Hospital workers demand reversal of 101 job cuts at Queensway Carleton

About 70 hospital employees, their unions and supporters gathered outside Queensway Carleton Hospital on August 19, demanding reversal of 101 job cuts announced in July.

The cuts include 87 nurses, seven housekeepers and four emergency department personal care aides. Hospital leadership cited insufficient funding amid rising operational costs. The cuts are severe given emergency-department strain: as of June 2026, only 17 per cent of emergency patients at QCH were admitted within the eight-hour target time, with an average wait of 17.4 hours — up one hour from May.

Lynn Ogylvie, a registered nurse in QCH's mom and baby unit for 32 years, said her unit would lose seven full-time nurses and four part-timers. "Mental health has already gone down the tubes because we're working all the time, most of us more than our full-time status, so we're just tired all the time," she said. "There are never enough nurses to start. Every day they're looking for nurses in every unit. I don't know what this means for the babies. That's what scares me."

Rachel Muir, an Ontario Nurses' Association vice-president and registered nurse, described conditions as "untenable" and "dangerous." Care providers experience violence from patients daily and are quitting after becoming "physically and emotionally destroyed," she said. "Inside the hospital it's awful... The feeling is not a matter of 'if' there's a critical incident, it's 'when.'" Guns and machetes have appeared — weapons not seen before — sometimes stemming from patient frustration over care delays.

Ottawa-West Nepean MPP Chandra Pasma, attending the rally, criticized the provincial Conservative government for limiting budgets, forcing the system to cut the most visible workers first: those who provide care.

Cuts are occurring across Ontario hospitals, where combined deficits reached $400 million at year-end 2025, with more than 1,200 positions eliminated since September 2025. The Ontario Hospital Association estimated hospitals needed about $2.7 billion. The Ford government provided $1.1 billion.