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Nurses in British Columbia are set to escalate job action next week, their union announced Friday evening, one day after targeted action began.
The B.C. Nurses’ Union (BCNU) said a picket line is planned to begin at Vancouver General Hospital on Tuesday at 5:30 a.m. PT, but essential services like emergency care will be maintained to protect patient safety.
Union president Adriane Gear said nurses do not want to be on picket lines.
“Nurses and all health-care workers and professionals choose these careers because we want to care for patients, our clients, our residents, and the communities that we serve,” she said Saturday morning.
“There hasn’t been a health-care strike of any kind since the early 2000s … the last strike that BCNU led was actually back in 1989. These decisions, or steps, have not been made lightly. The system is at a place where — and I can only speak for my members — they can’t hold it together any longer, and so something really has to change.”
The announcement comes after overtime restrictions and a ban on non-nursing duties — including cleaning and delivering meals — for members of the Nurses’ Bargaining Association (NBA) were implemented, after a 12 p.m. deadline passed on Thursday without further progress on a new contract.
The health-care workers are looking for a pay increase and mitigation of pressures such as unsafe staffing levels and workplace violence, among other things.
“We are in a critical nursing shortage. This was coming because of really poor planning, and I wouldn’t say of just this government but of all governments, and the pandemic exacerbated the situation,” Gear said.
B.C. currently has a permanent shortage of about 4,500 to 6,000 nurses, she said, which does not include those positions that become vacant due to short-term absences like maternity leave or illness.
“Nurses day in and day out are required to care for way more patients than what is safe,” Gear said. “It’s also about our health and safety. One nurse every 16 hours goes off [work] on a WorkSafeBC injury claim due to violence. That is unacceptable.”
Nursing shortage a critical issue, union says
In a statement, BCNU CEO Jim Gould said the government needs to return to the table with “an offer that respects nurses” and recognizes their value.
“This government is not going to solve the nursing shortage without making serious improvements to nurses’ working conditions,” Gould said.
He added that the union, which represents about 60,000 nurses across the province, will not tolerate attempts by employers to threaten or intimidate members participating in lawful job action.
Gear said she’s heard of some instances where managers have threatened to report nurses to their professional college for “compromising patient care” while participating in job action.
“That is completely unacceptable,” she said, adding that the duties included in job action do not require a professional nursing designation to complete them.
In a statement, the Health Employers Association of B.C. (HEABC) said managers and nurses will need to determine whether a specific task is essential to patient safety.
“B.C. has essential services orders in place for the health sector to prevent immediate and serious danger to the health of the public during any job action,” it said. “Even during job action, nurses continue to have professional responsibilities as outlined by the B.C. College of Nurses and Midwives.”
Parties need ‘space’: health minister
In a statement on Saturday, Health Minister Josie Osborne said British Columbians will continue to “get the health care they need. The Labour Board has robust processes in place to thoughtfully set what constitutes an essential service.”
Osborne added: “The best agreements are found at the bargaining table. These negotiations are important and sensitive and we want to give the Health Employers Association of B.C. and the Nurses’ Bargaining Association space.”
The union hasn’t had formal negotiations with HEABC since May, when it reached a tentative deal with health employers on a new collective agreement. That tentative deal was rejected the following month.
On Thursday, less than an hour after the job action began, HEABC said in a statement that it and the NBA have agreed to return to negotiations next week.
“HEABC believes that negotiations are best kept to the bargaining table where the parties can work together on solutions that are mutually beneficial and support the government’s and employers’ key priorities,” the association said.
The union says the escalation of job action is a regrettable step. “Nurses go into this profession because they want to provide care and serve their communities. Really, nurses are feeling like they’ve been left with no choice,” Gear said.
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