4,000 Brigham Nurses Are Two Days From an Open-Ended Strike After Midnight Talks Fail

About 4,000 nurses at Brigham and Women’s Hospital remain two days from an open-ended Brigham nurses strike after contract talks that ran from 9 a.m. Monday until around midnight failed to produce an agreement. The Massachusetts Nurses Association said there was still no deal as of 12:30 a.m. Tuesday. Unless the sides settle first, the walkout is scheduled to begin at 7 a.m. on Thursday, Nov. 12.

The union, which issued a 10-day strike notice on Nov. 1 after members rejected the hospital’s “last, best, and final” offer, said it is ready to return to the table at any hour. Mass General Brigham, Massachusetts’ largest private employer and the system that operates the Brigham, said it also remains committed to reaching an agreement, but it told WHDH that no additional bargaining sessions were scheduled.

Midnight talks, no deal, and a Thursday deadline

Boston 25 News, citing an MNA statement, reported that negotiators met from 9 a.m. Monday until around midnight and adjourned without an agreement. “We have just concluded another round of contract negotiations with Brigham and Women’s Hospital management, and unfortunately, we have not reached an agreement,” the union said. “As of 12:30 a.m., there is still no agreement on a contract that adequately addresses the concerns and priorities of our nurses.”

The union said it does not want “an unnecessary disruption to patient care” and is “ready, willing, and available to return to the bargaining table at any time before the strike begins.” WHDH quoted a shorter union statement saying, “MGB is aware of they need to do to reach an agreement,” an ungrammatical line in the station’s write-up, and that nurses remain “united for safe patient care and a fair contract.”

Hospital officials issued their own statement: “Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Massachusetts Nurses Association have concluded negotiations for tonight without reaching an agreement. We remain open to continued discussions, although no additional bargaining sessions are scheduled at this time.” In a separate comment to Boston 25, the system said it is “committed to reaching an agreement that supports our nurses and also protects our ability to sustain our mission, invest in all members of our patient care teams and staff, and continue serving the patients and the community who depend on us now and into the future.”

The two sides had returned to bargaining Monday with the strike already on the calendar, a session Boston news outlets had flagged as a last chance to avoid a walkout. As of early Tuesday, that chance had not been used up, but the clock was short.

What still divides the nurses and the hospital

The remaining disputes, the hospital said in a Nov. 6 update, “relate to compensation and benefits, including wages and health insurance.” Mass General Brigham also said that “no patient or workplace safety proposals remain unresolved.” The union has framed the fight differently. In the strike notice it issued Nov. 1, the MNA said nurses were seeking limits on temporary nurses, a float differential to reduce constant reassignment, insurance choice, and “a wage scale that is competitive for new and experienced nurses.”

Kelly Morgan, a labor and delivery nurse and chair of the Brigham MNA bargaining committee, said at the time, “We are ready to strike but are equally prepared to negotiate a fair contract that protects patient care, respects nurses, and averts the strike.” Jim McCarthy, a PACU nurse and vice chair, asked why the nonprofit system “would pour millions into another strike instead of investing in patient care.” Kristen Robishaw, a NICU nurse, told Boston 25, “Every patient is here because they require around-the-clock nursing care. We take that responsibility very seriously, and we deserve to be treated fairly for it.” She added, “We’re very committed to our patients. That’s where we want to be. We don’t want to be out on the sidewalk.”

Nurses reviewed and rejected the hospital’s Oct. 10 offer in a vote on Oct. 23, the union said. The hospital says it has sat through 27 bargaining sessions over 11 months and has already moved toward union priorities, including a shift so that all nurses would receive increases to their base wages rather than a mix of raises and bonuses.

Compounded raises over two years, as Mass General Brigham described its offer on Nov. 6. Nurses at the top of the scale would get a new 2.5% raise in each year, which the hospital called a compounded 5% increase. Nurses still moving through the 20-step scale would keep existing 5% annual step increases, which the hospital called a compounded 10% increase. Source: Mass General Brigham; chart: The Boston Report.

The hospital’s offer, the last work stoppage, and patients

Mass General Brigham has said that, despite union claims, Brigham nurses would not receive a “0% raise” under the current offer, and that the package would keep them “among the highest-paid locally, statewide, and nationally.” For nurses at the top of all scales, the hospital said it added a new 2.5% raise in each year of a proposed two-year contract. For nurses progressing through a 20-step wage scale, it said it would preserve existing 5% annual raises. The offer, in the Nov. 6 update, also included no increase in the health-insurance premium contribution percentage for current Brigham nurses in the post-tax medical plan; 20 additional 36-hour float-pool positions, which the hospital said were meant to reduce agency-nurse use and floating; and an increase in the annual professional-development reimbursement fund to $1 million.

This would not be the first work stoppage at the Brigham this year. In July, nurses staged what was intended to be a one-day strike, Boston 25 reported, and hospital officials then locked them out for an additional four days. The hospital says that if nurses walk out on Thursday it will stay open, that “skilled, experienced nurses will fill in,” and that most of those replacement nurses worked during the July stoppage. The Massachusetts Department of Public Health, it said, will have surveyors on site daily. The strike, the system emphasized, is at Brigham and Women’s Hospital only, not at Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital or other Mass General Brigham sites such as Massachusetts General Hospital. Patients have been told to come to scheduled appointments unless they hear otherwise from their provider, and to arrive early at the main campus from Thursday on because of extra activity around the hospital.

The union has called the planned walkout the largest open-ended nurses’ strike in Massachusetts history. Whether it starts at 7 a.m. Thursday now depends on whether the two sides, who left the table after midnight with nothing scheduled, sit down again in the two days that remain.

Sources

• Boston 25 News: 4,000 Brigham and Women’s nurses poised for indefinite strike as negotiations hit standstill
• WHDH: Mass General Brigham, nurses union negotiate into late night, no deal reached
• Mass General Brigham: Brigham and Women’s Hospital nursing union update, Nov. 6
• Massachusetts Nurses Association, via PR Newswire: nurses issue notice for an open-ended strike beginning Nov. 12