'Recognizes the hard work and sacrifices:' Nurses' union negotiators ask Alberta members to ratify mediator's report

Nurses protest low staffing and government cuts outside of Royal Alexandra Hospital in Edmonton on Aug. 11, 2021. Photo by Ian Kucerak /Postmedia, file

Nurses in the province are being asked by their union negotiating committee to ratify recommendations for a new collective agreement with Alberta Health Services (AHS) and other health-care employers, noting this was the most difficult deal in decades to hammer out.

The United Nurses of Alberta (UNA) negotiating committee is asking union members to ratify the recommendations by mediator Lyle Kanee that include pay increases over the life of the four-year collective agreement amounting to 4.25 per cent, said a Wednesday news release from the UNA. The term of the agreement would be from April 1, 2020, to March 31, 2024.

“This agreement recognizes the hard work and sacrifices of Alberta’s registered nurses and registered psychiatric nurses throughout the pandemic,” UNA president Heather Smith said in a statement. “Our members and their colleagues have been holding Alberta’s health-care system together, and it is relief to have reached an agreement with the assistance of the government-appointed mediator.”

Upon ratification, says the UNA, current semi-annual lump-sum payments will be converted to the wage grid. There is also a one-time lump sum payment of one per cent for 2021 in recognition of nurses’ contribution during the pandemic.

Other improvements include enhanced psychological supports, creation of a union-employer provincial workload advisory committee, and the implementation of a rural capacity investment fund, the union said. That fund will allocate $5 million per year to recruitment and retention strategies in rural and remote areas of the province, and $2.5 million per year for relocation assistance.

Noting this has been the most difficult round of negotiations in more than three decades with the union, UNA labour relations director David Harrigan, who led the negotiating committee in collective bargaining and mediation, said the agreement as it stands now will benefit all members.

“We are glad Alberta Health Services was prepared to move away from its initial demands for wage cuts and to drop its efforts to impose more than 200 rollbacks,” Harrigan said.

“We thank mediator Kanee for his hard work bringing the parties together to reach this agreement,” Harrigan added.

The UNA negotiating committee presented the mediator’s report to the executive members of affected locals in a virtual meeting on Tuesday evening.

The contents of the mediator’s report will be presented formally to the members at a virtual reporting meeting on Jan. 7.

A ratification vote is scheduled to take place on Jan. 17.

Finance Minister Travis Toews later Wednesday morning said in a statement that if the deal is ratified, it will form the “basis for labour stability in the health-care system.”

“I respect the frontline and unique clinical role nurses have played — and continue to play — during the COVID pandemic. This deal recognizes their hard work and dedication, and the many sacrifices nurses have made since the pandemic began,” said Toews.

In addition to RNs and RPNs employed by AHS, the agreement covers those employed by Covenant Health, Lamont Health Care and The Bethany Group (Canmore). UNA represents more than 30,000 RNs and RPNs in Alberta, plus some allied health-care workers.

Source: EdmontonJournal

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