On Thursday Registered Nurses’ Union President Yvette Coffey took aim at Premier John Hogan, who has yet to publicly address the healthcare scandal, which Hanrahan says has resulted in the province paying upward of $400,000 on average per agency nurse over the past couple of years. “The premier’s silence in the face of confirmed mismanagement and potential misconduct undermines the trust nurses and the public place in elected leadership,” Coffey said. That’s up to four times the salary of local registered nurses, PC leader Tony Wakeham has argued. “Public nurses were denied benefits, pushed into arbitration over overtime, and treated as an afterthought,” Wakeham said last week. Only then can we ensure accountability and better healthcare for all of us.”The PCs, the provincial NDP, and the Registered Nurses’ Union have all called for investigations into the province’s handling and mismanagement of agency nurses.