If keeping emergency rooms open doesn’t warrant spending - what does?

July 19, 2022

TORONTO — MPP Mike Schreiner issued the following statement in response to today's report from the Financial Accountability Office:

“Hospitals across the province are closing their emergency rooms because they don’t have the staff to run them.

And yet today’s report from the Financial Accountability Office confirms what we expected: the Ford government has been under spending on critical services like healthcare.

If keeping emergency rooms open doesn’t warrant spending – what does?

In the spring, the FAO projected funding shortfalls because of unallocated spending.

It’s shameful and inexcusable to underspend on healthcare while nurses and other healthcare workers are burnt out, emergency rooms are overflowing if not closing outright.

Ontarians are paying the price for Ford’s failure to invest in what matters to people.

We need urgent action that starts with fair wages and better working conditions for exhausted healthcare workers.

If this government really cared about repairing our healthcare system, they would invest in the people who deliver care by providing for fair bargaining and improving working conditions.

This includes immediately repealing Bill 124.”

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