More than 200 National Microbiology Lab employees’ contracts won’t be renewed amid federal cost cutting

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This article was published 26/01/2025 (258 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The federal government isn’t renewing the contracts of more than 200 employees at the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg amid “many” job losses across the country, their union told the Free Press.

Opened in 1999, the Arlington Street facility — Canada’s highest-security lab — stores and researches deadly pathogens, such as Ebola, in addition to other work to track and prevent the spread of infectious diseases.

“The department is not renewing the term agreements of many employees, and this includes the over 200 at the lab,” Shimen Fayad, national president of the Union of Health and Environment Workers, wrote in an email.

Union members were told the Public Health Agency of Canada’s decision stemmed from a “lack of funding,” she said.

Fayad said the JC Wilt Infectious Diseases Research Centre, located nearby on Logan Avenue, has also been affected, but exact numbers at that facility were not yet known.

The federal government promoted the JC Wilt facility as a hub for HIV and AIDS research in Canada when it opened in 2014 to complement the NML’s work.

Questions are being asked about what the situation means for remaining lab employees in Winnipeg.

“The union is concerned of increased workload on employees,” Fayad wrote.

She said the Winnipeg-based employees whose contracts are not being renewed had one to two years, and six to 14 years of experience.

In mid-November, more than 50 employees received letters informing them their terms would not be extended.

“The local union was not advised of this and members were clearly upset,” Fayad wrote.

The number of affected employees has since increased, according to the union.

Fayad said most terms will not be extended past March 31.

PHAC did not confirm how many contracts are not being renewed.

The agency received “time-limited” funding for “surge support” in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, spokesman Mark Johnson said.

“As this temporary funding winds down, the agency is responsibly managing resources to ensure a sustainable operational footprint moving forward,” he wrote in an email.

“In this context, management notified employees that the contracts of current PHAC term employees will end in accordance with their current end dates.

“PHAC will continue to deliver on its role of promoting health, preventing and controlling chronic diseases and injuries, preventing and controlling infectious disease, and preparing for and responding to public health emergencies.”

Fayad said PHAC set up a database, which is used by recruiting managers, that employees can voluntarily sign up to while they look for new positions.

The National Microbiology Laboratory had 783 employees as of early December, the vast majority of them in Winnipeg, Johnson said. NML also has main sites in Guelph, Ont., and Saint-Hyacinthe, Que.

Fayad said UHEW represents about 400 employees at the NML and JC Wilt research centre in Winnipeg.

The NML in Winnipeg is Canada’s only Level 4 virology facility. The work of its multiple divisions includes tracking and testing bacterial diseases such as tuberculosis, investigating food-borne disease outbreaks and assessing the impact of flu and other viral infections in Canada.

Public Health Agency of Canada had 4,251 employees across Canada in 2024, up from 2,379 before the start of the pandemic, Treasury Board figures showed.

Earlier this month, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada announced plans to cut roughly 3,300 jobs over the next three years.

Last year, the Public Health Agency of Canada defended security protocols at the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg, after the firings of husband-and-wife scientists Keding Cheng and Xiangguo Qiu sparked concerns about Chinese espionage.

Their security clearances were revoked in 2019 and it emerged last year they were fired in 2021.

Declassified documents from the Canadian Security Intelligence Service said the couple shared confidential scientific information with China, and posed a credible threat to Canada’s economic security.

The documents said Qiu hid her connections with China and was associated with Chinese “talent programs.”

chris.kitching@freepress.mb.ca