Tenet Healthcare bargains in good faith to settle second union contract this year in Massachusetts

Framingham, MA –  MetroWest Medical Center Framingham Union Campus is pleased to have reached a three-year agreement with the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), the union that represents various employees at the hospital including food services, environmental services, and various patient care aides. The hospital reached a tentative agreement with the union on July 16, 2021, and the employees ratified the agreement yesterday, on July 29^th. The agreement is a testament to the collaborative relationship between the hospital and the SEIU, and we look forward to continuing in this collaborative manner.

The agreement with the SEIU at MetroWest Medical Center marks the second collective bargaining agreement entered into by a Tenet affiliated hospital in Massachusetts in the past few months, and the 29^th collective bargaining agreement entered into by a Tenet affiliate since January, 2020. The other ratified collective bargaining agreement in Massachusetts was between Saint Vincent Hospital and the UFCW in March, 2021. In both cases, the union and the hospital made compromises to their positions, and Saint Vincent Hospital and the UFCW came up with a creative compromise to staffing ratios requested by the UFCW.

The agreements reached with SEIU and UFCW stand in stark contrast to Saint Vincent’s unresolved contract negotiations with the Massachusetts Nurses Association (MNA), which remain unsettled largely due to the MNA’s irresponsible insistence on unreasonable mandated staffing ratios, despite overwhelming and repeated evidence that the hospital’s staffing is both safe and effective. The most recent factual evidence of SVH’s staffing and quality is its rating in the U.S. News & World Report, which is indisputable. MNA does not appear to care about compromise. Instead, the union has clearly prioritized its strike and spreading known falsehoods about Saint Vincent Hospital over patient safety and over the nurses it represents, putting the community’s healthcare services at risk.