By Lorinda Seward, Local 351, inSolidarity Committee
One Big Union – this year’s OPSEU/SEFPO Provincial Women’s Committee Breakfast carried that same energy, grounded in and deeply connected to Convention 2026. Do you want to understand what One Big Union looks like in practice? Start with our women members!
Indigenous Equity Board member Cris Rego opened the morning in a way that felt less like a speech and more like a reminder. She spoke about women’s voices, saying “when we find our voices, we have power.”
Rego grounded the conversation in lived realities, especially in health care, where women, particularly Indigenous and racialized women, are too often dismissed, delayed or disbelieved. And then she named what many of us have said, half-joking, but fully serious, “If men had to go through what we go through, our health issues would have been solved years ago.” The room laughed knowingly, because it’s true. After all, patriarchy has always treated women’s pain as negotiable.
OPSEU/SEFPO President JP Hornick brought the lens wider, across generations, across time.
“I think about how far we’ve come and how quickly it’s being stripped away,” said Hornick. “I don’t want the next 50 years to be about fighting for rights we’ve already won.”
We are living in a moment where progress is not just stalled, it’s being actively rolled back. Reproductive rights, workplace protections, and gender equality gains that took decades of organizing are suddenly framed as up for debate.
First Vice-President/Treasurer Laurie Nancekivell didn’t mince words.
She reminded attendees that you can always count on the women of OPSEU/SEFPO not to stay quiet and not to back down. She also marked a milestone, 50 years of the Provincial Women’s Committee. That’s five decades of organizing and holding space– five decades of women lifting each other up in a system that wasn’t built for us to succeed.
Dr. Crystal Garvey — Equity Vice President and Women’s Equity Board member — brought it home in a way that felt both celebratory and grounding. She made it clear that the morning wasn’t just about awards: “We are collaborators and innovators and your impact is always felt”. Often, recognition is reserved for a few, while the labour of many goes unnamed. Dr. Garvey disrupted that narrative expanding the frame to honour all the women doing the work, often invisibly.
Photos and Bread and Roses Award Recipients
This year’s Regional Bread and Roses Award recipients reflect the depth and diversity of leadership across OPSEU/SEFPO:
- Region 1: Shelley Gartshore, Local 124
- Region 2: Donna D’Abreu, Local 281
- Region 3: Jessica Bushey, Local 358
- Region 4: Chrisy Tremblay, Local 454
- Region 5: Toni Pettit, Local 561
- Region 6: Chantal Barnhart, Local 615
- Region 7: Dana Bruno, Local 708
Each name represents more than individual achievement – it represents advocacy and leadership that often happens behind the scenes and under pressure.
This year’s overall Bread and Roses Award recipient is Janice Hagan.
Janis passed away earlier this year and her family accepted the award on her behalf. The moment was heavy but also deeply fitting. Janice’s activism, her solidarity, her refusal to stop climbing even when the mountain was steep — that’s the legacy: one that continues with every woman who organizes, who speaks up and refuses to accept less.
Proceeds from this year’s breakfast went to The Canadian Women’s Heart Health Alliance. Heart disease remains one of the leading causes of death for women in Canada, yet women’s symptoms are more likely to be dismissed, misdiagnosed, or overlooked entirely.
In a convention themed One Big Union, the Provincial Women’s Committee breakfast reminds us that unity is about naming power and challenging it. Because a union that works for all women is a union that works.