Details of new NB Medical Society deal released

The terms of the new contract the New Brunswick Medical Society and the provincial government signed last month [Canadian Medicine] have been released: 3.75% per year raises for four years, retroactive to April 1, 2008, followed by a two-year wage freeze from 2012 to 2014. [Government of New Brunswick/NBMS joint statement]

That's a big improvement on what the government initially brought to the negotiating table, which was zero.

In fact, the new deal is one of the two options (1: the initially-agreed-upon four-year contract with a two-year wage freeze preceding it; or 2: the initial deal with a two-year freeze following it) the government presented to the physicians this past summer, before then-health minister Michael Murphy changed his mind, retracted the offer and oversaw the legislature's drafting of a law [Bill 93 (PDF)] that gave the government authority to unilaterally override the original (wage-freeze-free) version of the deal, agreed upon in 2008.

Image: Government of New Brunswick

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