{"id":42421,"date":"2021-03-01T08:01:07","date_gmt":"2021-03-01T13:01:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/?p=42421"},"modified":"2021-03-01T07:36:23","modified_gmt":"2021-03-01T12:36:23","slug":"from-the-park-the-cavalry-is-coming","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/2021\/03\/01\/from-the-park-the-cavalry-is-coming\/","title":{"rendered":"From the Park “the cavalry is coming”"},"content":{"rendered":"

When I was just a kid, I remember on some special occasions going with my mom to a local bakery.\u00a0 It was a kid\u2019s dream come true walking in there.\u00a0 Cookies, chocolates, deserts with sprinkles.\u00a0 Keep in mind that this was a \u2018back in the day\u2019<\/em> old fashioned kind where everything, but everything was made on site from scratch.\u00a0 No mixes and no par baked\/frozen products.\u00a0 I\u2019m sure the clerks had to wipe my nose and forehead prints off the glass display case whenever I went in with Mom.<\/p>\n

Absolutely everything was so delicious\u2026.well almost everything I have to admit.<\/p>\n

There was this one particular desert they had all the time.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know what it was called, but it looked absolutely decadent.\u00a0 They were these kind of cone-shaped swirls of pink, blue, yellow or green made from egg whites and sugar.\u00a0 They had had sprinkles or sparkles of some kind on top.\u00a0 They looked like huge swirls of icing on a plate.\u00a0 Every time I went in, I could not take my eyes off them and would bug Mom mercilessly as only a kid can<\/p>\n

The funny thing is, when I sat down and bit into them, they were just hard or crispy on the outside and hollow on the inside.\u00a0 They were almost tasteless.\u00a0 And every time I thought that I was really being given something special, my expectations were crushed and hopes were crushed.\u00a0 So it is not surprising I can\u2019t recall what the desert was called.<\/p>\n

Here in Ontario, unless you are Rip Van Winkle, no one can be unaware of the terrible situation that has come to light about the neglect and lack of quality care that vulnerable Ontarians who live in long-term care (LTC) facilities.\u00a0 All of us are horrified when we hear more names of vulnerable loved ones are added to a growing list of thousands of fatalities in the centres.\u00a0 Not only are people dying in LTC facilities because they become infected by the virus, many are sick or dying because of lack of care and attention they need daily.\u00a0 They sit for hours on end calling us for things as simple as assistance to go to the washroom, hygienic cleaning after sitting in their own feces and urine for an entire day, assistance to eat, or even just get a drink of water.<\/p>\n

The problem boils down to the fact that LTC facilities are not forced to abide by reasonable standards of care and staff\/resident ratios.\u00a0 Ontario does not have enough trained Personal Support Workers (PSWs) working. It did not take long after the onset of the pandemic for this problem to come to light.\u00a0 When Ontarians learned of the shortage of PSWs in our LTC homes, they were shocked and appalled.\u00a0 The call went out loud and clear that the provincial government needed to do something to fix the problem — right away.<\/p>\n

Other provinces had the same problem but took immediate action to remedy it.\u00a0 In the summer of 2020, before the second wave of COVID-19 hit, British Columbia took immediate action by training and hiring 7,000 staff for long-term care.\u00a0 Quebec hired and trained 10,000 staff for long-term care.\u00a0 But the Doug Ford government\u2026. hired and trained virtually none.\u00a0 Now we are one year into this pandemic and nothing has improved. \u00a0Today we know that almost 3900 people have lost their lives to COVID-19 in long-term care homes, and most died alone and in pain.<\/p>\n

Doug Ford heard the call from seniors and their families, health care providers and even management and staff at LTC facilities.\u00a0 Ford promised to take immediate action and form an impenetrable \u201ciron ring\u201d of care around our most vulnerable.\u00a0 But what is Ford\u2019s plan?\u00a0 On February 22, 2021, the Ford government announced they were investing $4 million to help train 373 new PSWs.\u00a0 His plan is to wait until 2025 to have more people trained and hired to work at LTC facilities. \u00a0Talk about your delayed action. \u00a0I don\u2019t think I\u2019d want my loved ones sitting in any residence waiting for more help promised three or four years.\u00a0 They deserve our protection now, not a promise to improve years from now.<\/p>\n

When I read the details of the government\u2019s announcing that \u2018the cavalry is coming\u2019 and help is on the way, all I could picture were those beautiful looking fancy deserts that were disappointing and hollow.\u00a0 It seems to be a hollow promise and without substance.<\/p>\n

The crisis in long-term care has been building over years of Conservative and Liberal privatization, underfunding and cuts.\u00a0 We can fix this, but we need Ford to stop putting money ahead of seniors\u2019 lives.<\/p>\n

We are proposing a bill that would require every long-term care home has enough staff to offer every resident four hours per day of care and attention.\u00a0 The Ford government has voted against that bill again and again, blocking it again days ago.<\/p>\n

The NDP also sought all-party support to give PSWs a $4 per hour immediate and permanent raise, not only to recognize that they\u2019re overworked and underpaid, but also to help recruit and retain staff.\u00a0 The Ford government also blocked that.<\/p>\n

New Democrats have released our platform for long-term care and home care, which makes investment in hiring workers and add 50,000 more beds. These beds would be established in smaller, more home-like settings. Our plan brings the entire system into public and non-profit hands so that for-profit corporations will no longer be able to cut corners to pocket more profit.<\/p>\n

The NDP has a real plan that is ready to go now that would make a real <\/u><\/em>difference in people\u2019s lives right away<\/u><\/em>.\u00a0 Our plan is no tasteless fancy looking offering that is hollow and without substance.<\/p>\n

As always, please feel free to contact my office about these issues, or any other provincial matters.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When I was just a kid, I remember on some special occasions going with my mom to a local bakery.\u00a0 It was a kid\u2019s dream come true walking in there.\u00a0 Cookies, chocolates, deserts with sprinkles.\u00a0 Keep in mind that this was a \u2018back in the day\u2019 old fashioned kind where everything, but everything was made …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":4519,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-42421","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-19 20:35:26","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42421","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42421"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42421\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":42422,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42421\/revisions\/42422"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42421"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42421"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wawa-news.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42421"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}