As healthcare crisis worsens, it’s silence-as-usual from Doug Ford

December 15, 2022

TORONTO — Ontario Greens leader and Guelph MPP Mike Schreiner released the following statement about the ongoing crisis in Ontario's healthcare system.

“Every day brings new evidence that our healthcare system is crumbling before our eyes and every day the silence from Premier Ford and Health Minister Jones becomes more deafening.

Ambulances are on standby to shuttle sick children from overcrowded hospitals to somewhere with a vacant bed, life-changing surgeries are delayed, wait times throughout the system are at record levels.

And still the Ford government sticks to its message: nothing to see here, it’s all under control – when clearly it is not.

In the first six months of 2022-23, the government underspent on healthcare by almost $860 million. At a time when the whole system is under extreme pressure, this is mismanagement on a grand scale.

Ontarians deserve to hear how the Ford government plans to address the worsening crisis in pediatric hospitals and across the healthcare system.

They can start by dropping plans to appeal the court decision on the wage-suppressing Bill 124, which is driving healthcare workers out of the system, and actually bargain with nurses and frontline healthcare workers for fair wages, fair benefits and better working conditions.

This will halt the exodus of trained nurses from the system and reduce the need for hospitals to pay exorbitant rates to private nursing agencies to fill staffing gaps.

The government should also move more decisively to fast-track trained foreign nurses and other healthcare professionals into all sectors of our healthcare system. Its performance on this issue has not met the urgency of the situation.”

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Media contact:
John Chenery
johnchenery@gpo.ca
647-213-2060

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