15,000 Minnesota nurses still working without contract as union continues to block strike

It has been over a month since 12,500 Minneapolis-St. Paul nurses’ contracts expired on Could 31, and over two weeks since 2,500 nurses in Duluth, Hastings and different Minnesota cities noticed their contracts expire on June 30. Though numerous liberal and pseudo-left apologists for the Minnesota Nurses Affiliation (MNA) declare the union has “come out swinging” in opposition to the hospital executives, the MNA has confirmed to be the most important impediment to well being care staff combating for secure staffing ranges and wage will increase massive sufficient to guard them from the ravages of inflation.

Violating the essential precept of “no contract, no work” the MNA has blocked strike motion and has not even scheduled a strike authorization vote. As a substitute, it’s persevering with behind-the-scenes talks with the hospital chains, which can’t end in something however one other pro-company deal.

Nicely conscious of the anger of rank-and-file nurses, some Twin Cities hospital methods have proposed 8 % wage will increase in opposition to nurses’ calls for for as a lot as 39 % wage will increase to compensate for many years of wage stagnation and the present inflation charge of 9.1 %. Rejecting nurses’ simply calls for, a spokesperson for Fairview Hospital methods stated the “demand of a 39 % improve for wages and different will increase merely will not be practical nor in the most effective curiosity of our group.”

Why just isn’t in the most effective curiosity of the group to pay nurses sufficient cash to allow them to perform their life-saving work with out worrying whether or not they can preserve a roof over the heads? Paying a residing wage and decreasing workloads would additionally entice way more nurses and nursing college students. Stopping the exodus of burned-out nurses and ending the nursing scarcity is actually within the pursuits of sufferers and well being care staff locally. It is just unrealistic to hospital executives who need to squeeze much more out nurses as a result of they’re extra involved with company revenue than the “group.”

In accordance with the report by the Star Tribune, the highest executives of Minnesota’s 12 “nonprofits” pocketed hundreds of thousands in pay and different compensation because the pandemic ripped by way of hospitals and nurses and different well being care staff battled COVID-19 and the dearth of PPE. Regardless of administration’s claims that they would scale back government compensation, Craig Samitt, chief government at Blue Cross and Blue Defend of Minnesota, obtained a 108 % improve in 2020 to just about $3.5 million; Essentia Well being, which eradicated 900 jobs, paid CEO David Herman almost $2.8 million in compensation, a rise of 13 %; Mayo Clinic’s Gianrico Farrugia obtained $2.7 million; and Fairview Well being Companies’ James Hereford and Allina Well being’s Penny Wheeler obtained $2.6 million every.

These executives and the highly effective company and monetary pursuits behind them are ruthlessly defending their class pursuits. As a substitute of uniting nurses throughout the state and mobilizing broader sections of staff to interrupt by way of the intransigence of the hospital bosses, the MNA is engaged in impotent public relations stunts. This contains the MNA’s “Sufferers Earlier than Earnings” petition to the executives and boards of a number of hospital methods throughout Minnesota. MNA officers know appeals to the consciences of multimillionaire executives will fall on deaf ears however they need to divert the power of nurses into useless finish appeals, above all, to the Democratic Celebration.

The MNA’s internet web page contains nearly nothing concerning the present wrestle. As a substitute it contains the nugatory statements from numerous Democrats operating for workplace, together with many who confirmed up for photo-ops throughout final month’s “informational picketing” stunt.

However the Democrats, at least the Republicans, have overseen many years of assaults on well being care staff and the suitable to well being care. Obama’s misnamed Inexpensive Care Act did nothing to cut back the domination of the large hospital, insurance coverage, pharmaceutical and medical tools monopolies over well being care. As a substitute it incentivized value reducing, elevated workloads and different assaults on well being care staff.

The pandemic has confirmed past a doubt that each big-business events prioritize revenue over human life. Removed from ending Trump’s herd immunity COVID coverage, Biden has absolutely adopted this homicidal coverage and disarmed the general public within the face of a brand new surge of Omicron subvariants. Each events are chargeable for the lack of a couple of million folks, together with 1000’s of nurses and well being care staff, and the debilitation of hundreds of thousands extra.

The circumstances of nurses won’t be improved by way of fruitless appeals to corporate-backed politicians or extra “labor-management” staffing committees, such because the one proposed within the “Holding Nurses on the Bedside Act.” In the long run all of those proposals subordinate the wants of well being care staff and sufferers to revenue issues.

An actual battle is important and completely attainable. However the prerequisite of any wrestle is for rank-and-file nurses to take the conduct of the wrestle into their very own fingers. This implies constructing rank-and-file committees, made up of probably the most class-conscious and militant nurses from across the state, to stipulate the calls for that nurses want and elaborate a method to battle for them.

These calls for ought to embrace:

• An inflation-busting 20 % wage improve every year of the contract, on high of annual cost-of-living changes to counteract inflation.
• No out-of-pocket prices for household well being care plans.
• Rent 1000’s of latest nurses to ensure nurse-to-patient ratios, together with 1:1 for the ICU, 1:2 for the IICU and 1:3 for Medsurge.

Nurses should demand a right away strike vote and an finish to backroom negotiations by the MNA. All talks should be live-streamed and overseen by a rank-and-file committee. If the above calls for will not be met by July 24, a statewide strike ought to be launched by July 31.

On the similar time, the rank-and-file committee ought to set up strains of communication with nurses and well being care staff throughout the US and internationally. Of the 265 work stoppages a research by Cornell’s Industrial and Labor Relations recorded in 2021, well being care staff, together with nurses, accounted for 33 % of them. Tens of 1000’s of nurses in California, New York and different states are additionally combating comparable battles.

Earlier this 12 months, rank-and-file nurses organized a motion, unbiased of the unions, to defend Vanderbilt College Medical Heart nurse RaDonda Vaught in opposition to the hassle to scapegoat her for medical errors, that are the results of understaffing and work overloads.

As a substitute of fruitless and self-defeating appeals to hospital executives and bought-and-paid-for politicians, nurses should attraction to all sections of the working class to assist their battle. Nurses communicate for all of society and have standard assist of their counteroffensive in opposition to the dictates of the banks and companies. The wave of opposition amongst nurses should be translated right into a counteroffensive. Nurses should put together strike motion now, safe the assist of different staff, together with lecturers, manufacturing and repair staff.

This should be mixed with a political wrestle to take revenue out of drugs by nationalizing the foremost well being care monopolies and establishing a socialist medical system.