'Final offer' to N.B. nursing home workers is 'fair and reasonable': Higgs

N.B. nursing home workers not happy Latest contract offer from government is 'fair' says premier, but there's still a divide. Jessica Ng reports.

New Brunswick nursing home workers aren't happy with the latest contract offer from government while the premier says it's fair to both workers and taxpayers.

"This final offer is fair and reasonable, and it's affordable for New Brunswick taxpayers, who will ultimately foot the bill," New Brunswick Premier Blaine Higgs said about the latest and final offer sent to unionized nursing home workers.

The deal offers a raise of one per cent, with an additional three-year increase of 0.25 per cent annually.

"Any wage increase is a short-term high, because at the end of the day, if your working conditions have not improved, and your situation and the morale at work is the very same, that does not solve the problem," Higgs said.

Higgs says he would like to work with nursing home workers to find out what could improve their work environments to reduce the number of sick days they use.

The offer includes a reduction in sick days from 18 to 16, which doesn't sit well with the union.

"We have no idea why he's trying to take the sick days," said Patrick Roy, the CUPE provincial coordinator for New Brunswick."We have a workforce that is actually overworked right now; we deal with a lot of injuries."

The "final offer" will have to be voted on by union members at six of the province's 46 nursing homes.

CUPE says they're not confident their members will vote in favour of this final offer, which they say looks very similar to previous offers put forward by the Higgs government.

The union is presenting their own offer to government.

"The counteroffer that we're proposing is three per cent per year over 4 years, plus to sit-down and have a hard discussion about recruitment and retention, and to put some money on the table for recruitment and retention," Roy said.

Brien Watson, the president for CUPE NB, pointed to the province's $72.6 million surplus for the 2018-19 fiscal year.

"We had a surplus last year in the budget, so the money is there to fix this problem," Watson said.

If the deal isn't accepted the two sides will go back to the bargaining table. The workers have gone 35 months without a contract.

With files from CTV Atlantic's Jessica Ng.