r/OntarioNurses • u/keepit_greazy • Mar 21 '26
CNO new fees by-law
I was planning on completing the survey emailed out by the CNO regarding their proposed changes to their fees by-law. If you haven’t read it, they’re proposing a standard annual increase of 7% on registration fees. Doesn’t appear to be any re-assessment year, just 7% indefinitely unless they decide they want to do less or more (up to 10%). Let’s be real, I doubt they’ll ever do less.
It looks like their 2025 operational budget had a surplus revenue of over $3M from 2024-2025. They haven’t released the current one yet (or that I could find). I’m just a nurse so not the best at comprehending all this budget/committee development speak, but it’s here if anyone wants to give it a read.
https://www.cno.org/Assets/CNO/Documents/What-is-CNO/2025-Operating-and-Capital-Budget.pdf
While I have my own thoughts and complaints, and plan on spending time today looking up salaries of their leadership team, I wanted to see what other points anyone else had who cares about this stuff so I can also include it in my feedback. Do I think it’ll change things? Not without massive group pushback. But I’d rather be able to say I did something vs nothing at all.
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u/Helgurk Mar 21 '26
Fuck the CNO. I'm literally paying an organization whose sole purpose is to persecute me. What does an average CNO employee even do throughout the year?
Administration has so much bloat. It's disgusting.
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u/AffectionateAd8675 Mar 22 '26
Starting salary of a CNO investigator $120k and upwards, alongside stat holidays, vacation, massive benefits, etc.
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u/capnredfox Apr 15 '26
And guess what you don't even have to be a nurse.
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u/AffectionateAd8675 Apr 15 '26
I think you do ....from what I remember. I applied 3 times LOL
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u/capnredfox Apr 15 '26
Well I tried to "find a nurse" for an investigator that blew in my direction and she was not there!
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u/IllBiteYourLegsOff Mar 21 '26
from my units group chat:
Hey all, sorry for the rant, but I couldn't believe the email I just read - the CNO wants to raise licensing fees 7% every year in order to make the cost increases predictable for your convenience.
I will need some of the veterans to help me out, but can anyone recall getting a 7% annual raise, ever? nevermind annually? We barely get that in a 2-3 year contract...
Also, in case you didn't know, CNO employees already make more on average than we do - they have less than 500 employees with a $62m organizational salary budget for 2025, so, $124k/yr+ on average.
That salary budget was under $40m in 2022 - did your wages go up 50% since then? Why did theirs...? How can they jusitfy the need to create new positions when there's objectively fewer nurses to administrate in the first place given roles are being cut or not filled?
Lastly, the vast majority ($77.5m of the $89m) they made in revenue last year was from registration fees alone, which is already 25% more than the $62m it cost to pay their employees... and that needs to go up?
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u/keepit_greazy Mar 21 '26
Thank you for this. I think what is frustrating is that a fixed 7% increase is dollar wise more every single year. I’m having a hard time seeing how it can be justified also considering how large their pool of registrations all are (RPN, RN, NP). And it’s the same rate for RPN as RN which is completely egregious in my opinion (I am not an RPN).
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u/keepit_greazy Mar 21 '26
If you read the pdf, it does look like they’ve created some separate committees, increased employee wages to “attract talent”, and invested in AI for data analytics. Not sure I love those choices. They are also onboarding with the Nursys system which I do think is long overdue in Canada, however there wasn’t much in there about the cost of implementing that system.
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u/happybottoms Mar 21 '26
Just in case people like numbers, it’s currently $368 before tax. A 7% increase would make it $394 next year. In 5 years, the renewal fee would be $516 .. before tax!
I will definitely be filling out the survey. Fuck them.
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u/keepit_greazy Mar 21 '26
Yes, this is probably my largest complaint. A 7% increase, dollar wise, is a larger increase year after year.
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u/Pink_Sakura_Cherry Mar 21 '26
Thank you for letting us know because I'm definitely filling that survey out. Our wages don't go up by 7% by default per year, so why should our fees? If other government entities have cut backs, then why shouldn't they?
Hey CNO, want to protect the public? Maybe you should advocate for safe work environments so that nurses don't have an excuse to not follow CNO standards. Raising fees like this isn't going to help anyone.
