SoVote

Decentralized Democracy

Ontario Assembly

43rd Parl. 1st Sess.
March 7, 2023 09:00AM
  • Mar/7/23 10:40:00 a.m.

First of all, I’d like to thank the Patient Ombudsman. Since the Office of the Patient Ombudsman has been in existence, they’ve been a valuable tool to assess where we need to make improvements.

There is no doubt that the investments that we have made in terms of the Learn and Stay program at colleges and universities to allow nurses, lab technicians and paramedics in northern Ontario to be able to have their tuition and books covered are making a difference in terms of ensuring that we have sufficient health human resources.

I have to point out a very successful partnership that we have with the College of Nurses of Ontario, where in the summer we directed them to ensure that individuals who are internationally educated had their applications assessed and ultimately approved and licensed in the province of Ontario. Historic—7,000 new nurses in the province of Ontario are practising today that wouldn’t have been there without that work.

But we are not stopping there because this is not an either-or, this is an and. We can also expand our community surgical, and we’ve done that in Windsor, in Kitchener–Waterloo and in Ottawa through the expansion of existing infrastructure in community care that is now allowing more people access to cataract surgery. We’re getting the work done.

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  • Mar/7/23 11:30:00 a.m.

I hope the member opposite has received a copy of the Your Health document that has been circulated to all MPPs because it actually highlights in that document exactly the expansion that we have in the works to expand the number of family health practitioners and primary care practitioners practising in the province of Ontario.

In fact, since our government formed government, we have had over 1,800 new family docs practise in the province of Ontario. Of course, we also have two—not one—new medical schools that are being built. In fact, in Brampton alone, we are going to have new family docs who are registered and starting to practise their studies in September 2024 because we were able to work with a partnership with the city of Brampton to find an existing building, renovate it and get those students in training as quickly as possible.

I’m proud of the work that we’re doing—

Interjections.

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