Nurses’ aides could take industrial action at the hospital unless a dormant pay rise is acted upon, the Bermuda Industrial Union has announced.The word came from BIU head Chris Furbert on the same day that unionised postal staff downed tools over a fellow employee, fired on drug-related charges, whom management refuse to reinstate.Yesterday’s threat of a hospital action prompted a warning from the Bermuda Hospitals Board that strikes are subject to legal provisions, since the hospital’s services are essential to the public.Pointing to annual profits of $18 million in the BHB’s financial statements for the years ending January 31, 2010 and 2011, Bermuda Industrial Union President Mr Furbert said an arbitration award given this month to the BHB was “inhumane”.“This goes back to when arbitration began on November 29 for a hospital workers’ Collective Bargaining Agreement,” Mr Furbert said.The BIU had asked for a $35 a week wage increase for workers — an increase of about 3.5 percent — that was turned down in arbitration.The arbitration award remains is binding to both parties, Mr Furbert added, and the union will not contest it.But he said the BIU nonetheless retains the right to act upon the $12 a week Nursing Auxiliary raise that had been negotiated for 2009 to 2010, as well as 2010 to 2011, which he said hasn’t yet come into effect.Nursing Auxiliary staff are assistants to registered nurses, who belong to a separate union.Following a meeting on Thursday night, the BIU chief said, the union decided that BHB have “48 hours to reinstate the $12 wage increase” for the nursing auxiliaries.“If not, those 120-odd staff will take some form of industrial action,” Mr Furbert said, stressing that the latest action was based upon negotiations made prior to the latest arbitration.A BHB spokeswoman said the Board had been mustering its surplus cash to pay for the new acute care wing currently under construction, as well as investing in services at the hospital.“This includes capital programmes and purchases that are required not just for the new construction, but to ensure the safety of patients, staff and visitors in our existing facilities,” she said. BHB’s earnings have been capped since 2011, in accordance with Memoranda of Understanding with Government and insurers. That earnings cap has “severely limited BHB’s ability to raise revenue”, the spokeswoman said.“Our focus has been on finding internal efficiencies to ensure we can maintain a quality healthcare service and meet our financial obligations,” she continued. “No area is free from scrutiny: a zero based budgeting process has already taken place and a Transformation Office established to seek out and implement cost savings wherever they can be found, without impacting quality. We are also reviewing our core services and specialities. Salaries and employee benefits make up about 65 percent of BHB’s cost base. Contracts are being reviewed, performance pay has been stopped, scheduling and overtime are being closely managed, vacancies are not always being filled, compensation is being reviewed, and the Senior Management Team wages were frozen from April, 2012.”On the matter of arbitration, she said, the arbitration panel awarded BIU members an additional $20 per week.“BHB will abide by the arbitration decision, although the impact of the wage increase means that we will need to seek efficiencies elsewhere,” she said.However, she said the $12 a week award referred to by Mr Furbert had been for nurses’ aides training that had never taken place. It was outside of the scope of the arbitration process so no ruling was made, but BHB did commit to review this in consultation with BHB leadership and the union. “With regards to the threat of industrial action, there are legal obligations around how that is managed to ensure patient safety can be maintained, as the hospital provides an essential service.”On the matter of the dismissed postman, the Bermuda Post Office drew a line in the sand — saying he remains guilty of a serious infraction, even though his name was ultimately cleared of wrongdoing in the Island’s courts. The one-day work stoppage was announced yesterday by Bermuda Industrial Union President Chris Furbert, who castigated the decision by postal management to suggest arbitration.“We believe that the courts have ruled,” Mr Furbert said. “This would be like someone going to the Supreme Court, being found not guilty, and then you go on trial in the lower court.”In 2011, worker Anthony Rogers was charged with two others in Magistrates’ Court of conspiracy to import cannabis. The case against them revolved around a suspicious package.Explained Mr Furbert: “The issue is very concerning to us, because the parcel in question was under police surveillance.”Mr Rogers and others were acquitted last October, but he has not returned to his job, and the BIU rejected the offer of a return to arbitration extended by the BPO management team [see adjoining story]. Postal management said the worker had been dismissed because the parcel “disappeared from his possession” when he deviated from his set delivery route.However, the BIU responded by calling the statement, issued by Government, “an outright lie”.Mr Furbert said postal staff but will return to work on Monday — with the understanding that the BIU is to settle upon a time for a meeting of its members to decided the next course of action.At stake in both issues was the union’s faith in the arbitration process. Mr Furbert said trust for the procedure was “slowly, slowly dwindling from the BIU perspective”.