A Critically Important Warning in New Financial Accountability Office Report: Ford Government's Long-Term Care Plan is a House of Cards

TORONTO, May 27, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The new report on long-term care from Ontario's Financial Accountability Office "FAO" supports what the Ontario Health Coalition has been warning about and more. In the neutral language of accounting, it highlights that there is no actual plan to fund needed health care services in the Ford government's budget. It echoes what the Coalition has been warning for months, indeed for years.

In plain language the bottom line is as follows:

• There are more than 30,000 beds (a bed is a LTC space for one person) with licenses that expire in 2024 and there is no plan to redevelop 15,000 of them. At the same time, there is a 40,000 person wait list for LTC with significant growth in demand projected as population aging is now upon us.
• The budget planned by the Ford government is not sufficient to increase LTC staffing and deal with health care needs, even on Ford's timeline that both the Coalition and the LTC Commission urgently report is too slow. The Coalition and the Commission have called for the staffing increase to be fast-tracked as a priority because LTC residents are suffering with worse care levels than prior to the pandemic when the staffing shortages were already a crisis. It is entirely unacceptable for the Ford government to continue to choose not to fund this desperately needed care and to just leave the residents without.
• The FAO highlights the inadequate plans for health care funding post-pandemic. They make clear that, in the Ford government's plans, the LTC commitments cannot be met without starving other vital parts of health care. The Health Coalition calls for the Ford government to drop its plans to return to austerity budgets for health care post-pandemic. The indisputable evidence is that Ontario has a severe health human resources and capacity crisis across hospitals, long-term care, home and community care. Ontarians' health and lives depend on proper government planning to address these.
• The FAO reports the very significant funding increase (a 41% hike) that the Ford government has given for LTC bed redevelopments. The Coalition notes the vast majority of that is going to for-profit LTC corporations that have not redeveloped beds that were outdated decades ago. This policy choice is taking billions away from needed services and beds that could be redeveloped as public and non-profit homes at cost and run in the public interest, rather than for profit.
• The Coalition notes that the FAO numbers show in detail how the Ford government has made a choice to fund LTC for-profit operators tens of millions of dollars throughout the pandemic that they have taken in dividends (profits) and for executive bonuses, rather than actually improving care, and while leaving the sector without enough funding to meet desperately important public priorities.

"The bottom line is that the Ford government has planned severe underfunding of health care. In human terms, without a profound change in government policy, it means ongoing neglect of long-term care residents, lengthening wait lists, poor access to care across the health system, and the accelerated siphoning of public funds away from public needs to profit," warned Natalie Mehra, executive director. "Yes, it is fair for the Ford government to say they are in a position of catch up. But this fact was well-known before the last election and the Ford government is responsible for the political choice, leading into the pandemic, to prioritize tax cuts that primarily benefit the already-wealthy and other revenue cuts that deprive needed public services. That was a political choice, not a necessity. It has been made worse by the Ford government's choice throughout the pandemic to give the for-profit operators millions in public funding from which they have taken profits and bonuses without actually improving care."

"More than that, as the FAO report makes clear, the media and Opposition Parties must question on the public's behalf the decision that the Ford government made to dramatically increase the cost per bed to entice for-profit long-term care companies to finally redevelop their outdated beds after they have failed for decades to do so. Why are they now being rewarded for their negligence?" she asked.

"The government has to get out of the pockets of the for-profit long-term care industry. We urgently need the government to act in the public interest, not in the interests of health care privatizers who are getting government contracts across the system. The FAO report underlines the profound damage that has been done and is still being done. It cements that case that Ontarians desperately need a real change in direction. It is entirely unacceptable for our province to continue to leave elderly Ontarians, and those who need health care, to suffer in this way," she said. "It is even more egregious that while patients and residents go without needed care, profit-taking corporations are raking in profits from public funds for health care."

"These are hugely important public policy issues. The current plan of the government is a house of cards. This province needs, finally, real leadership and a mature discussion about what we need and how we can fund it. Ontario has, up until the pandemic, funded health care at among the lowest rates in Canada. To change course is absolutely doable, in fact it is imperative, but we cannot go on pretending that services are going to materialize without the resources, planning and investment to create them. This has to be a top priority," said Ms. Mehra.

With this release, the Ontario Health Coalition issued a briefing note on the key data.

For more information: Natalie Mehra, executive director (416) 230-6402 (cell).