Brampton MPPs Announce Plans to Fight for Third Hospital
Published October 16, 2018 at 4:46 pm
No matter how you voted in the last provincial election, one thing that most people in Brampton agree with is that the city needs a third hospital.
No matter how you voted in the last provincial election, one thing that most people in Brampton agree with is that the city needs a third hospital.
Last year, over 4,000 patients were treated in the hallways of Brampton Civic Hospital. People often waiting anywhere from 40-70 hours for a bed, were stuck on stretchers in Brampton Civic’s hallways during the hospital’s Code Gridlock.
Code Gridlock – basically meaning the hospital was overcrowded – was in effect for 65 days at Brampton Civic in 2017.
The Ontario NDP promised during the June provincial election campaign that they would build a third hospital for Brampton and expedite expanding Peel Memorial into a fully functioning hospital, if they were elected.
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Obviously, that did not happen but that hasn’t stopped the NDP opposition at Queen’s Park, specifically Brampton’s three NDP MPPs (Sara Singh, Gurratan Singh and Kevin Yarde) from holding a press conference this morning outside the Brampton Civic Hospital to announce the ‘fight will continue’.
NDP Hospital Announcement in Brampton from Kantastic on Vimeo.
“We are calling on the government to provide the necessary funding in the 2019-2020 budget for the construction of a new third hospital in Brampton,” Sara Singh said in delivering the remarks on behalf of her party. The NDP intend to introduce a motion on Tuesday afternoon in the Ontario Legislature asking for the money in next year’s budget.
Singh also emphasized that this was not just one party’s problem alone. “The Liberals and Kathleen Wynne froze and cut hospital funding – causing waits to get longer and hallway medicine cases to pile up. So far, Doug Ford has refused to take action on the problem – and his government has warned that hospitals need to prepare to do even more with even less.”
“You can’t fix decades of cuts to hospital funding with even deeper cuts,” NDP leader Andrea Horwath was quoted in the party’s press release, referencing the premier’s promise to find $6 billion worth of ‘efficiencies’. “It’s time to invest in Brampton families, and the care they deserve.”
When asked why the NDP is asking for the money to be included into a budget bill, something that opposition parties traditionally vote against anyway, rather than a stand alone piece of legislation to specifically address the hospital for Brampton, Singh replied that the Tories (Brampton has two PC MPPs) have not brought anything forward in terms of a plan for Brampton’s health care needs, so they’re putting pressure on the government to act.
The other consideration is that opposition members of the Legislature cannot put forward money bills; only the government can do that, so MPPs not in government are resolved to introducing their ideas in motions on what is called Opposition Days at Queen’s Park.
Which goes back to show how hamstrung an Official Opposition party really is, despite the impressive title. At the end of the day, it is at the governemnt’s discretion to ignore or acquiesce to the request.
But the NDP and Conservatives recently found some common ground when it comes to lowering auto insurance rates in Brampton by ending premium rating by postal code. Perhaps they think they could do the same with Brampton’s need for another hospital.
Do you think a third hospital will be coming to Brampton anytime soon?
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