An Ontario interest arbitration board has ruled that Queensway-Carleton Hospital may reassign registered nurses off their home units for up to four consecutive tours, striking down local contract language that had effectively limited reassignments to a single shift at a time.
The award, issued under the Hospital Labour Disputes Arbitration Act, resolves a single outstanding local issue between the Ottawa hospital and the Ontario Nurses’ Association following central bargaining.
The conflict between local and central language
The dispute centred on a reassignment guideline in the local collective agreement that restricted nurses from being reassigned for two consecutive tours unless the shifts were separated by at least one calendar day. The hospital argued this local provision was incompatible with an amendment made to the central agreement in 2023, which established that reassignments of four consecutive shifts or fewer do not constitute a layoff.
The 2023 central language change, made by a separate arbitration board, was intended to give hospitals greater flexibility to redeploy nurses internally and reduce reliance on agency staff. Queensway-Carleton argued that its local language was preventing it from using that flexibility, effectively nullifying a benefit the central award had been designed to provide.
The hospital reported completing more than 5,600 nurse reassignments since 2023, nearly 1,944 of which involved two or more consecutive shifts. The Ontario Nurses’ Association filed grievances challenging those reassignments under the existing local language, and those grievances were referred to arbitration.
Board rejects jurisdictional argument, grants proposal on merits
The hospital also raised a jurisdictional argument, contending the local provision was in direct conflict with the central agreement and should be declared null and void. The board declined to resolve the dispute on that basis, finding the two provisions were not clearly in conflict. The central layoff language explicitly permits the parties to negotiate the manner of reassignments at the local level, and the board found the local article operated as a scheduling guideline rather than a definition of layoff.
However, the board agreed the local language had fallen out of step with the central agreement following the 2023 amendment. Quoting the rationale behind that amendment, the board noted it was designed to give hospitals “the ability to redeploy nurses while maintaining valued seniority protections.” The existing local language, the board found, directly prevented the hospital from accessing that flexibility.
The board awarded the hospital’s proposed language, amending the local provision to state that a nurse shall not be reassigned for more than four consecutive tours. The board also accepted the hospital’s argument that keeping the same nurse on reassignment for multiple consecutive shifts supports continuity of care, rather than rotating a new nurse into the role every other shift.
Union opposed the change
The Ontario Nurses’ Association argued the scheduling provisions mattered deeply to nurses, who expressed strong opposition to being sent to unfamiliar units — an experience that could cause anxiety and affect patient care. The union maintained that the appropriate forum for the dispute was grievance arbitration, where a hearing date had already been scheduled, rather than interest arbitration.
The union nominee dissented from the majority decision, arguing that the hospital had not demonstrated genuine need for the change and that replication did not support the award. The dissent noted that many comparable local agreements across the province impose restrictions on consecutive reassignments that would make it difficult or impossible to reassign the same nurse for four consecutive shifts. No evidence was presented that the Ontario Nurses’ Association had agreed to alter those other agreements, or that other hospitals had even proposed similar amendments.
The dissent also challenged the continuity-of-care rationale, noting there was no evidence about which units nurses were being sent to or whether patient assignments on receiving units would support that conclusion.
The collective agreement runs from April 1, 2025, to March 31, 2027.
Decision maker: Arbitration board chaired by Colin Johnston; Philip Abbink, union nominee (dissenting); Brett Christen, hospital nominee (dissenting in part)
Counsel for the hospital: Porter Heffernan, Paula Campbell, and Tess Brown
Counsel for the union: David Cheslock, presenter; Steven Broadbent, labour relations officer
For more information, see Queensway-Carleton Hospital v Ontario Nurses’ Association, 2026 CanLII 30889 (ON LA).