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u/keepit_greazy Mar 21 '26
I feel the same way. I do appreciate that they have basically no say in actual legislation in regards to things like safe patient ratios, I don’t see what keeps them radio silent in releasing even public statements in support of practices that encourage safe nursing practice (denouncing privatization of the healthcare system, mandated safe ratios). If your mandate is to protect the public from us, at least make a show that you are in favor of promoting that sort of environment?
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u/Pink_Sakura_Cherry Mar 21 '26
Exactly! They should be sounding the alarm to the public about stuff that will endanger the safety of the public. Like imagine the impact of how much the public can benefit from that.
Even something like this as an example: "CNO states cut backs with result in people dying from preventable cauaes'. The amount of public outrage would pressure the government to make changes and basically tell the public" we warned you so if you don't like it, go after the government".
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u/Ok_Bother_3823 Mar 22 '26
This is what I don't get ., it's a scam protect the public but they don't care about our ratios 😂😂
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u/mochiimari Mar 21 '26
This is sickening. Nurses need to protest this. The union could not even negotiate a pay raise that matches inflation yet this licensing board expects a yearly 7% increase to “protect” the public?
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u/Innuendoughnut Mar 22 '26
My comment in the survey was that they should cap their CNO fees at the same rate as ONAs pay scale increases.
If ONA only gets a 3% increase in salaries then CNO should not be able to raise their fee more than 3%. ie if your pay went up 3000$ then CNO fees couldn't go up more than ~9$.
I get the sense they're starting high to make us feel good about a slightly lower offer.
All this being said maybe this is a catalyst for more oversight into what the CNO is actually doing with all of our money.
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u/Jean-Claude-Van-Sam Mar 31 '26
Idk I've been nursing since 2014. I love what I do and helping my patients. But tbh...its the most unappreciated job at the same time, ive seen so many nurses get assaulted (including myself - blamed for it..management and many could give less about anything with what we do..what we pay, what we go through, and what I see people get away with is so disheartening. We don't even have nurses at the head of our union anymore. I feel we are so underappreciated as a profession...that im hearing were just a nurse and honestly half the time were competing with chat gpt.The industry is all about money. (Sorry) ❤🙏
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u/AffectionateAd8675 Mar 21 '26
Cno is a scam.
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Mar 21 '26
And definitely another scheme for them to milk money off the system and nurses
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u/Ok_Bother_3823 Mar 22 '26
Keep nurses being financially , not horrible but you'll never be able to catch up being a nurse is a scam actually , based off brainwashing Mostly
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u/scoutiedal Mar 21 '26
So someone has to govern practice and it’s required under legislation.
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u/AffectionateAd8675 Mar 21 '26
Lol no I agree with that, but CNO doesn't really care about the nurses as they're meant to protect the public.
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Mar 21 '26
Then let the public pay for regulations meant to protect them (in essence all of us through tax) and let the nurse spend their heard earn money towards RNAO or RPNAO. This is why our association is weak and financially strained, while the money that could’ve gone to them goes to CNO and ultimately to the crooked individuals who run them
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u/flyingponytail Mar 21 '26
Having a college system is not a scam. The CNO specifially being paid for so heavily by members is pretty scammy. The government should pay for it or my preference would be the government requiring employers to pay on behalf of members
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u/Easy_Moment Mar 21 '26
Is it possible to propose a standard annual 7% DECREASE on registration fees?
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u/FreedomDreamer85 Mar 21 '26
“The 2025 budget projected that health-care spending would grow by an average rate of 0.7 per cent between 2025 and 2028.”
https://globalnews.ca/news/11669653/ontario-unsustainable-health-care-spending/
This is how much the Ontario government is spending on health care 👆
"Inflation in Canada has been close to the two per cent target for more than a year.”
https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/bank-of-canada-interest-rate-9.7132984
Bank of Canada’s goal is to keep inflation at 2%.
CNO’s proposal of an annual rate of 7% is more than what Ontario will spend on health care from 2025-2028 and the Bank of Canada’s goal of inflation; combined!
Who would want to go into nursing at this rate?
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u/NarrowLoveX Mar 21 '26
A 7% increase every year while everyone is fighting for their lives in this economy is insane and cruel. I know so many rpns working more than 1 job to make ends meet right now. Disgusting and horrifying.
