thunder Bay District Jail, said the jail is understaffed and the building’s inmate population is at “120 to 135 per cent capacity week to week.”
“It’s tough when you’re putting people in a space the size of your average bathroom, three to a cell, one sleeping on the floor. It’s just not humane. And when that happens, usually tensions rise, violence starts, and that violence will spill over,” Rojik said.
From Jan. 1 to June 30, the recorded number of inmate-on-staff workspace violence incidents is 42 at the Thunder Bay Jail and 22 at the Thunder Bay Correctional Centres.
This number includes assaults, attempted assaults, and threats, according to the statistics provided by Bradshaw.
In 2024, the recorded number of inmate-on-staff workspace violence incidents was 66 at the jail and 25 at the correctional centre.
“We need a commitment from the province to not only add more infrastructure, obviously, but to commit more resources and officers to managing the overcrowding. We have a 345 bed facility that’s going to open up within the next 2 years, hopefully, but that barely puts a dent in our overcrowding,” Rojik said.
“What we’re hoping is that the ministry, even though they have slated the Thunder Bay jail for closure, that they will maintain operation of it to ease that pressure, because if they do put it on the chopping block, then we’re looking at being overcapacity at the new facility the moment it opens its doors.”
One of the terms Bradshaw mentioned is the overhaul of corrections hiring practices.
“When you begin a career in corrections, you do not start like in many law enforcement agencies as a full-time officer. You are designated as a fixed-term employee, which means you’re regularly scheduled up to 40 hours,” Bradshaw said.
“They want them to work beyond 40 hours at straight time. They want to adjust the notice they can give them to change or add to their schedule without verbal confirmation. It is absolutely atrocious the way they’re treating the new staff and expecting retention.”
Currently, corrections has 64 full-time employees, and approximately 38 full-time fixed-term correctional officers, according to Rojik.
However, he said correctional officers are not the only ones experiencing staffing shortages.
“We have shortages in staffing of the maintenance department, the records department, and even management. They have their own issues with staffing and have holes in their full-time lines, so a lot of our correctional officers take acting positions,” Rojik said.
“They go to our compliments to do these extra jobs, which pulls out of the roster and the compliment for the jail, and takes away from even the availability of our fixed terms.”
Hornick said, employees need “adequate wage increases” above inflation and mental health support to attract new people into those positions, “so that these folks can retain people and recruit really qualified individuals who remain in the system as a good job and a good place to work so that they can keep our community safe.”
