The Tribune

By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

THE Public Hospitals Authority called it “reprehensible” yesterday that the Bahamas Nurses Union would admit to “deception” during negotiations in 2014 that led to an agreement for a now disputed shift change, insisting it remains resolute in implementing a five on/two off shift.

The PHA released the statement last night following a Tribune report where the BNU’s former president, Jannah Khalfani, admitted she signed the shift change agreement on behalf of the BNU though she knew the agreement would not be binding.

Ms Khalfani told this newspaper the agreement was signed when the BNU and the Ministry of Health were negotiating a contract for Department of Public Health nurses. She said because then PHA managing director Herbert Brown pressured the union to consider a nurses shift, she signed the document to pacify him.

She said the union always believed that for the change to take effect, the PHA needed to send a formal letter to the BNU kickstarting a process that would have reopened the industrial agreement to negotiation, a process she said was never carried out.

The PHA hit back in a statement yesterday. It said: “The Public Hospitals Authority (PHA) acknowledges with extreme interest the Bahamas Nurses Union’s position through its former president relative to the specific agreement entered into with the PHA on the 9th of December, 2014. We find it reprehensible that the BNU would publicly declare that it knowingly came to the negotiation table with the expressed intent to deceive the PHA, and by extension the government of the Bahamas by executing a document that in their opinion would be unenforceable. This outright admittance by the BNU clearly indicates a lack of good faith in negotiation. The PHA sincerely hopes that this was a case of miscommunication.

“The PHA stands on its original position that our proposed implementation of the standardised shift system is supported by and is in compliance with The Employment Act of 2001, the specific agreement dated December 9th, 2014 and the industrial agreements between the PHA and the BNU covering the periods of July 1, 2010 to November 15, 2015 and November 16, 2015 to November 15, 2020. We further contend that we do not rely on these agreements in combination but that each document stands on their own, giving rise to our authority to amend our shift system as well as our roster schedules. These rights are clearly spelt out in the 2010 industrial agreement and more specifically, in Article 5 of the 2015 industrial agreement. Further in consideration to our nurses and the BNU, we sought their concurrence regarding the value of the compensation; the period of the work week, as well as the minimum break period between shifts, to which the BNU agreed.”