Speaker, through you to the Premier: Every year, workers in Ontario are hospitalized because of heat stress. Some of them die.

Last year, you carried out a consultation on new heat stress regulations and you didn’t increase protection for any workers. This year promises to be another summer of climate-driven record heat. You can increase protection for workers right now. Will you do it?

Speaker, it came out just the other day that this government is paying substantial bonuses to private clinics for surgery that is done in public hospitals. It was revealed that the payments to the Don Mills Surgical Unit, part of the Clearpoint Health Network—it is getting paid almost double the amount that public hospitals get paid for cataract surgery, double the amount for knee surgery.

This government is engaged in a straightforward project of privatizing our health care system. That project is one which will result in less medical care for people; which will result, ultimately, in people being able to pay for their surgery and health care if they have the money and having to go without if they don’t. It is a disastrous course of action.

I call on the government to end the privatization of our health care system, to stop paying bonuses to private clinics, and to actually protect the health care of the people of this province.

I just want to note that I think I fully understand now what the health strategy is for the Conservative Party. We saw yesterday, with the information about people having their eye examinations reduced, that obviously people with problems are going to have to pay. I now can see where the future is.

When people go to hospital for a hip replacement—you’ll go in, and there will be a menu at the door that will say, “Hip replacement surgery: covered by OHIP; anaesthetic, extra. What’s it worth to you? Post-surgery recovery: nurse prices vary—but for free, we’ll pin a note on your gown saying, ‘They just had surgery. We urge you to be cautious.’ Hallway: free, but to get into a room, you’ll have to pay extra.”

Speaker, that’s where we’re headed. The sleight of hand, the shell game with this government is, they’ll cut the services; they’ll cut the services; they’ll cut the services. You’ll get something or other covered by OHIP, but everything else will be like an American hospital, where you pay for each juice and each Aspirin. You will be skinned.

I urge people to reject the direction this government has taken, because we know it will be a disaster for the health care of the people in this province.

The minister knows that if she actually put the money into the hospitals as they are now and opened up OR times, people would be getting the surgery they need now.

Ms. Visanji takes powerful painkillers to deal with her pain. She’s frightened she might become addicted to them. She can’t get the surgery she needs right now, and what the minister says is she’s going to have to wait for this bill to pass. That doesn’t help her today.

I’ll give you her phone number. Will you commit to talking to her personally, helping to address her problem or explaining why she has to suffer needlessly?

Again to the minister: What should have been part of this government’s plan all along was a plan to address the root cause of our health care crisis—that’s staffing issues. This government can take tangible action right now to retain health care workers. Will the government commit to not appealing Bill 124?

Yesterday it was a family in eastern Ontario who struggled to find a hospital that could accept them for labour and delivery. First they tried their local hospital, but the birthing centre was closed due to staffing shortages. The next hospital they tried didn’t have room, so finally they returned to their local hospital. That situation should never have happened. The mom, Kendra, said this afterward: “I’m just afraid ... that health care will fail me again, fail [my son].”

What does the minister have to say to parents like Kendra who are scared for the future of our health care system?

My question is to the Minister of Health. The Minister of Health has risen in this House countless times over the past few weeks saying that the government had “prepared” for the surge in respiratory illnesses. And yet, just this past weekend, CHEO in Ottawa has had to call in the Red Cross to help. That is not what a well-resourced and prepared health care system looks like, Speaker.

Does the minister think it’s acceptable for a hospital to have to call in the Red Cross?

Ontarians deserve a health care system that provides the care they need when they need it. CHEO has already had to cancel surgeries, open a second pediatric ICU and transfer teenage patients to adult hospitals. It’s now clear that this government hasn’t done enough.

Why didn’t the minister do more to ensure that the province was prepared for the respiratory season?

The FAO has shown that in the first half of the year, the government underspent in health care by nearly a billion dollars. To add insult to injury, the government plans to appeal the ruling on Bill 124, which has already driven countless health care workers out of our system. The government continues to underfund and degrade our publicly funded health care system.

