By Mario deSantis, April 19, 1999

This morning at about 8:00 AM, as I was coming back home after having dropped my wife Sharon at her place of work, I happened to listen to the radio and caught few words of Premier Romanow defending the governmental cost of the full page newspaper advertising against the nurses(1). Premier Romanow defended the cost of such advertisements, which ran for the last ten days across the province, stating that these costs were trivial with respect to the 22% salary increase over three years tabled by the Saskatchewan Union of Nurse (SUN) at the bargaining session with the Saskatchewan Association of Health Organizations (SAHO).

This Premier is such a misleading leader that only after so many years of being in power we can understand his political mission and his vision(2). Premier Romanow should not interfere with the collective bargaining processes, and he mixes up apples with oranges when he says that the cost of the full page newspaper advertising campaign is trivial when compared with the 22% salary increase tabled by the nurses. It is one thing to negotiate in good faith a collective agreement between SUN and SAHO and something else for the Premier to provide an economic direction for Saskatchewan.

Economic changes occur little by little, in smaller steps, and making sure that such smaller steps effect beneficially all the people, and not only the few privileged. The Provincial Auditor has recently stated that he is going to investigate the $40 million dollar overrun caused by the closure of the Plains Health Centre in Regina. This overrun is not an accidental mistake, it is the result of a detrimental policy direction to play with big numbers, big projects and big times. The 22% was not a big number, it was a reasonable expression of a collective bargaining process. The $40 million overrun is a big number, yet this Government wanted to cover it up(3).

Endnotes

1. Nurses Strike, Premier Romanow and the 22%, by Mario deSantis, April 11, 1999.

2. The Political Mission of Premier Romanow: Divide and Conquer, by Mario deSantis, April 18, 1999.

3. Auditor seeks answers on hospital renovations, by LeaderStar News, The StarPhoenix, April 17, 1999, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan