B.C. nurses expand job action to Surrey Memorial Hospital Thursday morning
Picket lines begin at 5:30 a.m. as union escalates pressure over pay and workplace safety.
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British Columbia's nurses will establish picket lines at Surrey Memorial Hospital and the Jim Pattison Outpatient Care and Surgery Centre starting Thursday, July 9, at 5:30 a.m., marking an escalation in their ongoing job action.
The move follows more than 1,400 reports of health employers allegedly intimidating nurses who are participating in legal union job action. The BC Nurses' Union (BCNU) announced the Surrey pickets as a similar line began at Vancouver General Hospital on July 7. These actions follow a province-wide ban on non-nursing duties and a restriction on overtime for Nurses' Bargaining Association (NBA) members that began late last week.
Union officials say nurses are facing threats of discipline, warnings that their professional licences could be at risk, and pressure to perform non-nursing duties or work unauthorized overtime. "No nurse should be made to feel afraid for standing up for safer workplaces, better retention and a stronger public health-care system," said BCNU President Adriane Gear.
Despite the escalation, the union confirmed that essential service levels will remain in place to protect patient safety. The job action follows a historic strike vote in which 98.2 per cent of the 50,850 participating nurses voted in favour of action. Members subsequently rejected a tentative agreement by 67 per cent, signalling that the government's mandate failed to address core concerns including meaningful wage improvements, workplace safety, retention and the ongoing nursing shortage.