Why is the minister letting the situation in our hospitals get so bad?

Why is the minister betraying the public’s trust by removing these farmland protections and giving away this immensely valuable public investment to powerful land speculators like the De Gasperis family?

The Duffins Rouge Agricultural Preserve Act was passed in 2005 to reverse this betrayal of public trust. Why is the minister repealing the act and once again betraying the public trust?

The minister is about to remove protections from the preserve, giving billions of dollars’ worth of public wealth to private interests. Why is the minister enabling this betrayal of the public trust?

My question is to the Premier.

The situation in our hospitals right now is critical. In a rare and historic moment, the five largest health care unions in Ontario have joined together to condemn this government’s inaction on the response to the crisis in our health care system. Together, they represent 295,000 front-line health care workers who feel disrespected and undervalued by this government. This government has consistently failed to listen to front-line workers.

Will the Premier and Minister of Health agree to meet with public health care leaders and implement their solutions?

How can the Premier justify reducing spending on health care staff during a health care human resource crisis?

Interjections.

Speaker, this government has no intention of listening to front-line health care workers. Unions representing hundreds of thousands of workers are urgently calling for the public sector solutions that this government is not interested in. We have the space and we have the capacity in our health system; all we need is the political will from this government to repeal Bill 124, to improve workloads, and to incentivize health care workers to remain in the system instead of driving them out.

Will the Premier commit to the solutions proposed by health care workers to improve access and quality of care in Ontario?

My question is to the Premier.

CTV News reported yesterday that a four-year-old with Down syndrome spent 40 hours in the ER of Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital before she was finally transferred to a bed. The child’s mother, Jasmine, was forced to create a makeshift bed out of chairs for her exhausted and sick daughter, who was suffering with a fever, vomiting and had low oxygen levels.

Our youngest children are sick and suffering because this government didn’t do enough to prepare for this crisis.

I ask the Premier, how many more kids will have to wait long hours for care before this government takes action to relieve the burden on hospitals and ensure our kids get the care that they need?

Why didn’t the Premier tell people during the recent election campaign that he’d be undermining democracy as part of his program?

Speaker, my question is to the Minister of Health. For months, there have been worrying signals from this government about their plans to privatize parts of our public health care system. In August, the Minister of Health received speaking notes that included the phrase, “No, we are not privatizing health care. Full stop.” But this phrase was scribbled out and never used by the minister. Why did the minister or her staff cross out this phrase in her speaking notes?

The Minister’s notes also had this phrase crossed out: “I want to be clear, there has been no expansion to the number of private hospitals who offer publicly funded procedures in Ontario.”

Did the minister or her staff cross out that phrase because there are plans to expand the number of private hospitals and private facilities in Ontario?

Speaker, the minister’s answers today have been very concerning. I’ll give the minister one more chance to reassure Ontarians about our publicly funded, publicly delivered health care system.

Can the minister tell this House today that this government is not privatizing delivery or operation of our health care system?

Interjections.

I appreciate the opportunity. I want to thank all my colleagues who have spoken so far today and who I know will be speaking further to this opposition day motion this afternoon.

Speaker, there is no doubt whatsoever that we have a crisis at our hospitals. You are well aware of this. McMaster Children’s Hospital in Hamilton is strained to the limit. We’ve had ERs shut down this past summer alone more than 86 times. In October, the emergency room in Chesley was forced to shut its doors for eight weeks.

The reason for this strain or crisis on the system is not mysterious: We have a body of workers—nurses and health care workers—who have been pressed to the limit through the pandemic, who were suffering under a huge strain before the pandemic and who have been put in a box of a 1% wage increase per year. These people who risk their lives, who risked the lives of their families, were told that they were heroes, yet their financial needs, their aspirations to live a decent life, have been kicked to the side, have been forgotten.