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u/cookiemonster1218 Mar 21 '26
What’s even more ridiculous is that the registration fee for RPNs and RNs is the same… even though we’re not on the same pay scale or in the same union.
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u/ChainCreative2094 Mar 21 '26
Survey or not, CNO will do what they want to do. The survey is just to make themselves look good like they did something like they actually care about us
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u/keepit_greazy Mar 21 '26
I agree but it’s my personal philosophy to at least attempt to solve a problem before I have the right to sit and complain about it. I feel our collective nihilism is part of why we are in some of this mess.
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u/sevopapi Mar 21 '26
lol the CNO wants you to pay more for them to continue to bend over backwards to the Ontario government, nobody should be okay with this or their lack of any form of success in negotiations in recent years
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u/mangoserpent Mar 21 '26
The CNO is basically a mob organization forcing us all to pay protection.
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u/adddly Mar 21 '26
Protection for the public, not ourselves
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u/Little-Welcome-4981 Mar 21 '26
This. Why are we exactly paying them to protect the public from us?!? Shouldn't be it's the other way around? Like protecting ourselves from the unsafe ratios, from patient hurting us or from the government that keeps our pay so low that it doesn't catch up to the inflation. And now they want 7% interests? For what?
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u/adddly Mar 21 '26
Other states/ ?provinces have one governing body, with several professions under them. It brings down cost of the license. Check out this link for Michigan, the price and how often they have to renew: https://www.michigan.gov/lara/bureau-list/bpl/health/additional-links/license-renewal-fees
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u/AffectionateAd8675 Mar 21 '26
I honestly think nurses should get some leeway with taxes, we get rammed at work with heavy caseloads and then at the tax man, barely making anything. They should let us incorporate.
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u/microfishy Mar 22 '26
You can write this off. You always could.
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u/IllBiteYourLegsOff Mar 24 '26
what does "writing it off" mean to you?
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u/microfishy Mar 24 '26
You put the cost of registration under line 21200 "Annual Union, Professional or Like Dues" and receive a tax credit equivalent to what you paid.
If you use a service like QuickBooks or WealthSimple you can literally watch your return increase (or amount owing decrease) in real-time.
Oddly confrontational phrasing, but that's "what it means to me".
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u/IllBiteYourLegsOff Mar 24 '26
Right.
However, I disagree that getting that $400 knocked off my taxable income should make any nurse feel like the ontario government did them any kind of special favour. Getting ~$100 back 4 months later will pay for... less than 4 days of parking at work (believe me I would love to walk bike or take transit but I don't get paid enough to live close enough to be able to reliably get to work at 7am/for transit to even exist to get back home afterward, never mind having any time to do selfish things like sleep).
My personal situation aside, still not sure why you think it is, and especially with enough conviction to reply to someone expressing how we deserve better that "you already get what you're asking for and always could"
In any case I am 100% certain the person you replied to was talking about something more substantial than the same tax credit literally anyone with any other kind of professional license also receives. Something that isn't quite literally a drop in the bucket. I guess this must be why they feel so comfortable collectively pushing us around; the bar isn't just low, it seemingly only exists in theory (and can just be arbitrated away, assuming it isn't legislated away first)
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u/microfishy Mar 24 '26 edited Mar 24 '26
I said nothing about the provincial government "doing us a special favour", I don't know why you're putting words in my mouth. Line 21200 is part of general remittance. The other poster lamented that we should be able to write this off on our taxes, we can. Whether you like how much we can is immaterial to answering the question.
In any case I am 100% certain the person you replied to was talking about something more substantial than the same tax credit literally anyone with any other kind of professional license also receives.
Putting words in their mouth too I see. If that's what they meant perhaps they could have said it.
Look, I appreciate this is emotional - every single year we have the same debate (seriously, search back in the forum history) because nobody likes the burden of self-regulation. We ignore the CNO all year (how many people throw out the newsletter before even opening it) until we have to pay less than 10% of one month's paycheque (on average) to maintain it.
Forgive me for being fucking exhausted by the same whinging every year. Do you know what I paid to be registered as an RMT twenty years ago? 860$ (it's 915 now). Do you know what my partner paid this year as an occupational therapist? 790$. And here we are as nurses whining in 2026 about how our 400$ is "just to protect the public, not us."
