TORONTO - Health Minister George Smitherman announced Thursday the province is spending $5 million to give nurse practitioners a pay raise, and he also took the opportunity to trumpet the Liberal government's health-care record while taking political potshots at the Conservatives.
During a politically charged speech at a medicare conference, Smitherman said about 700 nurse practitioners across the province can expect a 6.65 per cent salary increase, retroactive to April 1.
Speaking to a crowd of about 500 people, mostly health professionals, Smitherman defended the Liberals' track record on health care since taking office.
"I encourage all of you to not lose sight of the circumstances that you were experiencing three-and-a-half years ago, versus the circumstances that are at the present,'' Smitherman said.
The raise affects nurse practitioners who work in community health centres, family health teams, long-term care homes, aboriginal health access centres and the underserviced area program.
Nurse practitioners will see their salaries bumped up to $85,320 from around $80,000, said Health Ministry spokesman David Jensen.
He said nurse practitioners will likely see the raise on their paycheques by late summer or early fall.
Earlier, Smitherman said outside the conference that the pay raise will bring nurse practitioners' salaries more in line with nurses who work in settings such as hospitals.
"All of the nurses working in the community setting, this is designed to address inequities between them and nurses that are working in other settings,'' Smitherman said.
However, some critics said the pay raise still does not put the salaries of nurse practitioners in community health centres on par with those of hospital nurses.
NDP health critic Shelley Martel said the nurse practitioners' pay raise doesn't go far enough.
"I guess it's better than nothing, but it's certainly not what I can see they were looking at, and will not do the trick in making a number of agencies trying to recruit right now in a competitive position to do that,'' she said.
Martel pointed to figures provided by the Nurse Practitioners' Association of Ontario which show some hospital nurses earn higher salaries than some nurse practitioners in community health centres.
For example, a nurse working in the Niagara Region public health department earns $91,000 annually plus benefits for a 35-hour work week, while nurses in Windsor's public health department make $99,000 plus benefits for the same work week.
Martel derided Smitherman's announcement as political grandstanding leading up to this fall's provincial election.
"The house is finished and we are in election mode,'' she said. "So clearly this is the government trying to respond before the election to show they're doing something for nurse practitioners.''
