By Doug Draper
As much flack as the Ontario Liberals have taken for the mismanagement of hospital services in Niagara, the party is claiming that it has been doing more to save hospital services that than the Conservatives or NDP would.
Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty
Pointing to 28 hospital closures by the province’s former Conservative government and cuts to medical schools by a former provincial NDP government that led to shortages of doctors and nurses in the province, Premier Dalton McGuinty and his Liberals charged the following in a September 20 media release: “Based on their previous record, both the PCs and NDP would make the same mistakes again by closing down hospitals and cutting the number of doctors and nurses in the province,” said McGuinty. “Only the Ontario Liberals have a serious plan to continue moving forward, together, on health-care services.
Niagara At Large is posting the full text of the Liberal media release for our readers information. You may wish to share your views in the comment boxes below this release. Please remember that we only post comments by people brave enough to share their first and last names.
HEALTH CARE FOR ONTARIO FAMILIES WOULD BE AT RISK WITH HUDAK PCS
Premier Visits Expanded Montfort Hospital
OTTAWA — Premier Dalton McGuinty today visited the expanded Montfort Hospital in Ottawa, which the last PC government attempted to close.
“The last PC government did its best to close Montfort down,” said McGuinty. “Today, we’re standing here because, together, we fought to keep it open and because, in the years since, we’ve doubled its capacity.”
McGuinty also reiterated the Ontario Liberal Plan to invest in the creation of the Orleans Family Health Hub, help fund the major expansion of the Ottawa Heart Institute and work with Montfort as they continue their leadership role in serving the health-care needs of Franco-Ontarians.
The Harris-Hudak PCs closed 28 hospitals, tried to close Montfort Hospital and fired 6,200 nurses. Now the Hudak PCs have a $14 billion hole in their platform that would mean deep cuts to health care. The last NDP government cut medical school spaces and helped create a provincewide doctor shortage. Now the Horwath NDP platform doesn’t address the big challenges we’re facing in health care.
“Based on their previous record, both the PCs and NDP would make the same mistakes again by closing down hospitals and cutting the number of doctors and nurses in the province,” said McGuinty. “Only the Ontario Liberals have a serious plan to continue moving forward, together, on health-care services and infrastructure.”
“After eight years of rebuilding Ontario’s public health system, families need strong leadership and a strong team that will protect the progress we’ve made,” said Community and Social Services Minister Madeleine Meilleur. “Only Dalton McGuinty and the Ontario Liberals have a plan to make Ontario the healthiest place in North America in which to grow up and grow old.”
Niagara At Large 
Never have I read such a completely unintelligent statement in all my life, not only is Dalton saying that he can tell the future but it shows that he has not done his homework. It is completley wrong to allow the building of a hospital that is at the farthest point from all the hospitals in niagara south. Who are his advisors? Do they live in Ontario? I do not think that Dalton was aware or is aware of the problems that have been caused.
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Okay Mr. McGuinty. Niagara is waiting for you to come here and say the same words…. Together we fought to keep it open.
Sorry but you had the last three years to rectify a gross mistake called the HIP and you blew it.
Port Colborne and Fort Erie are not in a forgiving mood come time to vote.
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McGuinty is very devious. He didn’t close hospitals, he just completely gutted them to where they are no more than inadequately staffed homes for the aged, as he and his government did to Port Colborne and Fort Erie. Port Colborne and Fort Erie hospitals are also used for the NHS to send their patients with infectious diseases to in order that they can bring down their reported numbers in Niagara’s larger hospitals. They also cut around 100 hospital beds and accompanying frontline staff. McGuinty;s record in Niagara is deplorable.
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A Fact: The NDP government of Bob Rae at the time was misinformed by the medical society itself and because of this false information did cut back on the educational spots in colleges and universities for the training of new nurses and doctors. What McGuinty did during his tenure was push the Health Care System further down the road to privatization started by the Harris Conservatives. This Present government did to the Health Care System in this province what Nero did to Rome…gut it ..
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Commercialized health care means massive, expensive bureaucracies, plus extraordinary inefficiencies and inequities. We need universal, public health care as well as pharmacare, not a multi-tiered, inefficient, and expensive system.
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Take a note, Niagarans: McGuinty shouldn’t boast about hospital services in Ottawa. They exhibit many of the problems that we experience here in Niagara.
My dad spent 17 weeks at the Montfort General in 2010. Had my sister and I not spent hours every single day providing the care he needed and was not getting, I honestly doubt that he’d still be with us. Communications within the hospital were appalling. Nursing staff were surly and unhelpful; most of my Dad’s care was done by PSWs, many of them kind and compassionate.
Yes, the Hospital Services Restructuring Commission of the Harris government proposed closing the small francophone Montfort Hospital in 1997, as part of their attempt to contain healthcare costs. This outraged Franco-Ontarians, who formed a lobby group, SOS Montfort, composed of citizens and francophone businesses and led by Vanier Mayor Giselle Lalonde; a rally in Ottawa brought out a crowd of 10,000. Prime Minister Chrétien and Quebec Premier Lucien Bouchard were joined by federal PC leader Jean Charest in calling for the Montfort to remain open. A series of court battles ensued. In a precedent setting case, a court ruled in 1999 that the hospital cuts violated language rights. In 2001 a higher court upheld the decision and the province abandoned its plans to close the hospital. All this took place well before the provincial Liberals came to power, although they did put money into an expansion of the Montfort in 2003.
When Dalton McGuinty claims that Ontario healthcare has never been better — look behind his back to see if he has his fingers crossed when he says it.
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So what we are experiencing now is McNUTS idea of a serious plan – Politicians and diapers need to be changed for the same reason and this is a perfect example. WOW such crap !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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While just about all of the comments about Niagara’s health care and the Ontario premier are accurate, they all have lost sight of current political reality. MPP Kim Craitor, regardless of party-affiliation, is the best and most trustworthy man to vote for locally.
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A vote for Conservative or Liberal is a vote for commercialized healthcare.
It’s also a vote for economic policies that hollow out the middle class.
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