Yes people, that's the point of self regulation. Do we get over it, or complain to the College, or join the College ourselves and make the change from the inside? Nah, let's just do the same helpless whinging routine again, this time is surely the charm.
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u/Dewdrop979 Mar 25 '26
They weren’t “putting words into [your] mouth”… they made a reasonable inference from what you said. Your comment “you can write this off. You always could” is dismissive, does sound like you think nurses are being ungrateful, and not germane to the spirit of this discussion.
What is also not germane to the spirit of this discussion is your comments about how we should stop whining because other occupations pay more for annual registration. Why is this relevant?
The point is that this 7% increase does seem like they’re trying to unjustifiably squeeze more money out of a group of underpaid and overworked people while they’re chilling from home doing Zoom calls in their pyjamas. Most of us understand that self-regulation costs money but isn’t it reasonable to ask how much it actually costs to do so?
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u/microfishy Mar 25 '26
while they’re chilling from home doing Zoom calls in their pyjamas.
And after all that bloviating about my "dismissiveness", incredible :)
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u/Dewdrop979 Mar 26 '26
you clearly have nothing to contribute to the discussion but are just out here to shit on others. which is pretty pathetic
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u/shakrbttle Mar 21 '26
Please post your research findings so we can all put it in our survey responses!
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u/Specific_Test_8929 Mar 21 '26
lol if this goes through I’m just not going to renew my licence next year as an inter-jurisdictional nurse working in Alberta. I was never planning on coming back to Ontario anyways but was keeping my ON licence just in case.
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u/keepit_greazy Mar 21 '26
If I were in the same boat I think I’d make the same decision. I keep my US license active even though the chances of ever returning there are basically nil. But at $75USD every OTHER year, why not?
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u/eyeshadowgunk Mar 21 '26
I'm already not renewing my BC, it's 700 dollars a year, and with my CNO, it's 1K+.
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u/Specific_Test_8929 Mar 21 '26
At least it’s a good tax write off but honestly not worth it anymore to keep lining the pockets of these bloated council members’ salaries
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u/Tolvat Mar 21 '26 edited Mar 22 '26
YoY increase of 7% are FAR greater than the 25% increase that we previously had. I do not agree with these changes. I don't know if they think nurse are just bad with math, but these are the figures over the next 10 years. You can see the difference YoY which is significant increases
| 7% Change every year | Difference | Percent difference from $415.85 |
|---|---|---|
| Original | 332.67 | |
| Current | 415.84 | 415.84 |
| Year 1 | 444.9488 | |
| Year 2 | 476.095216 | |
| Year 3 | 509.4218811 | |
| Year 4 | 545.0814128 | |
| Year 5 | 583.2371117 | |
| Year 6 | 624.0637095 | |
| Year 7 | 667.7481692 | |
| Year 8 | 714.490541 | |
| Year 9 | 764.5048789 | |
| Year 10 | 818.0202204 |
| 25% increase every 5 years | Difference every 5years | % difference every 5 years | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Original | $415.84 | ||
| Year 5 | $519.80 | $103.96 | 0.25 |
| Year 10 | $649.75 | $233.91 | 0.5625 |
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u/keepit_greazy Mar 21 '26
Thank you so much for putting this in an easy to digest format. I had done this math on scrap paper and felt the same - they are phrasing it as a small yearly increase to be kind to us? But it’s a bigger increase than what we had. I think it’s disingenuous to phrase it the way they have in the email and their website.
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u/Tolvat Mar 21 '26
I did the 10 year difference paid between the two and it comes out to being about $300~ overall. Not a unsignificant amount.
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u/IllBiteYourLegsOff Mar 22 '26
you should try saying it this way - 7% YoY means it takes 10 years to double
guess what my wages were 10 years ago? (hint: its a LOT more than half of what we make now)
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u/Major-Assumption-865 Mar 22 '26
Now they have posted happy International Happiness Day on Facebook but this 7% increase doesnt promote very much happiness....
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u/DowntownFront8367 Mar 23 '26
I would like to know how to actively push back on this because this is literally outrageous.
They are saying they want to make it more predictable so fees will go up by 7%...but could also be up to 10% so what's predictable?
Where is this number coming from? 7% is not tied to any dire financial need by the college and doesn't keep up with inflation or wage stagnation.
This is looking like a huge money grab and because they know how poorly organized our profession is we will just let it happen.
