For Immediate Release July 29, 2003
Only good conditions can prevent
a crisis in nursing
Reaching a fair and respectful new union contract is the best strategy for avoiding a mass retirement of nurses says the United Nurses of Alberta. The Registered nurses’ union is responding to a report released today by the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI) that shows that Alberta could lose nearly one-third of its Registered nurses to retirement by 2006.
“The next contract for Alberta’s nurses could make this situation better or it could make it far worse,” says UNA Vice-president Bev Dick. “If Health Regions force nurses into a contract that gives Employers the ability to move nurses all over, and the ability to make them work straight midnight shifts, we could see even more nurses retiring than these frightening projections.”
The CIHI report shows how incentives to keep experienced nurses working longer could help prevent a crisis in the health system. “Quite simply 1 in 4 RNs currently caring for patients in this country could be gone by 2006,” says the report, which is available at www.cihi.ca.
In Alberta the projections suggest over 6,000 of the province’s 24,000 nurses could be gone.
Alberta’s nursing workforce has been growing in recent years, Bev Dick notes, but “this also is the fastest growing province in Canada, we need more nurses to provide the care our patients need.” On a per person basis we still have fewer nurses caring for patients than we did 20 years ago.
UNA has been negotiating with the Health Regions for a new nurses’ contract since January. In July, a government-appointed mediator made recommendations that accepted almost all of the Employers’ proposals that would worsen working conditions for nurses.
“The mediator’s recommendations for a contract would be a disaster for nursing in this province,” says Bev Dick. “I have had many senior nurses tell me that if that kind of contract is forced on nurses they will retire even earlier.” Although salaries are not a big issue the rollbacks also would cut into nurses’ income by eliminating premiums and overtime hours for many nurses.
“Our last new agreement in 2001 had good incentives to keep nurses from retiring, things like extra vacation days for long-service nurses. Many nurses said they would work extra years because of the bonuses in that contract. Now the Employers want to take much of that away, and make working conditions far worse. It’s a formula for disaster,” Bev Dick says.
“The best incentive to keep senior nurses working is improving working conditions so we have the time to provide good care to patients. Staff shortages and workloads have made it more difficult in recent years for nurses to do the work they love. If the Employers make conditions worse, we’ll not only lose experienced nurses, we’ll also lose young new graduate nurses who will choose to work out of province.”
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For more information or comment: Bev Dick, UNA Vice-President (780) 425-1025
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