Most people don't really know what's going on in the dispute. We don't have a copy of the contract, and we don't know for sure what they're making in other provinces and other countries. All we have to go on is media reports....and I wouldn't trust those farther than I can throw them. So all it is is hot air. Rhetoric. Both from the nurses' side and from the government's side. We don't know the truth.

However, we have seen how both sides have been treating one another. These are not talks on good terms. Both sides are openly hostile. They're not working together, they're working against one another. Which, I guess is sometimes the nature of the beast. But what should we, as the general public, think? I tend to side with the government I think. The government health ministry does not control the budget. The finance minister does that. So the health ministry people are working from a rather limited position. This is not a big corporation, where profit is an issue. No, here, if more money goes to nurses, less money gets spent elsewhere. Maybe less hospital beds, less x-ray technicians, whatever. So by paying the nurses more, the general public who depend on health care probably get less. Now I'm not saying that the nurses shouldn't get more than they are were before. But.....well, it's a hard balance to strike I guess.

Some of them are evidently so fed up that they would threat to resign. Are they going to make good on their threats? And if they do, how should the government react? Campbell thinks that these are empty threats. I tend to agree. I doubt that nurses will be leaving the province on anywhere near the scale that they claim they're going to. Not if the reports on the legislated deal are anywhere even close to the truth. I don't think that they should have made those threats. I don't believe in empty threats. They don't serve any purpose but to inform the enemy how desparate you are. However, having made those threats, I think that the nurses should be prepared to carry them out. Otherwise, I for one, will see them as liars and hypocrites. And I don't think that Campbell, once they all leave, should be begging for them to stay. He should let them go. It will create a problem in the short term, there's little doubt about that. But perhaps with a short term crisis, some long term solutions can be implemented. The BC health care system needs a massive overhaul, and this might be the opportune moment to begin. Those nurses who threatened to resign....would likely create further problems in the future anyways. If they don't want you, then you don't want them. And I will be damn glad to get rid of Debra McPherson anyways.

Whole goddamned province is falling apart at the seams....