N.L. nurses start strike vote

Many nurses voting in St. John's on the first day of a strike vote Monday said they feel job action is their only option.

Newfoundland and Labrador nurses started voting after union officials said they received a note from the provincial government saying its position hadn't changed over the issue of binding arbitration.

Karen Noseworthy, who works as an emergency room nurse at St. Clare's Mercy Hospital, said there aren't enough nurses to prepare beds and see patients, so they pile up in the emergency room hallway.

"It's bad. Every day we're looking at taking care of patients in the corridor," she said while waiting to vote.

Problems like that, nurses say, are why the union is seeking a strike mandate.

Diane Eveleigh says the government is leaving her and her colleagues no choice.

"I think that we're being forced into making the decision and I think that's why we have to do our strike vote. And we have to support each other, nurses. We just have to stick together on this one," she said.

The nurses union is also starting an ad campaign highlighting the problems caused by the shortage of nurses.

"There are surgeries being cancelled, there are procedures not being done because there are not enough nurses and we are concerned that patients aren't getting the level of care that they need," said Tammie Harvey, a cardiac care nurse at the Health Sciences Centre — the province's largest hospital.

Late last week, Newfoundland and Labrador Nurses Union president Debbie Forward made a final offer to the province that said nurses would give up their right to strike, if the government would agree to binding arbitration.

The union also offered last week to negotiate a two-year contract instead of a four-year contract — a condition the government must accept before talks resume. Finance Minister Jerome Kennedy said the province was willing to negotiate, but a two-year deal is certainly not one that it could accept

Binding arbitration was rejected by the provincial government the last time nurses went on strike in 1999.

Back then, it was Liberal premier Brian Tobin who legislated nurses back to work and imposed a new contract on them. According to transcripts from the house of assembly, Tobin said the government would not go to binding arbitration because it could lead to "unaffordable settlements."

At the time, the Conservatives argued the Liberal government was making "a mockery of the collective bargaining process" by legislating nurses back to work without binding arbitration.

Conservative Finance Minister Jerome Kennedy said recently the government may legislate the nurses back to work if they go on strike this year.

The strike vote is expected to take six weeks as nurses across the province cast ballots.