PC negotiating style to be tested as majority of labour contracts expire

With the vast majority of contracts expired, the PC government is poised to make its mark on labour agreements with public sector workers.

According to the briefing binder prepared for Finance Minister Allan MacMaster, 77 per cent of all 300 public sector agreements will have expired by the end of 2021. 

That figure is even higher for the health-care sector alone, where 86 per cent of agreements are up for bargaining. Those include contracts with nurses and many other front-line workers who have been sounding the alarm about labour shortages and burnout during the pandemic.

Throughout the summer election campaign and the first four months of his mandate, Premier Tim Houston has said repeatedly that he'll make Nova Scotia a desirable place to work in health care, and that health-care workers will feel respected by the government.

Now, with many unions preparing for bargaining, union leaders say the time has come to see those words put into action by signing deals that ensure better working conditions and higher wages.

"I would have probably said to you when they were just elected that I was hopeful because this government ran on a platform that said 'we see you and we value the work and we value the sector,'" said Nan McFadgen, president of CUPE.

But more recently, said McFadgen, she's been discouraged.

At the end of last month, CUPE held rallies across the province to call for a wage increase for continuing care assistants, who make up the bulk of the workforce in long-term care. One week later, the province announced a $57-million plan for improving long-term care that did not include any changes to pay for workers.

Barbara Adams, minister of seniors and long-term care, said unions need to head to the bargaining table to seek those changes.

McFadgen said Adams's comment struck her as misinformed, since CUPE is in the process of establishing a bargaining protocol.  

"They are messaging that they're willing to talk wages … but I guess we'll see."

Jason MacLean, president of NSGEU, said he sees an opportunity for the Houston government to hit the reset button on labour relations after two "tenuous" mandates with the Liberals, mostly under Premier Stephen McNeil.

When employers and unions reached impasses during McNeil's time in government, he routinely settled things with legislation, imposing agreements on workers to end or prevent strikes.

Like McFadgen, however, MacLean said his early optimism about Houston's approach to organized labour is beginning to wane. 

MacLean said Houston's tour of the province to meet and speak with health-care workers is laudable, but he worries it was a "one off."

"You can see that in [Houston's] press conferences, that he is saying he cares about the health-care workers, but it's all about the execution."

"I came in a lot more hopeful than I feel at the moment on how this government feels about labour and the relationship it needs to really advance issues in this province," MacLean said. 

For Janet Hazelton, president of the Nova Scotia Nurses Union, it isn't a matter of hope. She said the province's current staffing gaps and the government's promise to fill them mean there's no room for this government to fight with workers like its predecessor. 

"In my view, they really don't have a choice."

Hazelton said Nova Scotia is going to have to make its health-care contracts more competitive in the national context to attract and retain workers.

Fiscal update

On Tuesday, MacMaster released a fiscal update that showed the province with surplus of more than $100 million — a major turnaround compared to the $445-million deficit forecasted in September.

Asked by reporters how that might inform the province's approach to bargaining, MacMaster said nothing changes.

"At the end of the day we want people to feel valued, wherever they work in government, whether it's in the education system, in our hospitals, in our nursing homes, throughout the civil service, people working on our roads. 

"In terms of negotiations, all of that will be at the negotiation table. We respect collective bargaining, we want to respect that in the sense that we want to keep those discussions there."

MacMaster said the PC government is focused on improving working conditions, especially in health care.