CKNW Editorial
for July 9, 1999

Like most of you I’m sure, I’m disinclined to support lawbreakers. And when I make exceptions to that rule, they’re seldom if ever in support of illegal strikes. But I make a big exception with the nurses on Quebec. In fact I go further, as I hold out my wrists waiting for the handcuffs, I think nurses throughout the country ought to take job action is support of their sisters and brothers. Now that’s pretty heady stuff I know for a person the government in Victoria claims is part of a right-wing conspiracy but I mean it.

Nurses are unfairly dealt with around the world. And I think it has a hell of a lot to do with the Florence Nightingale image with has persisted for 150 years. The tradition of nursing, as seen by those outside the profession who profit from this so-called tradition, is the lady with the lamp. The well-to-do graduate of the Junior League with nothing to do but fulfill her noble ambitions – that’s the vision Doctors and Hospital Administrators still harbour in their breasts. This despite all the evidence that nursing is a noble profession difficult of attainment which requires bloody hard work often under unsatisfactory conditions.

The image governments would like us to think of the nurse as the self sacrificing noble lady who, when it comes to things like money and working conditions, ought to be protected from herself. Why, these people aren’t really unionists seeking better conditions – they’re charity workers.

That’s the way we once looked at doctors too. He was the guy (usually) who only charged patients who could afford it and was in the game mainly for the good he could do for mankind. Times have not only changed for doctors.

Nursing is not only a noble profession it is one not easy of attainment. Considerable study and training, both in the academic and practical areas, is required. Nurses are highly educated and skilled professionals.

Moreover, any emergency that happens in a hospital is almost certain to have a nurse as the first line of defence. The medical assistance they provide is often highly technical to the point that from delivering babies to injecting medicines the nurse is the primary health practitioner. In addition to this the job is often dangerous. It’s not the doctors who patrol the psych wards and keep patients from killing themselves or each other. It’s not the administrator who receives patients complaints and concerns first hand, it’s the nurse. And it sure as hell not the doctors or administrators who clean up the messes.

Nurses are expected to accept the fact that about $40,000 is fair for less senior positions and that if they reach the top of their profession they’ll earn slightly in excess of $50,000. This may be a lot of money for some walks of life but it sure as the devil isn’t for highly trained professionals.

I said that nurses are doomed by their history as begun by Florence Nightingale – they are and part of that tradition is underpayment. From the start and without exception nurses have throughout history been underpaid.

Society suffers for this. There has been, for most of my memory, a shortage of nurses. This has varied but I think in general that’s a fair statement. And why is this so? Because though called a profession, one of the healing professions, it has never been accorded the money, the dignity or the job satisfaction that should go with that profession. Nurses have traditionally been patronized by doctors and administrators alike and have been seen as an expense that can be dealt with easily by government paymasters.

Yes, the nurses in Quebec like the nurses in Saskatchewan before them are on an illegal strike. But this strike isn’t just for more money or better treatment it’s a strike against an attitude. I say good on ‘em and I hope that they not only get the support of the Quebec population but that their colleagues across the country support them even unto giving some other governments the finger as well.