During question period Thursday this week, NDP health critic and Nickel Belt MPP France Gélinas demanded that Doug Ford not only stop any more layoffs at Health Sciences North, but also impose a moratorium on jobs cuts in all hospitals in Ontario.
“Less than a month since he was sworn in as premier, jobs are being cut at Sudbury’s hospital,” said Gélinas. “At least 51 incredibly hard-working and dedicated health care providers are set to lose their jobs at Health Sciences North. And the union president says that the workers there are ‘stressed to the hilt.’”
She called on Ford to step in. Gélinas said hospitals can’t afford more cuts and layoffs after they have been “cut to the bone” by the successive Progressive Conservative and Liberal governments.
The board chairs of the four biggest hospitals in the northeast say they are struggling to deliver services in “a fiscal environment that threatens basic financial survival,” the MPP said.
“Today, hospitals in northern Ontario are on the brink of financial crisis,” Gélinas said.
Elected at the end of June, Ford hasn’t set his sights on health care during his first month in office, focusing instead on Ontario’s sex-ed curriculum, the size of Toronto’s city council and cannabis sales.
— Sudbury.com