Union Resistance to Nurse Staffing Reductions: Protections Through the Grievance and Arbitration Processes
Benjamin Wolkinson and M. Catherine Lundy
DOI: 10.2190/CP4Y-HYB3-FHDJ-2KGB
Abstract
Institutional efforts to lower costs by reducing the number of health-care workers employed constitute a critical concern for unions in the industry. Through examination of both reported and unreported decisions involving staffing issues that have been adjudicated between 1970 and 1998, the authors demonstrate how through use of the grievance arbitration process unions have sought to challenge such efforts. Specifically, through arbitration, unions have enforced contractual provisions establishing affirmative employer obligations not to reduce staff or to maintain minimum staffing levels. More general contract provisions on safety, seniority, and recognition as well as jurisprudential principles of past practice have been relied on to block efforts to lay off workers and transfer work to unlicenced personnel and/or nonbargaining-unit members. Moreover, the just-cause provision has been used to protect employees from charges of negligence in cases when understaffing has prevented close monitoring of patients. While limited staffing and financial resources may discourage and reduce the frequency of arbitration efforts, union success when resorting to this process shows its potential for helping unions maintain and promote adequate staffing levels.
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