From 2:00 PM to 7:00 PM on Wednesday, July 17^th, members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Ontario’s Health Care Workers’ Coordinating Committee (HCWCC) gathered to raise awareness about the conditions facing public healthcare in Ontario. 

The event, the first of a series of Province-wide days of action, was held at the 100 Acre Brewing Co. on Ashburnham Drive and aimed to collect in-person signatures for the “Support Our Care” petition. According to a CUPE press release, the petition “calls on the Ontario Conservative government to heavily invest in health care, raise the wages of health care workers, focus on the recruitment and retention of health care workers across sectors, and strengthen workers’ rights.” 

“Our healthcare system is failing, and they’re selling it off one brick at a time,” HCWCC Vice Chair Charlene VanDyk told Arthur. “We’re looking to get upwards of 60,000 signatures to present to the Ford government at the legislature to let them know ‘Hands off our healthcare’.” 

VanDyk worries that the Ontario government’s plans to expand the number of facilities with private clinics could create a two-tiered system in which private clinics siphon off public employees to treat patients who are able to pay out of pocket. 

“When folks are paying for services, obviously the clinic will be paying more,” she explained. “Agency nurses make more than hospital nurses, and so we’re losing folks who work in the public system to the private system, because people are going to follow the money.” 

VanDyk believes developments like last year’s closure of the Minden, Ontario, emergency room are an early example of “the government actually showing what they’re going to pull.” 

“[The Ford government] is going to close these places down, and we’re not going to be able to afford to get the same healthcare as somebody who lives in a more urban setting. People are going to have to relocate to follow the jobs,” she added. 

Per CUPE Ontario Secretary Treasurer, Yolanda McClean, these job losses compound the larger, systemic issues facing Ontario Healthcare Workers. 

“When we don't have workers that make good wages; that work 2-3 jobs and are unable to actually make ends meet; who don't have enough sick days to stay home with their families and take care of themselves; the problems become greater and greater,” she explained. “They’re home sick. No one’s taking the shift. Then, when someone gets sick and goes to the hospital, they can’t get attended to.” 

According to McClean, many underestimate the importance of public healthcare funding because it’s difficult to see it in action until they’ve had to go through the healthcare system themselves. 

McClean said a couple who had signed the petition earlier that day told her “We're so glad you're doing this,” because they had "only realized how much we need this system in the last 10 years after we’ve been through cancer and back.” 

Vand Dyke said she worries that the Ford government’s promise to increase the number of beds in long-term care homes is an improper use of resources in the healthcare sector. 

“We don’t have enough staff to staff those homes,” she said, adding that at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, private LTC homes “had the worst death rates. They had the worst outbreak rates. They had so many folks that suffered tremendously.” 

“We need to make sure that this government does not just keep lining the pockets of private investors,” she added. 

Here in Peterborough, CUPE is taking action to try and address the increasing privatization of the healthcare sector. The union is hosting a rally on July 30^th from 11:00 AM to 1:00 PM in front of MPP Dave Smith’s office to protest the privatization of hospital services. 

The rally comes as the city’s own hospital is feeling the effects of tepid provincial funding. 

This year, the Peterborough Regional Health Centre (PRHC) launched a $60 million fundraising campaign to finance equipment purchases and capital projects, which according to PRHC Foundation CEO, Lesley Heighway, are not funded by the Ontario Government. 

PRHC serves over 600,000 people in Peterborough and the surrounding municipalities. Despite the staggering number of people it serves, the hospital is ineligible for provincial grants to build a new cardiac laboratory, having instead to rely on donations from the local community. 

To VanDyk, the hospital’s reliance on private capital instead of provincial funding is not a surprise, but merely a hallmark of current Provincial politics. 

“I don't think any hospital in Ontario is being properly funded or financed by this Ford government,” she said. 

With files from David King