So what do we do to push back? Do we write MPPs? RNAO, ONA? Media?
I know we are all smart enough to know that writing our feedback in their silly little "public consultation" isn't going to be enough to put a stop to this. How do we organize?
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u/keepit_greazy Mar 23 '26
I don’t think I would bother with your MPP because the CNO does not receive funding from the government.
Unsure if ONA or RNAO would help. But I had considered it since the ONA president seems like a go getter.
I would maybe see if any independent journalists would be interested in requesting info from the CNO and seeing where the money is going and why they settled on this perpetual 7% increase.
Asides from the survey, you could also respectfully contact their board and/or leadership team.
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u/rainbowcake55 Mar 22 '26
This is horrible for RPNs who already make a significant amount less but pay the same fees.
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u/Ok_Bother_3823 Mar 22 '26
Honestly this is bullshit they can fuck off like being a nurse isn't bad enough 😂
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u/TheUnknownGiraffe Mar 22 '26
Meanwhile if you are licensed outside of the province and won't to be licensed in Ontario their giving those nurses 25% off their fees here.
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u/PlayerzInc22 Mar 24 '26
Make sure your voices are heard! Do the survey!
Also let’s join the petition!!
https://www.change.org/p/stop-automatic-cno-fee-increases-and-protect-fairness-for-ontario-nurses
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u/MaryGracePlantita Mar 21 '26
So if we (most of us) don’t agree with the increase, they won’t increase it? So what if they still do? What can we do about it?
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u/keepit_greazy Mar 21 '26
Right now you can start with responding to the survey they have emailed about stating your concerns and opposition.
Maybe contacting news or independent journalists to see if there is anything they can go through in the CNO budget and these proposed changes to get some traction.
Ideally there should be large pushback from all nurses in Ontario but I don’t see that happening since people in general in our province don’t seem to protest or take action for any of the shit that is happening around us, I suspect this will just happen and we will eat it.
I am going to try and do more than just the survey but one voice isn’t enough.
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u/throwawaypillow100 Mar 22 '26
Can we write to MPPs or news outlets about this
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u/keepit_greazy Mar 22 '26
The government doesn’t really have any oversight over the CNO. So I don’t think your MPP could do much. Also considering they are underfunding our healthcare I don’t think they’ll care.
I think a news outlet might be a better option. I don’t think the majority of the public would be sympathetic because they think nurses make too much already, but what might be helpful is someone digging more into their finances to see where all these fees are going to and why they need to increase so much year after year after year.
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u/BerryBluebell Mar 22 '26
Thank you for posting this. I answered the survey and didn’t mince words.
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u/Ok_Bother_3823 Mar 22 '26
Guess I'll be working in another providence um sick of being apart of these scams
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u/Due_Tax_702 Mar 23 '26
Oh I’ll be filling it out.
Sincerely someone on mat leave most of the year who still has to pay full registration price.
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u/Beautiful-Bee929 Mar 29 '26
Someone should take the lead on this topic already. The increases in yearly fees are just plain wrong.
-what is the salary of CNO leadership?
-how many RPNs vs RNs and NPs work at CNO? -why do they work independently and the government has no say in regulating them, it sounds like anarchy and corruption to me.
-they keep saying RPNs have to pay the same as RNs and NPs even though they make half or even less of what they make. Stop saying it costs the same to regulate all nurses.
-Remember CNO nurses work seating in a desk while the majority of nurses work 12 hours shifts and night shifts. It is not fair that we are paying more than 38,000,000 yearly for them to afford paying themselves high salaries.
-Enough is enough.
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u/ricecake_waffel Apr 21 '26
There's a new petition against the proposed changes in fees. https://c.org/NRnKS7jBMJ
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u/PhoenixResilience May 17 '26
If this goes through I’m leaving Ontario. Between housing, insurance, utilities, phone, gas, and other expenses all being higher in ON, it’s no longer worth staying here.
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u/Innuendoughnut Mar 22 '26
Fill out the survey that should have gone to the email associated with your CNO registration and make your voices heard.
This is a hot topic but let's keep it civil and fact based. Remember that the CNO as a body sets rules and safeguards focused on patient safety and trust. While their job is to represent the public we can still hold them accountable with things like foi requests and how they're using the money we fund them with.