After fighting for about year to get the Halifax Regional Municipality to recognize that a janitorial company they awarded contracts to was circumventing the Living Wage requirement at Alderney Gate and other municipal locations, and after the HRM finally recognized there was a problem and announced it would be terminating Imperial Cleaners contracts earlier this month, the HRM Budget Committee has been having discussions about watering down or axing the Living Wage Requirement in the HRM Supplier Code of Conduct as part of broader efforts to balance the 2026/2027 budget.
SEIU Local 2 provided a presentation to the HRM Budget Committee on Monday, February 16, 2026, on the importance of the Living Wage policy. On Friday February 20, 2026, during the Budget Committee continuation meeting, HRM Council voted against Councillor Purdy’s amendment to consider replacing the living wage requirement with a lesser “fair wage”.
SEIU applauds the Councillors who voted this down and spoke in favor of not cutting the Living Wage Requirement, including Sam Austin, Becky Kent, Virginia Hinch, Laura White, Jean St-Amand and Shawn Cleary.
Members of the Workers’ Alliance speak passionately about the Living Wage and the mistreatment of janitors at a public hearing at Halifax City Hall on Jan. 27, 2026.
SEIU members were surprised to hear HRM Director of Procurement, Stephen Terry, make statements to Council that Supplier employees have not made direct complaints about the living wage requirement during this meeting.
In a letter sent to the HRM Council and Director of Procurement on February 23, 2026, SEIU set the record straight on this inaccurate claim as it is a complete mischaracterization of the public events that has unfolded over the past year.
Worker Labour Complaints
Workers at Alderney Gate have repeatedly complained about HRM’s failure to uphold the living wage requirement. Not only have they spoken out publicly about the workplace violations and abuses they’ve endured but they have also filed multiple legal complaints and made an application to form a union.
Through SEIU, these workers have provided direct evidence to HRM (i.e. years of their own paystub documentation) through the Union’s judicial review complaint, in liaising with Councillors like Sam Austin, and in letters to HRM Council.
Imperial Rebidding
It also came to SEIU’s attention that the incumbent contractor at Alderney Gate, Imperial Cleaners, has been welcomed to make bids for HRM janitorial tenders at the sites that it was recently removed from by HRM.
HRM spokesperson Sarah Brannen told the Halifax Examiner on February 2 that HRM would be terminating sixteen contracts with Imperial Cleaners due to their failure in complying with the Living Wage Requirement. Seemingly, Imperial Cleaners is re-bidding on some of those sixteen contracts that are being re-tendered.
Punishing Imperial Cleaners by terminating its contracts and telegraphing to other Suppliers that there are (and will be) severe punishments for circumventing HRM rules was a step in the right direction. However, HRM would be taking multiple steps backwards if it were to re-award contracts to Imperial Cleaners, a perpetrator that not only circumvented HRM rules but whose actions have led to immense taxpayer costs in re-initiating multiple tenders.
The Alderney Gate and Imperial Cleaners situation have exposed gaps and faults in HRM’s living wage policy. Rather than scrapping the policy through budget cuts, SEIU believes this moment is an opportunity to patch the cracks and realize the true intent behind the policy that took HRM Council nearly a decade to build towards.
Our Union and workers are proud to live in a city that has a living wage requirement for contract employees. SEIU has once again asked that HRM Council and Staff work diligently to ensure that budget is not balanced on the backs of precarious janitors and other contract workers.