Until we get rid of Bill 124, until we actually bring in compensation that will retain these people that we need to have, until we actually bring in compensation that will bring back some of the early retirees, we will not be able to make up for the number of people that we’re losing in our health care system, in our hospitals. That will mean the crisis that we face will continue.

Speaker, this motion to set in place an approach to retention and to recruitment is going to be critical to make sure that any of us in this room and our families will be able to get the urgent medical care they need when they need it, will be able to get the surgeries that they need when they need it—not delayed six months, not delayed a year or two years, but when they need it. If we fail to do this, we are putting the people of Ontario in an impossible position, a position where their lives are at risk, the lives of their children are at risk, the lives of their friends and family are at risk.

I am urging the government to not only vote in favour of this motion today, but, upon passage, to actually take the steps necessary to implement these very critical measures so we have a health care system that works, that will deliver and once again will be the envy of people around the world.

To the Premier: For months, health care professionals have raised concerns about hospitals’ capacity to respond to the early respiratory illness season that we are seeing this year. Despite the alarm bells, this government sat on their hands and did nothing. Today, ER wait times at children’s hospitals are unseasonably high, pediatric ICUs are over capacity and children are being transferred to adult hospitals. Why has the government ignored the growing crisis in Ontario’s children’s hospitals?

We all have a role to play in protecting children from severe illness, especially the government. Why hasn’t this government responded effectively to the acute pressures on our children’s hospitals and increasing demand for pediatric ICU beds?

I will take one second, as a member of the class of 2006, to welcome back the member from Nepean. Welcome back, sister—courage.

Speaker, since the beginning of this year, Ontario’s ERs have been closed more than 100 times. Those closures are happening in rural areas, places like Chesley. Their ER is closed until the end of November because of a shortage of nurses. Just a few weeks ago, most of Chesley’s residents packed into a meeting to fight for their community hospital. This government has left Ontarians with no credible plan of action to address the crisis in our health care system.

For the Premier: Why has the Minister of Health neglected her duty during this difficult period?

There are consequences when health care isn’t there when people need it. Recently, Eleanor wrote to me about the passing of her daughter, Amelia. Amelia was diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer, and she was diagnosed late, with her screening pushed from November to February. By then, her cancer was so advanced, the only thing doctors could do was palliative chemotherapy.

Eleanor is a retired nurse. She knew that Amelia’s diagnosis was likely fatal, but with earlier screening and better access to care, Eleanor believes Amelia would have lived more than the five short months from diagnosis.

Speaker, these are real-life impacts of the government’s inaction on health care. Will the Premier and minister commit to meaningfully invest in our health care workers so there are no more stories like Amelia’s?

In September, a four-year-old child with a broken arm was left waiting more than four days for minor surgery at McMaster Children’s Hospital. These types of delays can have dramatic impacts on growing kids.

Speaker, these tragic stories are driven by staffing shortages that are now commonplace. How much worse does the crisis in our health care system have to get before the minister and the Premier give nurses and front-line health care workers the support that they need?

My question is to the Premier. Ontario’s health care crisis is getting worse by the day. Over the last week alone, there were overnight and weekend closures at Chesley hospital, Durham hospital, Walkerton and St. Mary’s, which was closed for a week. And just this morning, the Kemptville District Hospital announced its ER would be closed for the next six nights.

Doctors and front-line health care workers are very clear: This is a staffing crisis, and forcing seniors into private long-term-care homes is not going to solve that crisis. Why is the Premier saying no to front-line health staff who want to solve the staffing crisis?

Will the Premier start taking steps today to address this crisis, starting with a repeal of the disastrous Bill 124?

The Premier talks about the status quo. There’s nothing more status quo than Conservatives privatizing health care. Asking nurses and health care workers to accept cutbacks and pay freezes has been the status quo that this Premier has created. Public hospitals need proper funding and resources to maintain quality of care and to maintain safe working conditions. Nurses and health care workers need support, not wage freezes.

