B.C. nurses ask for better staffing as labour talks begin

The labour focus in B.C. is shifting from teachers to nurses today.

The B.C. Nurses Union has opened its annual convention in Vancouver.

The union is heading into contract talks with their employer.

The BCNU says its focus will be hiring more staff.

“There can’t be any more productivity coming out of these nurses,” says BCNU President Debra McPherson. “They are working through their coffee breaks, through their lunch hours. They are doing excessive on-call, excessive overtime. They can’t squeeze one more minute if work out of these people.”

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McPherson says B.C. nurses are in despair every day about their workloads and their ability to deliver safe health care to the public.

“We will wait to see what the employer brings to the table in terms of those issues. We are focused firmly on the issue of staffing. That is the gain that we want to make in this round of bargaining.”

But in contract talks, the nurses will be working under the same net zero mandate as the teachers.

The Union has began negotiations for a new four-year contract, asking for 2,000 more nurses across the provincial health-care system.

The nurses’ current contract, which expires on March 31.

With files from the Canadian Press