A Liberal MPP has introduced a bill aimed at reining in the high fees companies charge to send nurses to long-term care homes and hospitals as temporary workers, a problem identified by the Ford government.
However, it's not clear if the bill will gain the support of the Progressive Conservatives it would need to become law.
Adil Shamji, an emergency medicine doctor, said the use of health-care staffing agencies ballooned during the pandemic.
On the one hand, he said, agencies' ability to send nurses where they’re needed on short notice was a “lifeline” at the height of COVID but, on the other, bad actors have shown how “corrosive” it can be when profits mix with health care.
Hospitals and long-term care facilities across the province are facing staffing shortages, with unfilled nursing positions an acute problem.
Shamji says staffing agencies are both part of the solution and the cause: they send nurses to fill empty shifts, at a higher cost, but are also poaching nurses from permanent jobs.
When nurses leave permanent positions to work for agencies they become temporary workers and often book shifts through apps, trading stability and benefits for flexibility and generally higher hourly pay.
Shamji described scenarios where agencies recruit nurses out of hospital parking lots, only to send them back to the same hospitals at three to four times the cost.
In other cases, he said, nurses who work for these agencies have fallen in love with health-care settings in rural communities but have been prohibited from being hired there by non-compete clauses in their contracts.
His bill would require that nursing agencies be licensed and regulated, and banned from specific practices: Uber-like surge pricing, poaching staff, charging an “unconscionable price,” and including non-compete clauses in nurses’ contracts.
“It takes aim at the most outrageous and predatory practices in a way that is reasonable and fair to everyone,” said Shamji.
The bill has the support of the other opposition parties at Queen’s Park — the official Opposition NDP and lone Green MPP Mike Schreiner.
“We have to crack down on that and I'd rather we just didn't see those agencies at all,” said NDP leader Marit Stiles. “The fact that they exist at all is a problem.”
But Shamji said his bill was written so that it would not put the agencies out of business, which he added would further destabilize the health-care system during a precarious time.
“What it does do is level the playing field,” he said. “It prevents the siphoning of health-care workers out of the public health-care system and it stops runaway profiteering, among other things.”
Shamji said the Ford government promised in August to take action on staffing agency costs but has not done so.
The Ontario Nurses’ Association (ONA), which supports the bill, made a similar complaint.
“The current government has taken no action, after ONA has repeatedly raised this issue, in order to deal with urgent issues such as nursing agency price gouging and accountability to Ontarians,” said Bernie Robinson, a registered nurse and the interim provincial president of the nursing union.
However, the Ontario Long-Term Care Association said in a statement it relies on agencies and has been working with the government on rising agency costs. It was noncommittal on Shamji’s bill.
“In addition, we recognize that not all staffing agencies supporting long-term care homes in Ontario are the same and thank the ones working with integrity in terms of their pricing, screening and training."
AdvantAge Ontario, which represented not-for-profit, municipal long-term care homes in Ontario, said it has been "leading the charge to address price gouging by some temporary staffing agencies in long-term care and across the health system," and has been working with the government on the issue as well.
"Here’s what’s at stake. A recent survey of 100 of our members found homes are paying a very high price to fill staffing shortages — including being forced to pay on average $88 per hour for a temporary RN, more than twice their typical wage of $43 per hour," said CEO Lisa Levin in a statement.
Health Minister Sylvia Jones was absent from Queen's Park on Thursday and her staff did not provide a comment for this story by deadline.
