WINDSOR, ONT. -- The union representing personal support workers in Windsor-Essex says its “pathetic” it took a pandemic and a Canadian Armed Forces report to get the government to acknowledge what they have been saying for “a lot of years.”
“The unfortunate part is that it took the military to write a letter to the prime minister of Canada saying how deplorable these, some of these homes were, when we've been saying the same thing. The members have been saying the same thing,” says Tullio DiPonti, president of Unifor Local 2458.
Local 2458 represents people like PSWs employed in 22 long-term or retirement facilities in Ontario.
DiPonti says as recently as January 2020 they met with Minister of Long Term Care Merrilee Fullerton, to tell her about their concerns, including lack of personal protective equipment (PPE) and declining staffing.
“All the homes have been under this strain, they've all been working short,” says DiPonti. “They couldn't recruit anybody to help because nobody was going in because they were afraid of the COVID.”
In a damaging report to the federal government, military personnel deployed to five long-term care homes detailed a wide range of concerns, staff seen reusing PPE, bug infestations, sick patients allowed to roam the halls, rotten food left in hallways and residents who were under-fed.
All of the complaints are from five facilities in the Greater Toronto Area : The homes included Orchard Villa in Pickering, Altamount Care Community in Scarborough, Eatonville Care Centre in Etobicoke, Hawthorne Place in North York and Holland Christian Homes' Grace Manor in Brampton.
In the fallout, Premier Doug Ford says he inherited a “broken system” but vowed to fix it.
DiPonti argues not only did the Conservatives knew about the issues, so too did all different parties, and DiPonti blames them all for the situation and the chronic under-funding of the sector.
“It’s unfortunate because a lot of good people, people that fought for this country, are dying for no reason, other than for that lack of care from the government,” says DiPonti.
Graphic warning: Here is the full report from the Canadian Armed Forces. Details included in the report may be disturbing.
