Health Sciences North budget sees surplus, despite funding constraints

Morning North6:50Budget surplus reported at Health Sciences North AGM

A budget surplus of 117 thousand dollars was reported at HSN's Annual General Meeting. HSN President and CEO Denis Roy, spoke with the CBC's Marina von Stackelberg about how the hospital is managing under increasing budget constraints.The president of Health Sciences North says more jobs cuts are expected at the Sudbury hospital.

Denis Roy said the budget constraints put on the hospital by the province means more cuts will be needed. The province froze the budgets of hospitals in 2012, and focused on increasing funding to community-based healthcare instead.

But Roy said the move means making some difficult choices at the hospital.

"There's a limit to the number of years where one organization budget doesn't change and we still have to provide the same service," he said.

"So far we've been relatively lucky. A lot of the positions were vacant. But is that going to continue? I'm not sure. Nursing cuts, other cuts, my cuts — you know, everybody will suffer."

At its annual general meeting Thursday night, the hospital reported a budget surplus of $117,000, about a quarter of what it was the year before. Roy said the hospital has managed to avoid too many layoffs by not filling vacant positions or by hiring internally.

In March, the Ontario Nurses Association said they had been told that HSN would be cutting 39 full-time and five part-time nursing positions.

The cuts amount to 85,000 hours of lost nursing hours. Roy added nurses need to change the way they do things to maintain quality nursing care.

The hospital has also cut 1.6 jobs in administration.