HHS Cuts 413 Positions: What Staff Are Owed

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Hamilton Health Sciences has announced that it is cutting 413 positions, 143 of them nursing, against a projected $150 million deficit for 2026-27. The number that matters to you is smaller and more complicated than the headline. About 157 of those 413 are vacant posts that will simply not be filled, which leaves roughly 256 people actually affected, and the hospital has said the reductions reach both union and non-union positions.

Updated September 2026

What you are entitled to depends almost entirely on which side of that union line you sit on, and on one technical question about the ESA that the coverage has not addressed. This article works through both.

Why 413 is probably not a mass termination

This is counter-intuitive, so it is worth setting out properly. Under section 58 of the Employment Standards Act, 2000, enhanced group notice applies where an employer terminates 50 or more employees at one establishment within a four-week period: eight weeks for 50 to 199, twelve weeks for 200 to 499, sixteen weeks for 500 or more, plus a Form 1 filed with the Director of Employment Standards, with the notice period not beginning until that form is received.

On the raw number, 256 people would sit in the twelve-week band. But the rules do not apply where the employees being terminated are 10 per cent or fewer of those employed at the establishment for at least three months, and none of the terminations result from a permanent discontinuance of all or part of the business. Hamilton Health Sciences employs many thousands of people, so a few hundred reductions sit well under that threshold, and a budget-driven restructuring is not a discontinuance of the business.

So the likely position is that the enhanced group notice does not apply, and each person falls back on individual entitlements. That is not bad news, and it is the reason the distinction matters: individual entitlement for a long-service, non-union employee is usually worth considerably more than eight or twelve weeks. Our article on mass layoffs in Ontario sets out the group rules in full, including the Form 1 sequence and the newer Career Supports and job-seeking leave obligations.

The fork: union or not

What non-union hospital staff are actually owed

Hospital administrative, managerial and professional staff are often the group with the most to lose and the least idea of it. Long service and specialised roles push reasonable notice up, and so does the fourth factor, the availability of comparable work. That factor bites hard here. With HHS and St. Joseph’s both reducing positions in the same year, a hospital finance manager or clinical administrator in Hamilton is looking for the same job in a market where the two largest employers of that skill set are cutting rather than hiring, which is an argument for a longer notice period and one our Hamilton employment lawyers make on these files. The factors are set out in our article on the Bardal factors and worked through in how the reasonable notice period is calculated.

If you are being redeployed rather than cut

In a restructuring of this size, some people are not terminated but moved. If the new role is materially lesser in pay, responsibility or status, that is not simply a transfer. A significant unilateral change can be a constructive dismissal, which means you may be entitled to treat the employment as ended and claim on the position you held before. The bar is high and the response has to be prompt and in writing, so take advice before either accepting the new role without comment or refusing it outright. The related problem of a position eliminated and then quietly refilled is covered in our article on being replaced after a layoff.

When the cut lands on a protected ground

This part applies whether or not you are in a union, and it is the most commonly missed issue in a large restructuring. Selection for layoff cannot be influenced by a protected ground under the Human Rights Code. Where the people cut are disproportionately those on medical leave, on accommodation, on pregnancy or parental leave, or in an older age band, that is a discrimination question regardless of what the budget spreadsheet says.

Unionized employees are not shut out of this. The Tribunal and labour arbitrators have concurrent jurisdiction over human rights matters arising in a unionized workplace, so a Code claim can be brought to the Tribunal in your own name even where a collective agreement covers the layoff itself. Our articles on why human rights matters go to the HRTO and workplace accommodation explain how those claims run, and the Shingiro decision shows how the Tribunal approaches a dismissal said to be performance or operations driven.

The deadline is short and it is not extended by an internal process or a grievance. An application must generally be filed within one year of the last incident, and our article on limitation periods sets out the clocks that run alongside it.

This is the pattern, not an isolated event

Ontario health care has been shedding positions steadily through 2025 and 2026 as hospitals close budget gaps, and the questions are the same each time. We covered the same issues in our articles on the Ottawa health care layoffs and on the Ontario Science Centre closure, where the same union and non-union split determined what each person could do.

Frequently asked questions

The information in this article is current as of September 2026 and provides general information only. It is not legal advice and should not be relied on as legal advice or opinion. It is based on the reductions announced publicly by Hamilton Health Sciences on 18 September 2026, and what any individual is entitled to depends on their own contract, service and circumstances. This publication is copyrighted by Achkar Law Professional Corporation and may not be reproduced in any form, in whole or in part, without express permission.

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“text”: “Notice or pay in lieu, statutory severance where you have five years of service and the employer meets the payroll test, and continued benefits through the notice period. Unless your contract contains an enforceable termination clause, the measure is common law reasonable notice based on your age, length of service, the character of the role and the market for it, which for long-service hospital staff is usually months rather than weeks.”
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“name”: “I am in a union. Can a lawyer help me?”,
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“text”: “For the layoff itself, your union is the right route and the collective agreement governs layoff order, bumping and recall. Where the issue is a human rights one, such as selection influenced by disability, accommodation, pregnancy or age, you can bring an application to the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario in your own name, because the Tribunal and labour arbitrators have concurrent jurisdiction over those claims.”
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“@type”: “Question”,
“name”: “Does it matter that the hospital is cutting for budget reasons?”,
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“text”: “Not to what you are owed. An employer can end employment without cause for any legitimate business reason, and the reason does not reduce the notice entitlement. The reason only becomes legally significant if selection for layoff was influenced by a protected ground, which is a separate claim.”
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“text”: “Your statutory entitlements are owed whether or not you sign. A release is what you give in exchange for anything above the minimum, and signing it closes every claim covered by its wording, including human rights claims. Have it reviewed first; that review is usually quick and it is the step that cannot be undone afterwards.”
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