10 Apr Nurses, N-Dips, & humble pie — readers react

On Monday, I suggested that, having had their hats handed to them by voters in the last election, surviving New Democratic MLAs would do well to show a tad more humility than they evinced in the the dustup over essential services legislation. Many readers reacted.

An Ontario lawyer took issue with my describing the nurses’ one-day strike as “unnecessary.”

I’d say that the workers in question are the ones best able to determine whether or not a strike is necessary or not, no?

I could have phrased this better. The strike was unnecessary—and pointless—in the sense that legislation to force the nurses back to work was 24 hours away. A health care worker put it more forcefully.

The nastiest move in the nurses strike was actually the walkout on Thursday. The point of a legitimate strike is to compel the employer to negotiate and make concessions. Walking out on patients last Thursday was never going to have this effect. The legislation was going to pass and whatever tools the union would have after that would not be influenced by walking out Thursday. The ONLY effect that had was to make the lives of patients even more miserable. Thanks, Joan.

[T]here is a competition between Jessome and Hazelton over who is going to represent the nurses in the newly squished together Everywhere-but-Halifax Health Authority. Jessome – as she so often does – greatly overestimated the power of the hand she held and has pretty effectively ended her chances of collecting dues from the rural nurses. I am sure McNeil’s guys will see to it that the legislation creating the new district gives Hazelton successor rights. Rick Clarke and co can’t be too happy with the black eye Jessome and her lack of PR skills has given unions.

A retired medical professional doesn’t believe the NDP got quite as bad a drubbing as I indicated:

The NDP indeed went from 31 seats to 7, but their popular vote was 111,000 to the Liberal’s 190,000, about an 18% swing of those who voted. Basically 80,000 people switched their votes from NDP to Liberal; there was virtually no change in Conservative popular vote [except that it was more effectively concentrated in winnable ridings. – PD]; 275,000 of the electorate didn’t vote.

The Liberals were supported by 45% of the vote and won 60% of the seats; in the last election it was the NDP that did more or less that.

You make it sound like the NDP should have their tails between their legs, should sit in their corner and shut up on issues that matter to them, even though they won the support of 26.84% of the voters.

Why should 18% of the 60% who voted, 11.45% of the electorate, decide that someone has a majority in the Legislature, when 60% of the electorate couldn’t? How is that representative of the will of the people, and how does that generate anything but division and endless positioning, instead of proper governing?

The story here is not that the NDP lost massively, but that our electoral system massively fails to represent the will of the people in the Legislature. And it is all in an effort to create a false majority, when there is clearly no such thing as a majority opinion in the Province – probably never has been.

Haven’t we had enough senseless division as a result of parties seeking the brass ring of false majorities based on a 10% swing in the electorate, especially when 40% of the electorate doesn’t even vote?…. {W]e need to concentrate on proper representation before we are ever going to be able to address the problems we face.

We also need pundits to stop chewing on the one side of the story that supports the inflated egos of a sad group of people who claim to lead us, don’t fairly represent us, and can’t balance a budget.

The reason they can’t balance a budget or stimulate the economy is because they base their decisions on gaining the approval of 11% of the electorate, instead of seeking engagement of all of the electorate in achieving consensus and compromise through proper representation. 45% approval is not a 60% majority in any sane system of representation.

Well, sure, we could have a great discussion about proportional representation (a system I used to favor, although now I lean more toward run-off elections until one candidate secures 50 percent of the vote). But first-past-the-post is the system we’ve got, and those are the rules all three parties play by. A swing by 18 percent of voters from one party to another may not seem huge, but in the Canadian political context, it is an extreme outcome, one that ought to chasten the losers.

I don’t want NDP MLAs to sit in the corner and shut up, but they ought to consider the recent verdict of the electorate before using unusual, anti-democratic tactics to thwart the will of the majority.

A reader old enough to remember Harry and Parker fondly [thank you] peers into the internal dynamics of the third party:

[P]erhaps most of the defeated NDP MLAs were of Darrell Dexter’s more centrist bent, while the surviving MLAs are more members of the NDP’s left-wing, pro-union roots, who were, by and large, silent when Dexter was in charge. Viewed in this light, perhaps the NDP’s stance on the legislation isn’t so much a lack of being humble as a return to their roots.

As well, it’s always easier to criticize than be the one making the decisions. Perhaps a little less ego and a lot more working together might be in everyone’s best interests.

Ahem. On a similar theme, a Halifax journalist friend writes:

You neglected to mention that the Liberal party led by Stephen McNeil is also guilty of a flip-flop on the issue of health-care workers and their “right to strike.”

Although it is a tad dated, please read this op-ed submitted under the name of Liberal Leader Stephen McNeil when the Rodney MacDonald government was considering legislation similar to the kind just passed by McNeil’s Liberal government. (Link: )

Times change, opinions change, but one thing that never seems to change is the partisan noise that drowns out what we need in politics: a reasoned debate of the issues based on facts, not the colour of someone’s stripe. Good ideas and bad ideas have one thing in common: they can come from anywhere on the political spectrum.

I am no fan of outlandish union demands and hyperbole, nor do I condone intransigent governments or bureaucrats who keep their heads the sand, but I think that collective bargaining (when done in good faith) is the best way to protect the interest of patients. This legislation might force nurses to stay on the job, but it will not force the government to address the many problems that exist.

A former Conservative cabinet minister writes:

Apparently humility and reflection are not part of the NDP philosophy. A mind greater than mine once said if you don’t reflect on the past, you cannot have a future. I recommend that thought to any NDPers who reject the notion that reinvention is in order.

From another Ontario an Annapolis Valley reader:

[D]oes one have to be a follower? Humility often gets walked on , mistaken for weakness and fear, or interpreted as chameleon and opportunistic. Maybe it was respect for the old party line, not Frank personally. I am no fan of Frank. Darrell left a lot of good people outside the fold. Darn hard to get it right. Whatever ones does, like a Richler novel, the readers will tell you what it really means. Maybe someday we’ll mature sufficiently to see issues not personalities challenged. Essential services should have been described long ago and relieved them from the option to strike. Something needs to happen to shore up medical outcomes.

That’s it for now. And, no, I haven’t forgotten my promise to compile the comments of readers who think the [mostly imaginary] wind chill should lead every newscast from October to May.