Two local community nurses are campaigning against a contract bidding system they say keeps as many as 100 people in Grey-Bruce in permanent part-time work with low pay and no benefits, sick leave or vacation. Community nurses care for sick and elderly people in their own homes. Paid by the visit, they earn far less than their hospital counterparts for similar work and have no hope of full-time positions with benefits, Brenda Drescher and Sue Katsuno said Thursday. “We need secure jobs,” Katsuno said. Despite a growing nursing shortage in Ontario, all of the area’s community nurses are employed as part-time casual workers, though some may work full-time hours or close to it. Katsuno and Drescher have written a three-page letter — without response so far — to federal and provincial health ministers, the local MP and MPP and others as part of a public awareness campaign to highlight “poor working conditions experienced by us in our everyday lives.”

Both said their beef is with the system, not with their employer, which they would not name for fear of “repercussions.” Read more