I’d like to welcome one of my best volunteers, Matthew Sawaya, who is here again in the members’ gallery.

It’s great to see you, Matthew. Thank you so much for being here and for being part of our youth council.

Merci. Je tiens à remercier le député de Glengarry–Prescott–Russell. J’ai écouté attentivement ses commentaires sur ce projet de loi. Nous pouvons tous convenir ici, je pense, qu’il y a une crise dans les soins de santé, dans nos hôpitaux, sûrement. Parlez à n’importe quel hôpital en ce moment du problème et il vous dira que le problème, ce ne sont pas les lits; ce n’est pas « l’issue. » C’est le manque d’infirmières. Pourtant, rien dans ce projet de loi ne recrute une seule infirmière ou ne supprime le plafonnement de leurs salaires.

Pourquoi le député pense-t-il que la réponse la plus appropriée à cette crise est de continuer à manquer de respect à ces travailleurs sur le dos des plus vulnérables de notre province?

Good afternoon. I am really pleased to rise today to join the debate on this new bill, the so-called More Beds, Better Care Act, or, as it’s been called by experts, health care workers and seniors’ advocates: “morally repugnant,” “shameful,” and “a violation of patient rights.” It seems the government is feeling this negative response to this move as well, as they enter into—and we’ve seen it all week this week—serious damage-control mode here in the Legislature and in the press.

What I would like to start with, Speaker, is explaining and trying to understand a little bit about why there has been such a negative response out there to this legislation. Let me start by explaining that this bill seeks to amend the Fixing Long-Term Care Act, 2021, to include a provision that would allow hospitals to discharge patients determined to need what they call alternate levels of care, or ALC, without their consent—and I underline that: without their consent—to increase, allegedly, hospital capacity. It’s part of the ministry’s stated plan, and this is what they’ve said they’re trying to achieve, to move 200 people who have been in hospital for six months waiting for long-term-care beds, within the next three months, to a total of about 1,000 more by March 2023. By amending the Health Care Consent Act, this bill will provide authority for clinicians and placement coordinators to determine the eligibility for a patient to be transferred into long-term care, and that could be a location far, far away from their loved ones, from their caregivers, or it could be—and I think this is increasingly likely under this government—to a private care home. It could be, as we have all discovered, unfortunately, in the great tragedy that overtook this province during the COVID pandemic, to a private care home that could offer substandard care.

Let me tell you, and I think we’re all hearing it—I know we’re all hearing it, and that explains, in part, why the government has been in damage-control mode this week. We’ve been hearing a great deal of fear out there from families with loved ones in this situation. I think many of us here at some point in our lives have experienced this, have had somebody in our families who were in long-term care. I certainly have. If we haven’t, then we will. You can be sure of that. It’s almost a given: At some point, you’ll probably go through this with your family, if not yourself, right? We’re hearing from so many of these families who have people in this situation right now. We’re also hearing from seniors and others in long-term care themselves or in hospitals right now who are terrified, absolutely terrified, that they could end up separated from their families, from their support networks.

Rainer Pethke, who cares for his 95-year-old mother while looking after his own kids—and this is the other piece of this; it’s often people who are sandwiched between those generations. He told CBC this week that his heart absolutely sank when he heard about the changes that were being made in this bill. And I wanted to quote him, because it really touched me: “My fear is they’ll move her into some location, Lord knows where, where I can’t support my son, I can’t support her” and “eventually, I wouldn’t be able to support even myself.” And that is reflective in a lot of what I’ve heard from people in my community—similar concerns.

The Advocacy Centre for the Elderly issued a statement on this bill, and I want to quote it as well: “We oppose today’s proposed amendments to the” legislation “revoking the right of seniors in hospital to consent to #LTC which will result in them being moved far from supportive family & community, again attempting to ‘fix’ health care to the detriment of #seniors.”

The Minister of Long-Term Care has been working really hard to walk back this element of this bill this week, spinning that this power has already existed. So why include the change in the legislation then, Speaker? That’s what I want to know. If this was already there, if they already—what is this all about? Really, I’ve been struggling all week to understand that spin. I cannot for the life of me get my head around it, because the fact in this bill is that most of the requirements, the criteria, the restrictions—even the geographic boundaries from within which ALC patients could be transferred into long-term-care homes is going to be determined in regulation. And what does that mean for those watching? That means behind closed doors, that’s what that means. Everything in here that really matters is going to be determined in the regulations. That’s my read on this bill.

Many, many people—I will say, as well, as I find it very concerning, although it’s definitely been a trademark of this government over the last few years—are just hearing about what’s happening, what’s going to happen here. And the reason that they’re just hearing about it is because, hey, it’s summer. A lot of people are hopefully taking vacations or spending time with their families, maybe not paying attention to the news every second of every day. And the other piece of it is that the government is actually, once again, trying to rush this legislation through. And you’ll know, anybody who’s been watching what’s been going on over the last few years, that this government has used every tool in the toolbox to try to limit the ability of opposition and the public to have their voices heard on debate and in discussion and to actually provide the time and the opportunity for real, fulsome debate and discussion and amendment of legislation, which is what we should all be here to do. We are legislators, right?

