Nurses union paints health facilities grey only when NDP in power, health minister says

Manitoba’s health minister dismissed grey-listing of hospitals by the Manitoba Nurses Union on Tuesday, suggesting the tactic is mainly used when the NDP is in power.

“This is kind of what we’ve seen from them before, when a previous NDP government came into power and this is what MNU did,” Uzoma Asagwara said.

Nurses at St. Boniface Hospital, concerned about safety issues in the workplace, will vote next month on whether to join colleagues at Health Sciences Centre and Thompson General Hospital in grey-listing their facility.

Grey-listing warns other nurses not to apply for jobs or accept shifts at a particular facility because the union membership has declared it unsafe.

“This is an approach that they choose to take for us,” the minister said.

“The question for all of us is how we are going to choose to focus our energy.”

In August, MNU members grey-listed the Health Sciences Centre and did likewise in Thompson.

“I think the question for all of us is how we are going to choose to focus our energy,” Asagwara said.

“Over the recent weeks and months, I’ve had many conversations with nurses who work at St. Boniface Hospital.”

Asagwara, who uses they/them pronouns, has spoken to institutional safety officers and leadership at St. B.

“All of these folks are laser-focused on working together to improve safety and security,” they said.

“Everyone’s energy is focused on actions that will lead to measurable improvements for nurses and for better care for patients.”

MNU president Darlene Jackson said grey-listing is a last resort for nurses whose concerns aren’t being addressed in the workplace and that it is an effective measure.

“We’ve definitely seen some improvements at HSC,” she said Tuesday. “We now have police 24-7. We have had quite a few of the issues we talked about addressed.

“There are still issues that are outstanding, that the (employees feel) are important and must happen.”

She said the union is seeking a memo from the employer specifying when measures will be taken.

“We want something in writing that gives us assurance that it is going to be dealt with, that it’s not going to be just swept under the carpet.”

Asagwara said safety requires “a layered, practical, methodical approach to be taken to make sure that all of these measures are being put into place as quickly as possible, but also in the right ways.”

And that’s the approach being taken at St. Boniface, they said.

The MNU has “brought forward a whole lot of demands. Many of the things that they brought forward are outside of safety and security,” Asagwara said.

If the aim of grey-listing is to dissuade new recruits from taking jobs there, it’s not working, the health minister said.

“What we know is that the results are telling us a different story,” said Asagwara. “We have been able to continue to hire nurses throughout grey-listing at HSC.

The practice of grey-listing institutions is unique to Manitoba, said Canadian Nurses Association CEO Valerie Grdisa.

The former mental-health nurse said Manitoba’s experience with grey-listing hospitals is being watched by health-care facilities across the country.

Grdisa said heightened concern about safety and violence toward staff is a national issue, and that that there needs to be zero tolerance for it.

Jackson said other provinces have asked about Manitoba’s grey list.

“When I’m at my national executive board meetings for (the Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions) I’ll often get questions from other presidents or from their executive directors just asking what it is…. They’re always very interested in knowing what’s happening, what’s been accomplished, ‘how do you feel it’s going?’

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca