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No actual layoffs are currently planned,' Horizon says New Brunswick Telegraph-Journal. Thu May 14 2015, Page: B6, Section: CityByline: Derwin Gowan ST. STEPHEN * Horizon Health Network has no "current" plans to lay off staff, according to an email from Leslie Reid, regional director, workforce relations.

She confirmed, however, that the network did issue a layoff notice as of May 1, and that discussion will resume at some point with a private company interested in providing services to some New Brunswick hospitals. "Horizon gave a layoff notice but only because May 1 constituted the commencement of the mandatory freeze period due to contract negotiations between the employer and the union. The language in the collective agreement requires that in order to make any changes in terms and conditions during the negotiation period, a notice of layoff must be served. No actual layoffs are currently planned, therefore no jobs are affected," Reid wrote.

The Leader-Post (Regina) Sat Sep 17 2016

The Regina Qu'Appelle Health Region (RQHR) will be issuing layoff notices after a two-year review of staffing in 117 round-the-clock care units. To get to a balanced budget, the region must reduce 120 full-time equivalent positions, but much of that will be accomplished by cutting casual work from part-timers and attrition. Fewer than 20 people are expected to lose their jobs, but all positions are being considered, said Keith Dewar, CEO of the RQHR. "(Attrition has) been our commitment all along," Dewar said. "Our interest here is providing quality, safe care. Our second obligation to the public is to do so in a way that shows responsibility for the funds that we've been entrusted."

The RQHR's annual budget is more than $1 billion. As of August, it had a $4.7-million deficit. The RQHR has 11,000 staffand an eight per cent attrition rate, which means roughly 800 employees leave yearly. "By the time we have the meetings with the unions and go through the formal process, we don't believe in some cases some of the numbers we're looking at right now would be given layoffnotice," Dewar said. While some front-line healthcare workers will be among those receiving layoffnotices, they will be able to bump to another position under their collective agreements.

More than 20 registered practical nurses will receive their layoff notices this week. They will have seven days to decide their possible future.

More than 40 registered nurses and registered practical nursing positions were eliminated at the North Bay Regional Health Centre earlier this year as part of a cost-saving measure.

Sue McIntyre, president of CUPE local 139, said the cuts have impacted 31 RPNs.

Workers to file grievances as union says contract has been breached

Oct 14, 2016

Health Sciences North has switched its laundry services from a Sudbury company to one in Hamilton, putting 36 people out of work.

The North Bay Nugget Mon Jan 12 2015

The latest round of cuts at the North Bay Regional Health Centre is a hard hit on front-line staff, according to the Canadian Union of Public Employees. The hospital issued a media release Friday indicating 75 positions are being reduced in this latest round of cost-saving measures. Twenty-six of those positions are currently vacant.

I'm blown away this time," said Shawn Shank, president of CUPE Local 139. I didn't think the number of cuts would be this high, especially to nursing positions." The hospital has reduced its unionized workforce by 149 positions over the last two years, through layoffs or eliminating positions. The hospital slashed 34 jobs in June and eliminated another 40 nursing jobs in April 2013. Shank said Personal Support Workers were also targeted in this round of layoffs. We see the elimination of vacant positions as job cuts. Nurses and hospital staff continue to do more with less," he said Friday evening. Canadian Union of Public Employees will lose 27 full-time positions, including 10 Registered Practical Nurses, as well as clerical positions and porters.

The Daily Gleaner (Fredericton) Sat Sep 7 2013

About 160 Horizon Health Network employees will be affected by layoffs in the coming weeks as the health authority rolls out a new nursing strategy meant to standardize the way nurses, licensed practical nurses and patient-care attendants provide care. Several weeks ago representatives from CUPE Local 1252 received word that 128 employees will face layoffs, reductions in hours, or changes to their responsibilities in the near future.

Newsletter March 4, 2014

Petitions with more than 5,500 signatures to be presented in B.C. legislature March 5

Not even the unrelenting snowfall prevented an estimated 150-plus concerned citizens and trade unionists from gathering at a Campbell River rally on March 2 to condemn the mass staff layoffs underway at New Horizons care home.

National Post Fri Sep 25 2015

Premier Rachel Notley says the Alberta government will maintain public-sector services and not lay off workers despite a drop in revenue triggered by plunging resource revenues. Notley gave some hints about the NDP's first provincial budget next month in a speech Thursday at the Alberta Urban Municipalities Association convention. "We're going to stabilize publi

c services and correct some mistakes the previous government made in managing finances like a $1.1-billion cut to health care and deep cuts to our schools and post-secondary institutions," she told delegates. Finance Minister Joe Ceci has been touring the province to gather input for his budget. He has already said that Alberta is on track for a record $5.9-billion deficit this year as the oil crunch hits families and businesses. "It makes no sense to respond to layoffs and job losses in the economy by making things worse by more layoffs and more job losses," Notley said.

News release It’s time for successorship laws that protect workers and ensure stable health care delivery, says the Hospital Employees’ Union March 2, 2015

Staff at a Surrey long-term care facility, and cleaners in Vancouver Coastal Health hospitals, have been given layoff notices by their corporate employers. The Ahmon Group has told more than 240 care aides, nurses, cleaners, and dietary workers that it will contract out all of their work at its Laurel Place care home in Surrey, effective June 1, 2015. The workers are members of HEU and signed a first collective agreement with Ahmon Group just last October. And Aramark – the U.S.-corporation that has held a commercial contract to clean Vancouver Coastal Health hospitals and extended care facilities since 2003 – has lost its contract and will lay off about 935 staff between August 9 and September 22.

Staff at a Surrey long-term care facility, and cleaners in Vancouver Coastal Health hospitals, have been given layoff notices by their corporate employers. The Ahmon Group has told more than 240 care aides, nurses, cleaners, and dietary workers that it will contract out all of their work at its Laurel Place care home in Surrey, effective June 1, 2015.

And Aramark – the U.S.-corporation that has held a commercial contract to clean Vancouver Coastal Health hospitals and extended care facilities since 2003 – has lost its contract and will lay off about 935 staff between August 9 and September 22.

HEU secretary-business manager says that stronger successorship language is needed to protect workers and services in a health care system that has seen significant privatization over the last decade.

Oct 11, 2016

CUPE long-term care workers ask the public to join the fight to stop budget cuts Three members of the support services department at the Heart of the Valley Nursing Home in Middleton, Nova Scotia received lay off notices last week — which is near Premier Stephen McNeil’s constituency office. The layoffs are the result of $6.7 million in budget cuts to long-term care announced by the Nova Scotia Department of Health and Wellness.

Aug 12, 2016

Workers received notice of layoffs, or reduced hours of work, this week at the Port Hawkesbury Nursing Home. The layoffs are the result of $6.7 million in budget cuts to long-term care

announced by the Nova Scotia Department of Health and Wellness ($3.6 million cut in 2015 and an across the board one per cent cut in 2016 of $3.1 million).

The Regina Qu’Appelle Health Region (RQHR) is missing surgical, emergency room and financial targets, according to its second quarter report released Wednesday evening at the Regina Qu’Appelle Regional Health Authority’s board meeting.

The emergency department length of stay continues to be on an upward trend with the average patient staying for 13 hours instead of the 2016-17 target of 7.75 hours

The region’s population has grown by 47,000 people over the past decade and the population is aging — both contributing to longer ER waits, said Keith Dewar, CEO of the RQHR. “The growth in demand has resulted in significant volume pressures that have not been directly funded,” he said. “About a third of that growth and demand — both by population increase and by demographic changes — is funded.”

May 28, 2015

That was because, as noted on the CUPE webpage, "CUPE 1252 is having a rally in front of the Legislative Assembly at noon on May 28 to protest the cuts in health care."

The New Brunswick Telegraph-Journal reported, "Norma Robinson, president of the Canadian Union of Public Employees council that bargains on behalf of more than 10,000 New Brunswick hospital support workers, expects layoffs this year..." That's because, "Horizon Health Network [a provincial health authority that delivers medical care to the central and southern portions of the province] will resume [discussions] at some point with a private company interested in providing services to some New Brunswick hospitals." That contracting out could mean that food and nutrition, portering and housekeeping employees would have to apply to work for the new contractor.

