Health staff have bone to pick with government

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This article was published 23/01/2025 (308 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Two new surveys of allied health-care staff and nurses suggest workloads and morale are worse or unchanged for many since the NDP government vowed to make life better for them when it was elected 15 months ago.

Jason Linklater, president of the Manitoba Association of Health Care Professionals, whose members are without a contract, said the results of a poll by that union should set alarm bells ringing.

“There’s a true disconnect between what government is saying in news conferences and campaigns, and what people in health care on the front lines see every single day,” he said.

“When we hear messaging coming from government that doesn’t reflect reality, it leads me to believe we’re at a stalemate in terms of being able to actually fix the system.”

The association represents allied health workers, including paramedics, respiratory therapists, lab and imaging technologists, and mental health clinicians.

The union emailed a three-question survey to 6,012 members in December to find out how they felt about staffing, workload and morale in 2024, following a longer survey in May. The latest questionnaire was completed by 1,446 members.

Almost half (48 per cent) said their workplace lost staff last year, while 41 per cent said staffing levels were about the same, and 11 per cent said there had been improvement.

A majority (62 per cent) said their workload got worse in 2024, while 36 per cent said they were doing about the same amount of work, and two per cent said their workload had decreased.

The association said 59 per cent of respondents felt morale had worsened in their workplace, 33 per cent noticed no change and eight per cent reported an improvement.

An employee who works in mental-health and addictions services said it’s difficult to stay hopeful or positive, given the state of the system.

“I love my job, but sometimes I ask: can I continue to do this?” said the person, who agreed to speak on condition of anonymity.

The employee said current workloads are unsustainable and more staff are needed to better support patients.

While their hope for change has faded, the employee said it’s still early for the NDP.

“There was a lot of hope (after the October 2023 election) because their whole basis was fixing health care. It’s tough to continue to find that hope when nothing has really changed,” they said.

The NDP promised to listen to workers and “rebuild” trust after seven years of Progressive Conservative government.

“We hear you,” Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara said in response to the association survey. “I respect what allied health-care professionals tell us their experiences are, and I take them very seriously.”

Under the NDP, Manitoba has hired more than 870 net new health-care workers, and it has seen improvements in vacancy rates, Asagwara said.

About 10 per cent of the net new hires were allied health positions as of late September.

Their contract expired March 31, 2024, making them the only public health-care sector without a new collective agreement, the union said. Previously, the workers went five years without a contract.

Linklater called on the government to create a strategy that assesses current allied health staffing levels and determines how to retain, recruit and train the number of staff who will be needed in future.

Asagwara said the government is happy to work with “experts and partners” to boost capacity.

On Monday, the Manitoba Nurses’ Union released the results of its own member survey, which was completed by 1,326 members in October.

They were asked to grade the government’s performance on fulfilling election promises to improve health care and patient outcomes in the first year of its four-year term.

The nurses union said 42 per cent gave the province a “D” (no improvement), and 24 per cent gave a “C” (very minimal improvement). A similar number (23 per cent) gave the government an “F” (things have become worse), while 10 per cent gave a “B” (some improvement) and one per cent offered an “A” (lots of improvement).

The union said 65 per cent felt the government was not effective at addressing issues or potential solutions suggested by nurses during Asagwara and Premier Wab Kinew “listening tours” of hospitals and other health-care sites.

Last June, a Doctors Manitoba report found 46 per cent of physicians were considering leaving the province, retiring or reducing their clinical work hours in the next three years.

About three-quarters said they were considering leaving or retiring due to frustration, burnout, heavy workloads or excessive paperwork, said Doctors Manitoba, which represents more than 4,000 physicians and medical learners.

chris.kitching@freepress.mb.ca

Health Care survey