Local 97 – CDHA Nurses: Passage of Bill 37, Back to Work Plan

Local 97 showed up in a BIG way today! You sent a powerful message to your employer, the government and the public – you will not be silenced about the important issue of patient safety. Most importantly, you were not silenced by Stephen McNeil!

You should be so proud of yourselves for standing up and ensuring Nova Scotians understand that Capital Health and Stephen McNeil are not allowing nurses to deliver safe patient care. And you are standing up to the Liberals’ oppressive Bill 37, which takes bargaining rights from 35,000 health and community services workers in the province.

Our fight will not end when this legislation passes.The NSGEU will launch a constitutional challenge against the Bill. And the NSGEU and other unions will plan future actions to protest the bill, and we’ll need your support then, too!

Local 97 also has to continue with the process of negotiating a collective agreement. We will have more information on that in the coming days.

The Next 24 Hours

Despite all of our best efforts, this bill will definitely be passed by this Liberal majority government at some point tomorrow (Friday, April 4th).

It is important for nurses to understand that Bill 37 requires nurses to return to work as soon as possible after it is passed. If the law is passed before 7 a.m., staff who were scheduled to start work at 7 a.m. must show up for their regular shift. If the bill passes after 7 a.m., the legislation requires people who were scheduled to start at 7 a.m. to show up for shift as soon as they can get there.

Because of this, we understand that nurses who are scheduled to work tomorrow morning may not be able to come sit in the gallery at the legislature as Bill 37 is passed into law. Please, get the rest you need!

After speaking with legal counsel, we recommend that emergency services staff members that are working as per the emergency services plan stay until a manager determines it is safe to allow them to leave.