TORONTO - Lump sum payments to thousands of nurses in each of the next two years do not violate the Ontario government's two-year wage freeze for public sector workers, Liberals, nurses and hospitals said Friday.
About 48,000 nurses will get lump sum payments of between $500 and $1,300 in 2011 and 2012, depending on seniority, and will then get a 2.75 per cent wage hike in 2013.
The Liberal government said Friday the decision by an arbitrator to give the nurses payments equal to about a 1.8 per cent pay hike over two years actually helps lower wage settlements going forward because the lump sums are not built into base salary.
Taxpayers will not be paying any more money to go toward the nurses', or any other public sector workers', compensation increases in the next two years, said Premier Dalton McGuinty.
"We said if you negotiate something beyond zero, you're going to have to find that within your existing budget," McGuinty said at an unrelated event in London, Ont. "So to be fair, it is not adding pressure to our budget, just so we're clear on that."
The Ontario Nurses Association said nurses actually got larger lump sum payments in previous contracts, and noted there were reductions in severance and sick pay provisions in the new contract so it does meet the wage freeze mandate.
"The government basically said a net zero compensation increase, and if you actually look at the whole collective agreement there have been reductions that have provided for those lump sum payments," said ONA president Linda Haslam-Stroud. "So we have not, net, received any wage increase. This arbitrator has actually met the government's mandate."
The Ontario Hospital Association also said the deal meets the wage freeze guidelines and will help hospitals, who get only a 1.5 per cent funding increase this year, balance their books.
"Any increases they received in benefits in 2011 and 2012, the two years of the government's proposed zero compensation, are totally offset by the changes made where there are reductions in benefits," said OHA President Tom Closson. "If you look at over a three-year period, 2.75 per cent change in salary and benefits seems quite reasonable given the current economic climate."
Five Ontario hospitals, including Sick Kids in Toronto and Credit Valley in Mississauga, are non unionized, and there's at least one where unionized and non-union nurses work side by side. So some nurses had their wages frozen last year and this year while their counterparts continued to get raises, said Closson.
"We do believe strongly that unionized and non-unionized staff should be treated equally and therefore fairly," he said. "It is a concern we've been expressing since the freeze went into effect. This is something we think the government needs to rectify."
The New Democrats said the agreement with the nurses shows McGuinty's wage freeze for one million public sector workers was a joke.
"Mr. McGuinty's campaign around flatlining public sector wages has been a fraud from the get-go," said NDP critic Peter Kormos. "It simply hasn't happened. Ain't going to happen. Mr. McGuinty knew that and he should be honest to Ontarians."
The Liberal government has been under fire for similar deals in other public sector contracts, where workers are offered top-ups or payments to sidestep the wage freeze the government tried to impose to help tackle a deficit of $16.7 billion.
The Ontario Provincial Police were given a five per cent raise this year and promised another 8.5 per cent in 2014, after the supposed wage freeze, but it turns there was a hidden clause in the deal that will give many officers raises in 2012 and 2013.
The Liberals have also come under criticism for a secret 2008 deal to give the Ontario Public Service Employees Union -- its largest public sector union -- a three per cent pay hike in 2012. That side deal wasn't revealed until a labour board hearing last month.
Hundreds of eHealth Ontario bureaucrats were given bonuses and merit pay this year but the payouts were later cancelled after loud complaints from the opposition parties.
