Thank you, Speaker. Through you, I have to say—and I’m going to quote Anthony Dale, the CEO of the Ontario Hospital Association: “Ontario’s hospitals are rapidly becoming the health care provider of last resort for thousands of people who actually need access to home care, long-term care and other services.”

In our budget that we just passed, a billion dollars was set aside for community home care services in the province of Ontario. We are building the capacity to ensure that people are able to be in their homes in community, whether that is in their own homes with appropriate home care support or, in fact, with long-term-care-home facilities. We have invested so much, as a province, to make sure that the capacity is there, the staffing is there, the oversight is there. We’ve done that work.

Now we have to make sure that those individuals who are languishing in alternate-level-of-care beds in our hospitals are actually in community, where they deserve to be.

I have to remind the member opposite that in March 2019 you said, “One out of every seven hospital beds is used by somebody that we call ALC, alternate level of care. It’s a fancy word that means that you really would like to be supported at home, you really would like to be supported someplace else....” What has changed, respectfully, from March 2019 to today? We have built the capacity in our long-term-care homes. We’ve built the capacity within community. So why does the member now change her tune and suggest that alternate-level-of-care patients need to be in hospitals when where they really want to be is in community?

This weekend, four hospitals in eastern Ontario were forced to close their emergency departments. Patients in Kemptville, Carleton Place, Alexandria and Almonte were all forced to drive 30 to 45 minutes further than usual to reach the nearest emergency room while experiencing a health emergency.

Does the Premier believe that a 45-minute drive for patients in an emergency is good health care?

My question is to the Premier.

Amanda Molnar’s 20-year-old son is blind and non-verbal and has complex medical needs. He has had serious pneumonia three times since June. About a week ago, Amanda had to call an ambulance for him and was told that a backlog at the ER would mean at least a 15-hour wait at the hospital.

Does the Premier believe that a 15-hour wait for emergency health care is acceptable?

Does the Premier believe that his government’s failure to deal with ER wait times is risking the health of patients like Amanda’s son?

I’d like to take this opportunity to highlight some of the investments that we have done specifically related to emergency departments.

Speaker, $90 million in the emergency department Pay-for-Results Program provides funding incentives for 74 high-volume emergency departments to make improvements in areas such as length of stay.

We have, in the province of Ontario, 49 municipalities using a 911 model of care pilot, which allows for palliative and mental health and addictions patients to be treated or referred to or cared for in community, instead of immediately—and only having the option of taking them to an emergency department.

These innovative solutions—we’re working with partners to make sure that the pilots we are doing are working, and are expanding them. That was why we were able to—during the Association of Municipalities of Ontario—announce that we’re going to continue expanding these successful models that communities want, patients expect. It is making a difference in reducing wait times and delays in our emergency departments.

I would love for the member opposite to have some conversations with paramedics, with the organizations that are doing these innovative pieces—and saying, “Do you see value in expanding them beyond the current 49 pilots?” I see the value. We have made those changes and we’re expanding those programs, because we see it making a difference in the lives of patients.

We’re not going to keep doing the status quo and expect a different result. We’re having this innovation, we’re seeing results, and we’re continuing to expand it across Ontario.

The patients from three of the closed emergency departments were diverted to the Queensway Carleton Hospital in Ottawa. The Queensway Carleton is already short-staffed and already experiencing incredibly long wait times, so these closures resulted in serious strain for the Queensway Carleton this weekend, including almost as many patients in the ER admitted and waiting for a bed as there are stretchers in the ER.

Will the Premier address the crisis in emergency care before someone dies because of it?