Author of the article:Don Braid • Calgary Herald
Publishing date:Jul 12, 2021 •
Health-care workers stage a wildcat strike at University of Alberta Hospital on Oct. 26, 2020, to protest job cuts announced by the Alberta government.
PHOTO BY DAVID BLOOM/POSTMEDIA
It takes a special government to praise nurses for their work during the greatest health crisis in a century, and then offer them a three-per-cent pay cut.
This makes the UCP look heartless. By comparison, their treatment of doctors seems almost humanitarian.
The United Nurses of Alberta, with more than 30,000 members, is a much more powerful body than the doctor’s group, the Alberta Medical Association.
And many nurses are talking about a strike.
“I’m not raising that word — it’s the members who are raising it,” says UNA president Heather Smith.
“The mood is definitely very tense. And last week does not in any way help to de-escalate an exhausted workforce who already feel under-appreciated and disrespected.”
Last Tuesday, government negotiators formally proposed a three-per-cent pay cut over one year. The union says that with other government demands, this amounts to a real-world cut of more than five per cent.
The government has always signalled that after the pandemic, it would turn to the province’s serious fiscal problems, which include a $16-billion deficit and nearly $100 billion in debt.
Premier Jason Kenney often admiringly cites Premier Ralph Klein’s cuts in the 1990s, which were more severe.
But Klein made nearly everybody in public life take pay cuts of up to five per cent — nurses, teachers, public servants, professors, the whole crowd. Retired public employees resent the shrinkage in their pensions to this day.
But with everybody fighting mad at once, the Klein government couldn’t be accused of picking on one group.
Now the UCP is doing the reverse, by taking on the most fatigued and demoralized group in Alberta, and one of the most admired.
It takes a special government to praise nurses for their work during the greatest health crisis in a century, and then offer them a three-per-cent pay cut.
This makes the UCP look heartless. By comparison, their treatment of doctors seems almost humanitarian.
The United Nurses of Alberta, with more than 30,000 members, is a much more powerful body than the doctor’s group, the Alberta Medical Association.
And many nurses are talking about a strike.
“I’m not raising that word — it’s the members who are raising it,” says UNA president Heather Smith.
“The mood is definitely very tense. And last week does not in any way help to de-escalate an exhausted workforce who already feel under-appreciated and disrespected.”
Last Tuesday, government negotiators formally proposed a three-per-cent pay cut over one year. The union says that with other government demands, this amounts to a real-world cut of more than five per cent.
The government has always signalled that after the pandemic, it would turn to the province’s serious fiscal problems, which include a $16-billion deficit and nearly $100 billion in debt.
Premier Jason Kenney often admiringly cites Premier Ralph Klein’s cuts in the 1990s, which were more severe.
But Klein made nearly everybody in public life take pay cuts of up to five per cent — nurses, teachers, public servants, professors, the whole crowd. Retired public employees resent the shrinkage in their pensions to this day.
But with everybody fighting mad at once, the Klein government couldn’t be accused of picking on one group.
Now the UCP is doing the reverse, by taking on the most fatigued and demoralized group in Alberta, and one of the most admired.
Members of the United Nurses of Alberta march outside the Foothills Hospital in Calgary on Feb. 13, 2020, to show support for front-line workers. PHOTO BY JIM WELLS/POSTMEDIA
The UCP surely knows its demands create the likelihood of a strike or other labour action. They calculate that the battle for public opinion can be won with attacks on “union bosses” and appeals to the larger fiscal picture.
The biggest nurses strike in Alberta came in 1988. It was a 19-day horror, technically illegal, that cost the union $426,000 in contempt of court and other fines. More than 75 nurses faced criminal charges.
But the nurses got a favourable settlement and established themselves as a force.
“The similarities between 1988 and now are actually quite frightening,” Smith says.
“Back then we also had staff shortages across the province, and the employers came to the table and asked for rollbacks. It’s the same kind of mentality that you see today.”
But the big difference now is that public service strikes are legal
The UCP surely knows its demands create the likelihood of a strike or other labour action. They calculate that the battle for public opinion can be won with attacks on “union bosses” and appeals to the larger fiscal picture.
The biggest nurses strike in Alberta came in 1988. It was a 19-day horror, technically illegal, that cost the union $426,000 in contempt of court and other fines. More than 75 nurses faced criminal charges.
But the nurses got a favourable settlement and established themselves as a force.
“The similarities between 1988 and now are actually quite frightening,” Smith says.
“Back then we also had staff shortages across the province, and the employers came to the table and asked for rollbacks. It’s the same kind of mentality that you see today.”
But the big difference now is that public service strikes are legal
A nurse helps people lined up for COVID-19 testing at the Richmond Road Diagnostic and Treatment Centre in Calgary on June 3, 2020.
PHOTO BY GAVIN YOUNG /Postmedia, file
The Supreme Court ruled in 2015 that complete bans are unconstitutional. The Alberta courts followed shortly afterward, basically confirming the high court ruling.
New Alberta law on conditions for strikes sets hurdles for both sides. For one thing, union and employer have to agree on which workers are essential, and ensure that those people stay on the job.
But once the conditions are met, a strike can begin with no threat of contempt charges and fines for the union and the workers. Consequently, any strike could last much longer than illegal ones.
Even today, it takes a lot of provocation to push Alberta nurses toward a strike.
Since the 1988 conflict, Smith says, “nurses have worked their whole careers and never had to face this dilemma, in terms of standing up for our workplace and ourselves.
“These people have never had to consider a strike vote. Now we have members from across the province saying, ‘Where’s the vote?'”
There’s positioning going on at this point, obviously. The government may demand three per cent to soften up the nurses for zero. Union officials have to reflect the members’ views while still trying for a negotiated settlement.
But many Alberta nurses are profoundly exhausted, bitter, disillusioned — and now, insulted.
One way or another, they will be heard.
Don Braid’s column appears regularly in the Herald.
Twitter: @DonBraid
Facebook: Don Braid Politics
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