BURK’S FALLS – The five candidates vying for the job of MPP for the Parry Sound/Muskoka riding faced off for an all-candidates debate on Monday night and the primary focus of the evening was health care.
There was no mudslinging as the candidates fielded questions in front of a full house in the Land of Lakes Public School theatre on Monday, Oct. 6 hosted by the East Parry Sound Steering Committee one week before the election.
“I absolutely support getting the best health care we can for Burk’s Falls and Almaguin area,” said incumbent PC Norm Miller. “That’s why down at Queen’s Park I was down there supporting that and I do support health care across the whole riding.”
Miller says going forward he would do all he can to get the best health care possible in Burk’s Falls.
“Currently there is a family health team with a few bells and whistles. I would say, at this stage we need to get that family health team so that all the doctors in the area are participating,” he said. “So that all the services are available for that family health team.”
He says they should continue to look further at having a family health centre.
Miller says the party is committed to investing $6.1 million in health-care funding in the first four years as well as investments in long-term care.
“In Almaguin this issue is not just a health-care issue,” said Green party candidate Matt Richter. “It can be approached as well from a business issue.”
He says the Green party recognizes that health care is not its own separate entity.
“We can go to different areas and cross reference for funding to help support this,” he said. “We realize that a strong and healthy health-care system in Almaguin, in Burk’s Falls, will bring business.”
He says a sustainable health-care system is high on the priority list for companies wishing to relocate or open operations in an area.
“We also have to continue to raise the awareness in our entire riding so that everyone in Parry Sound and Muskoka realizes what is going on here,” he said. “Then there is more openness and more engagement. The funding has to come and it needs to be acted upon.”
Freedom Party of Ontario candidate Andy Stivrins questioned how much of the funding shortfall went to eHealth.
Stivrins says there are overworked doctors and nurses but instead the government chose to hire “bureaucracy to figure out how to make them work harder.” He was referring to the Local Health Integration Networks.
Liberal candidate Cindy Waters says the answer isn’t easy.
“It’s not just a matter of finding some money and bringing it to you. We need to be future-minded about what we’re bringing here,” she said. “I think there has been a few struggles with the models that are here in the family health team, I’ve heard that they are not including some of the residents here that are in need.”
She says that needs to be looked at, changed and managed.
NDP candidate Alex Zyganiuk says they will ensure that dollars will be invested in frontline care.
“This is important because we value people’s lives first, over money,” he said. “We spend billions of dollars every year in the health-care system and we expect that money to be invested providing medical care to people when they need it.”
Streamlining health-care service from the ministry down was also put to task.
“The Green party will ensure that community will be put back in charge of local decision making,” said Richter. “That’s not just in health care, that’s in all areas.”
He says the first thing the government can do is to validate and honour community input.
“The LHINs need to be overhauled. I think it would be irresponsible to say we are just going to get rid of them because locally, and throughout our riding, we are hearing that in theory and in scope they can work, but there is not the appropriate local mechanism in place,” he said.
“You need a strong voice from the community and I think that someone from Almaguin, … is sitting at the LHIN in order to bring health care locally,” said Waters. “The Almaguin Highlands has been let down … because they have not been represented. They didn’t even know where the representation was and where those supports were going to come from.”
Zyganiuk called the LHINs an “irresponsible organization.”
He said communities have to be involved with the process to be part of the consultations.
“You know the solutions. This is your homeland. You know what’s needed and you need to be part of that process,” he said. “The LHINs are being held responsible for the deficit here of service delivery that each and everyone of us are entitled with our health care.”
“The North East LHIN runs from Parry Sound to James Bay. I wouldn’t call that too local,” said Miller. “What we’ve said is we’ll do away with the LHINs that cost $300 million to this point.”
Miller pointed out that the North Muskoka LHIN spent $1.6 million refurbishing their offices, which was the exact deficit of Muskoka Algonquin Health Care.
“If they had used that money for Muskoka Algonquin Health Care they wouldn’t have had to close down Burk’s Falls,” he said.
The most heart-wrenching question of the evening came from an elderly woman with health issues who told the panel that she had gone two years without medication and that Hydro One had put a lien on her home.
“Nobody caught the lien and now I’ve got nothing left but my dignity. What can the government do about it?” she said.
“I would advocate for you in whatever way I can and sincerely, we’ll have a chat after. There are organizations that will be supportive of you … I don’t think you’ve heard them all,” Waters said. “It’s a hard go. It’s been a hard go for a bit. Especially in this area.”
She spoke of government jobs that had been cut from the area during the days of the Mike Harris Conservatives. “Then the economy fell down across the world. Not just here but across the world and our whole entire community depends on the weather. We’re not farmers. We need some support here. We need the provincial supports here.”
Zyganiuk says it is shameful that this could happen and energy-spending costs need to be reined in.
“Starting with the capping of six-figure salaries that CEOs are making and the unexplainable extra taxes that are put onto our hydro bill that you can’t understand anymore,” he said. “It’s about making it accountable again and I think we’re looking at bringing this back into the area of a public utility with a commission in place to make them accountable and transparent.”
Miller says that hydro is one of the biggest things that people were concerned about when looking at affordability issues.
“That’s why we chose to remove the provincial portion of the HST from hydro electricity bills and oil or gas if we’re successful in forming government as quickly as possible,” he said. “We also feel that energy policies should be treated as economic policy not as a social program because it is too important for the economy of the province.”