Ontarians who want to have their say on this bill won’t even have time to participate in the legislative process in any kind of fulsome way because the minister has already publicly stated he wants the bill passed by September 1. So, Speaker, here we are once again faced with significant changes to our long-term-care system, to our hospitals, being rushed through the House with little review, little oversight and with most details, again, to be determined after it has passed. This Premier and this minister are asking vulnerable seniors and their loved ones to simply trust them to respect their rights, their health, their autonomy. Well, Speaker, I can tell you that we don’t trust this government. I think most people do not trust this government. And, I tell you, where they really don’t trust this government? They don’t trust this government when it comes to long-term care because 5,000 vulnerable seniors died under this government’s watch. This “just trust me” approach isn’t going to fly.

This is a government and a Premier who claim to be building an iron ring—do we remember that? We remember that. They claimed to be building an iron ring around long-term care, while over 4,000 seniors died. They cut comprehensive inspections to a pitiful nine out of 626 long-term-care homes in 2019. Remember that? I remember that. They were cutting millions of dollars from long-term care even before the pandemic began.

Absolutely, there were.

While low-paid PSWs and other care workers got sick or were forced off the job, we remember the army had to be called in to help. Their report—which these members don’t even talk about; they don’t even want to talk about it—identified absolute—

Interjection.

Their report—and I encourage you, if you haven’t done it, to read it. Please read their report, because it identified absolutely horrifying examples of neglect happening—and let’s be very clear—predominantly in for-profit long-term-care homes. Those report findings: What did this government do with them? They ignored them, and they went even further: They blocked our calls and the calls of those families for a full public inquiry into long-term care—shameful.

Throughout the pandemic, there was a—and I just want to say, because the other interesting thing that was going on here—

Interjection.

Despite the death and the neglect that was so evident in the for-profit sector, many of those same corporations—again, let’s not fool ourselves that this has nothing to do with the fact that so many of those Conservative staffers have moved into lobbying for those homes. Many of those same corporations were granted 30-year licence renewals—shame.

Of the 30,486 beds announced by this government, more than half of them—16,304—were in the process of being allocated to for-profit corporations as of November of last year. This is this government’s record. It’s the record of a government that applies arbitrary caps on salaries of our front-line heroes. It’s the record of a government that gifts shareholders of corporations that have failed our seniors—and that’s why the chorus of criticism is growing across this province. That’s why this government is working so hard to spin this a different way.

I want to be completely clear: This bill is going to be an absolute boon for the for-profit long-term-care sector. And I want to add as well that I think we can expect that, due to those worse outcomes for residents in those homes, they will have much shorter wait-lists than non-profit and municipal homes. People don’t really want to go to them, and they are more likely where those seniors are actually coerced to go. I think that’s the saddest part of all this: As people have found that those for-profit long-term-care homes had such a terrible track record during the pandemic, folks don’t want their parents to go there. They don’t want their loved ones going there. But this government wants to send those seniors there so badly that they’re willing to put in place legislation that will result in the coercing of those seniors to go into those homes. This is about dollars and cents. This is about profits. This isn’t about patients. This isn’t about creating more opportunities for other patients to move into those hospital beds.

This government’s position has been that this bill is going to address hospital capacity, even if it’s at the expense of the rights of patients. But this, like their plan to expand the use of private services in the health care sector, absolutely ignores the fact—and I mentioned this in my question to one of the members opposite previously—that this is a staffing crisis. This is about staffing.

I won’t pretend that hasn’t been a long-standing issue. We’ve seen government after government—certainly in the last 20 years—dealing with a staffing crisis in our hospitals and our long-term-care facilities. But that was without question made worse by the pandemic. And what was this government’s response? To put in place some kind of arbitrary cap on the salaries of the very same people they call heroes, and then wonder why in these conditions they would be fleeing, desperate to get out of this sector. They’re treated with such deep, deep disrespect.

The crisis has reached, without question, a breaking point. We’ve all talked about that in here. We’ve all heard it in our communities. The government here, though, is still refusing to address the root of the problem. I think that’s what’s so shameful about this legislation. Because you would think that in this moment the government would be looking for real solutions, not just solutions to footing the bills and padding the pockets of the shareholders of long-term-care corporations, no, but actually finding solutions that will mean that our loved ones get the care they need and, yes, are moved into the most appropriate care.

Their only solution, ever—and it’s really mind-boggling—seems to be to look to the private sector, even knowing that it’s going to drain money from a public system, exacerbate a staffing crisis and ultimately pad a system that we know failed Ontarians so badly in the pandemic.

