Nurses’ vote makes Seven Oaks General Hospital fourth Manitoba facility on safety-focused grey list

Nurses at Seven Oaks General Hospital have voted in favour of grey-listing, adding to the list of Manitoba health facilities where union members are urging colleagues not to accept work due to safety concerns.

The Manitoba Nurses Union said 98 per cent of members working at Seven Oaks voted in favour of the action, amid mounting frustrations over violence, security gaps, poor communication and unsafe staffing levels that compromise the safety of staff and patients.

The results were announced days before Monday, when the province promised to have institutional safety officers in place at Seven Oaks.

“The problem is nurses don’t trust that those promises are actually going to happen,” union president Darlene Jackson said in an interview Friday.

“Our labour relations officer and the executive there have been talking to the employer at Seven Oaks for well over a year about these very issues, and not a thing gets done until nurses say, ‘That’s it, we’re done talking. We’re going to grey list’ and, suddenly, we see all kinds of promises,” the MNU president said.

Grey-listing is a union tactic that discourages nurses from seeking work at a facility, and presses health authorities to take action in response to members’ concerns. The action is considered a last resort, Jackson said.

Nurses at the northwest Winnipeg hospital are calling for a slate of security enhancements, including stronger access controls, improved emergency communication protocols and increased support following critical incidents and higher staffing levels.

Although nurses at Seven Oaks voted in favour of grey listing, the local union executive hasn’t enacted the measure yet, Jackson said.

“This is a time period where the employer has the ability to make good on those promises — put things in writing, with a time and a date that we can expect to see things happen — to avoid enacting grey-listing,” Jackson said.

MNU members at Health Sciences Centre and Thompson Hospital voted to grey-list those facilities last year. Nurses at St. Boniface Hospital took the same action in February.

Nurses in hospitals across Manitoba have expressed concerns about the increasing frequency of violence and threats made against them.

Seven Oaks is one of Winnipeg’s busiest hospitals and should have at least two institutional safety officers on duty 24-7, Jackson said.

The specialized security officers are trained in various de-escalation techniques, enforcement of provincial laws, arrests, searches and seizures, use of force and officer safety, note-taking, interview basics, court preparation and mental-health awareness.

Seven Oaks has three security guards who don’t have training and authority to restrain and detain someone threatening violence, Jackson said.

On Thursday, the province announced First Nations Safety Officers will be introduced at St. Anthony’s General Hospital in The Pas as part of its zero-tolerance policy for violence and abuse in health-care settings.

“When we took office, there were no ISOs working in Manitoba hospitals,” Health Minister Uzoma Asagwara said in a news release. There are more than 130 helping keep staff, patients and visitors safe at a cost $18 million annually, the release said.

Dedicated, 24-7 ISO coverage will be added at Concordia Hospital later this month following recent safety improvements, including upgraded lighting, amnesty lockers and additional secured access points, the minister said.

At HSC, safety improvements have included a 24-hour Winnipeg Police Service presence, enhanced security in tunnels and parkades, additional cameras and lighting upgrades, advanced weapons detection technology and expanded access controls.

In Thompson, the Manitoba government added ISOs, established a 24-hour security presence and created a security access checkpoint at the hospital’s main entrance.

“It didn’t come voluntarily,” Jackson said Friday.

“It’s shameful that we actually have to get to grey-listing to get response, but that seems to be how we need to go about it,” she said.

“As nurses, they’re not willing to take abuse and violence any longer.”

carol.sanders@freepress.mb.ca

tyler.searle@freepress.mb.ca