Randy Pettapiece says Ontario needs to commit to and fund new long-term care beds for Perth County.
The PC MPP for Perth-Wellington says in an open letter to the province that there is a crisis in his riding over long-term care beds caused by “years of neglect” by the Liberal Government.
He says the crisis has taken place despite the best efforts of long-term care homes in Perth County because of factors including many new admissions come with increasingly complex needs and homes are also coping with staff shortages.
According to Pettapiece, the Liberals haven’t presented an effective plan to deal with the issues and he says that people are skeptical of the provinces plan to increase the number of long term care beds in Ontario by 5-thousand between now and 2022 and by 30-thousand before 2027, because it was made in the lead up to Junes provincial election.
Pettapiece adds that it was beyond disappointing to the news lately that Perth County is “not a priority” area for the government when it comes to long-term care beds.
“We do know that we have an influx of seniors coming on, the baby boomers are here, and they’re going to be needing care down the road and now we have information that Perth County isn’t even on the governments radar so it’s very discouraging.”
Liberal Premier Kathleen Wynne announced last November that Ontario will spend $500-million over the next four years to create 5000 long term care beds but didn’t lay out which areas will benefit.