I want to speak in the remaining moments that I have here about a better way, because this government could use the lessons of the pandemic to make historic changes to the way we deliver seniors’ care. Ninety per cent of seniors would prefer to stay home. Providing publicly funded, quality, dependable home care would go a long way toward keeping people healthy in their homes and keeping hospital beds and workers free to care for folks who are in need. But this bill doesn’t mention home care, not even once, and it doesn’t put forward a single idea to expand it.

Perhaps the most effective way, I want to add as well, to improve seniors’ care would be getting the profit out of long-term care. The government could have chosen to meet the growing demand and reduce the wait-list and wait times by expanding the not-for-profit and municipal sector, where funding goes to patient care instead of padding the dividends of those wealthy shareholders I’ve spoken about.

I wanted to add: There’s a new culturally sensitive long-term-care home and affordable housing development that’s being planned to be built in my community for Portuguese-speaking seniors. It’s been in development for years, but we need it built yesterday. Under the current system that’s in place, they can’t access provincial funding until the building is completed. They’re continuing to work. They’re spending so much time—the community has been working on this for years, fundraising like crazy, while seniors in our community wait. And now what this government is telling us with this legislation is that those seniors might not end up even in Toronto. Gosh knows where they could end up if this bill is passed. And their families could be coerced into that, based on what this government decides to put in those regulations. Again, do we trust this government to put the interests of those seniors and vulnerable people ahead of padding the shareholder pockets? No, we do not. It’s really unacceptable.

I spoke in my response to the throne speech recently about the need for humility from this government instead of hubris. This is an opportunity to get this right. What this government has presented in this legislation is a lost opportunity. It’s very unfortunate.

Listen to seniors. Listen to advocacy groups. Listen to the health care workers who are telling you that this legislation will harm people, not help them. Bring some transparency forward instead of hiding the changes in your still-to-be-announced regulations; how about that?

Seniors in Ontario deserve dignity, respect and agency. This bill is going to affect some of the most vulnerable seniors out there, especially those with dementia—

I have a minute left, so I’ll make the most of it.

As I was saying, seniors in this province deserve dignity and they deserve respect. What this bill will do—again, it’s this “just trust us” approach with a government that has given us and Ontarians absolutely no reason to trust them. It’s going to target the most vulnerable among us.

I would urge the government once again to expand the opportunity for these folks to come and speak to you. Reach out to those people who are going to be most impacted. Listen to what they have to say. Do something to actually improve working conditions and pay for nurses and other front-line health care workers, because that will do more than anything that this bill will accomplish.

We have a responsibility to make sure that we don’t divide our most vulnerable residents from their families and from the care they deserve. I would encourage the government to take a second look and do something more positive with the opportunity they have here.

I spent two minutes talking about home care because that’s what seniors want: They would like to stay in their home, at least in my community, and I think, from speaking to seniors, across this province. So I would urge the member opposite to take a moment to really read this legislation and consider what’s not said here and what’s going to be determined in regulations because I think that is what is concerning to most Ontarians.

It’s a low bar to say that the only thing that this government has put in this legislation that they’re preventing is the actual physical restraint of individuals. But, unfortunately, it is a low bar, because what we think is going to happen is that people will be coerced using other means.

Our health care workers—the same people this government and these members stood up and proclaimed were heroes during the pandemic—have been hit hard with an arbitrary wage cap, while the cost of living is increasing for them, they’re living with PTSD from the experience of COVID, for goodness’ sake, and they’re overwhelmed, overworked.

We have a staffing crisis. If this government wants to actually do something to deal with the crisis in our hospitals right now, they would be addressing that. Repeal Bill 124.

Thank you so much to the member from Scarborough Southwest for that excellent question, and thank you for all you do for your community as well. I’m always hearing about the extraordinary work you’re doing there to serve folks from your community, many of whom are, I know, coming to you with the same issues and concerns about this legislation, about their family members, about the state of our health care system and long-term care. As you mentioned, one of the real issues here is the protection of patient rights.

But why is this government doing this? To save the for-profit long-term-care industry from financial ruin. That’s why they’re doing it. That would be my assumption. Again, I won’t, I can’t speak for them, but if you look at what’s going on in the industry right now—

Interjection: That’s imputing motive.

I’ve been listening to the member from Kitchener–Conestoga’s comments. The member wants the official opposition to support this legislation. Earlier today, the interim leader of the official opposition asked the Minister of Long-Term Care in this place if he would ban hospitals from billing for hospital beds for people who continue to stay there. And the member opposite talked about if people prefer to stay, they won’t—the long-term-care minister refused to answer that question. It was very notable.

Afterwards, in scrums—and I want to just share this with everybody here, because it’s coming out in the news reports as we sit here—the minister has been quoted as saying now, “If they refuse to move into their home of preferred choice, then yes, absolutely,” the hospital will charge them, “because we need those spaces for patients who need acute care.” The Minister of Long-Term Care has confirmed that those patients will be billed if they don’t take the spaces that are immediately offered to them. I’d like to know the member’s response. Please, give me a reason to support this terrible piece of legislation.