Rankin, Liberals put spending cuts ahead of health care heroes

HALIFAX -- Iain Rankin is pushing frontline health care workers into a strike vote by refusing to go into arbitration with 7,500 health care employees, including lab technologists responsible for COVID-19 tests, mental health workers, and critical care paramedics.

While the Liberals have hailed health care workers as heroes during the pandemic, Iain Rankin has repeatedly argued for putting spending cuts ahead of the people who provide vital public services:

• “All these things cost money, it's all one pot of money, that's why we need to continue to hold the line on labour, Mr. Speaker.” - Iain Rankin, Nov. 2, 2016
• “There has to be some kind of restraint on the culture of reliance we have here on our public sector.” - Iain Rankin, Oct. 30, 2014

Iain Rankin voted in favour of several anti-labour bills including:

• Bill 1 - amalgamated the health care system, unnecessarily reduced the number of bargaining units, and attempted to assign union representation rights.
• Bill 30 - interfered with collective bargaining for home support workers.
• Bill 37 - limited job action rights for more than 40,000 workers in acute care, long-term care, group homes, home support, child protection and other sectors.
• Bill 75 - legislated a contract on teachers, forcing the first province-wide teacher strike in the province’s history.
• Bill 148 - imposed a wage package on 75,000 public sector workers, including healthcare workers, which included a two-year wage freeze and the elimination of the long service awards.

The people who deliver frontline health care and Nova Scotians who rely on these health care services deserve better than a government fixated on cuts.

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