Talks break off, pickets inevitable, N.L. nurses say

Talks aimed at finding a breakthrough to a long-running dispute between the Newfoundland and Labrador government and its unionized nurses have failed, the union said.

In a statement late Monday night, the Newfoundland and Labrador Nurses' Union blamed the government for the collapse of discussions that began Sunday behind closed doors, with the assistance of a conciliator.

"Government remained unwilling to consider any change in their language. Not one word. Not one comma," union president Debbie Forward said in a statement.

In a news conference later Tuesday, Forward lashed out at Premier Danny Williams and his government, accusing them of putting nurses in an untenable position.

"Their intention is to punish nurses," Forward told reporters.

"Their intention is as well to punish the health-care system and the people of the province because that is what they are doing and that is what they are planning to do tomorrow when they lock nurses out."

Later, Forward and her supporters rallied on the steps of Confederation Building, the seat of the provincial government.

Forward said nurses expect to be locked out starting at 7:30 a.m. on Wednesday.

But Premier Danny Williams on Tuesday described the pending job action as a strike, and blamed the nurses for setting its wheels in motion.

"If in fact the nurses are going to go on strike tomorrow, as they've indicated, then that's their decision and there's nothing we can do about it," Williams told reporters in Grand Falls-Windsor.

"I'm at a complete loss, we're all at a complete loss to understand how, in these difficult economic times that our nurses will not take [our] offer," he said.

"It's in the nurses' hands."

Threat of 'overtime strike' rebuffed

The union had wanted to wage what it calls an overtime strike, in which members refused to accept overtime assignments.

Government officials said last week that they considered the notice of an overtime strike to enough of a move for the four regional health authorities to enact the essential workers agreement.

"The employers, by invoking the agreements, are telling more than half of our members not to show up for work. That is locking nurses out," Forward said.

The union, which represents more than 5,000 members and garnered a strike mandate this winter, rejected a final government offer this month that includes generous wage provisions and higher starting and top salary scales, but also contract demands that the union finds offensive.

The government wants to enforce a market adjustment provision, which would allow recruiters to pay some nurses more than their peers doing the same job, as long as the position had been deemed hard to fill. The union says the provision undercuts the purpose of collective bargaining.

The government also wants to eliminate a nurse's position two years after he or she is declared permanently disabled. The union said that provision is an assault on injured nurses and worker safety.

The union has been calling for binding arbitration to settle the issues. Premier Danny Williams has ruled out that option.

Williams has also said that if government must use the legislature to force nurses back to work, it would drop increases to starting and top salary scales, and instead use the same wage template negotiated with other public-sector unions.

Forward, meanwhile, refused to comment on informal proposals that individual nurses have made that they resign en masse to avoid being legislated back to work.

Forward warned that the impact of such a move could be dramatic.

"We told them that by locking nurses out and legislating the template upon us, they will destroy health care in Newfoundland and Labrador," she said.