How many ERs have to close before this government gets it?

Speaker, it’s not clear who the government is listening to. Long-term-care homes have told the government there are not enough beds in long-term-care homes to relieve hospital pressures—the operators themselves. Front-line nurses have told the government that Bill 7 does nothing to address the hospital crisis in Ontario; it simply forces patients from one understaffed environment into another.

Is the government refusing to hold hearings because they know their plan won’t work and they don’t want to hear it?

My question to the Premier. This government is giving itself the power to sign people up for long-term-care homes they don’t want to go to. Yesterday, the long-term care minister admitted to media that they will use financial coercion to make them go. He said, “Should a hospital charge them? Absolutely.”

Why does this government believe that a hospital stay should end with a bill?

Late yesterday, we learned the government plans to ram this legislation through without any hearings or opportunities to hear from front-line workers and from families whose lives will be devastated by these changes. Why is the government so unwilling to hear from families and front-line workers who will be devastated by this bill?

Interjections.

Again to the Premier: The government is giving itself the power to sign people up to long-term-care homes they don’t want to go to. If they refuse, they could be slapped with a huge tab, like Jon Suter and his family.

To prevent seniors from being coerced into long-term-care homes against their will, will this government ban billing for hospital beds?

Dr. Vivian Stamatopoulos says she’s already hearing from families being threatened with high fees for their hospital stay.

Jane Meadus, a lawyer for the Advocacy Centre for the Elderly, says they get hundreds of these calls from families.

The government’s new legislation lets them send your information to a care home without your consent. They can sign you up for that care home without your consent. If you refuse to go, they have the power to use massive bed bills to force Grandma to get in that cab.

I ask again, will this government ban billing for hospital beds?

My question is to the Minister of Long-Term Care. The government is now going to move people from hospitals to nursing homes that they do not want to go to. If they refuse to go, will they be billed for their hospital bed?

Can the minister guarantee right now that if a senior refuses to go to a care home they don’t want, they will never be billed for their hospital bed?

Why does this government believe it’s okay for health care to come with a bill?

My question for the Premier: According to Dr. Michael Warner, the OR at Michael Garron Hospital in Toronto dropped to using just two out of 10 operating rooms at 4 p.m. That’s eight operating rooms sitting empty for more than 12 hours per day.

Why is the government choosing to send surgeons, nurses and funding to private, for-profit clinics while operating rooms in our hospitals sit idle?

Why is this government refusing to use the operating room, CT and MRI capacity we already have?

Speaker, my question is to the Premier.

The government is planning to force ALC patients waiting in hospitals to move to long-term-care beds far from home, without their consent. This is going to tear seniors away from their spouses, their essential caregivers, their grandchildren, and everything that’s familiar to them.

Doctors and nurses rarely need to provide medical care for ALC patients, so this won’t free up nurses or doctors. This government is sacrificing seniors to free up furniture.

Why is the government hurting seniors instead of tackling the hospital staffing crisis?

Why is the government expanding for-profit care and making the staffing crisis in our hospitals even worse?

This scheme doesn’t hire a single nurse. It doesn’t hire a single doctor. It doesn’t keep ERs open this weekend.

Will the government scrap this scheme and instead launch a plan to recruit, retain and return nurses with better pay, better working conditions and the respect that they deserve?

My question is to the Premier. Records from Ontario Health show 1,400 people died while waiting for surgery last year. That’s a 43% increase compared to pre-pandemic years and a 30% increase over just a year before. When lives hang in the balance, why is the Premier refusing to invest in recruiting, retaining and respecting health care workers?

The staffing crisis is costing people their lives. Why is this government planning to spend money on privatization that will bleed even more staff from our hospitals?

We have a hospital staffing crisis. Privatization would siphon staff out of our hospitals and send them to a for-profit system. Why is this government planning to spend money on privatization that would make the hospital staffing crisis even worse?