Apr 01, 2015

The Sudbury Star Thu Mar 26 2015

After months of talk about pending cuts to nursing and other staff positions at Health Sciences North, hospital administrators have released a document saying how they believe the hospital can cut $5.1 million from its budget without affecting patient care. The Ontario Nurses' Association has warned as many as 42 nursing positions -- equivalent to about 85,000 hours of nursing care--will be eliminated so HSN can balance its books. Until Wednesday, hospital officials would only say they didn't expect a single nurse to lose his or her job because the positions could be trimmed by attrition. Seven layoff notices have been issued to ONA members, but the hospital's official position is not one nurse will "be out the door." ONA Local 014 president Kelly Latimer spoke Tuesday night to more than 300 people at the Steelworkers Hall at a forum organized by the Ontario Health Coalition, which has a Sudbury chapter.

Mar 17, 2015

But hospital denies number of layoffs Health Sciences North is cutting 42 registered nurse positions, the Ontario Nurses' Association said Tuesday.The cuts follow rumours in January that as many as 34 nurses could lose their jobs at the hospital.But hospital spokesperson Dan Lessard told NorthernLife.ca in an email the hospital will not be issuing 42 layoff notices to nurses.

FREDERICTON: The Horizon Health Network will reduce or completely close the cafeteria services as of next month in all its hospitals.

The Union representing the cafeteria workers, CUPE Local 1252, was notified this morning of the coming reduction of services. “We were informed that 13 full-time equivalent positions are impacted by the decision which will affect 25 workers”, said CUPE Local 1252 president Norma Robinson.

The Sudbury Star Fri Oct 23 2015

Registered practical nurses blaming provincial government health-care cuts for a change in their status at Health Sciences North converged on the office of Sudbury MPP Glenn Thibeault on Thursday to protest government underfunding. RPNs at HSN say their positions were eliminated and they were transferred to the renal program as renal aides, where they are expected to practise on the dialysis unit like nurses, but their status and pay has been downgraded, according to representatives at CUPE Local 1623. "It's a multi-purpose rally today," said Dave Shelefontiuk, president of CUPE Local 1623. "The immediate purpose is over the action the hospital has recently done, which is to reassign 16 RPNs back to the renal (program), freeze their wages and they're no longer going to be used as nursing staff, but we all hear every week there's a nursing shortage at Health Sciences North and they voluntarily took 16 very experienced nurses out of the system and we don't think that's correct. We think that's degrading to these nurses. They went to school, they're professional nurses, they have the skills and now they're not being allowed to use those skills."

The other purpose of the rally, Shelefontiuk said, was to highlight workers' struggles under the current funding model. "We're over capacity now; the emerg has been just jam-packed," Shelefontiuk said. "Everybody who provides direct patient care is overworked, they're stressed out, and the only thing we can see to correct this problem is if Mr. Thibeault and Premier (Kathleen) Wynne realize that the North East LHIN (Local Health Integration Network) needs to be funded differently from the other LHINs.

The Daily Gleaner (Fredericton) Tue Apr 12 2016

Officials with the Nashwaak Villa nursing home in Stanley have filed an application with the New Brunswick Labour and Employment Board seeking clarity on whether or not they are the legal employer of the facility's staff because the facility hopes to gain greater control over the management of hiring protocols and other employee-related administrative matters. Daphne Noonan, executive director of the Nashwaak Villa, said a confusing situation has developed over the past 40 years, creating complexities around who is the legally recognized employer for her staff.

Over time, those responsibilities - such as payroll - were transferred to the health authorities, which has caused some complications, she said. Even though the Nashwaak Villa manages employee hours, Horizon Health Network issues the cheques and manages human resources issues and support. "It's just evolved through history. What that has resulted in is that it's unclear to everyone who the employer is," she said, explaining that her board cannot find any formal documentation that explains the division of responsibilities. "The nurses have a bargaining unit and the CUPE folks have a bargaining unit. Our folks are the only ones in the province who work in a unionized nursing home who are governed under the collective agreements of the public service. That's just the way it's been. They've always been considered members."