Statement from MPP Bill Walker on Nursing Home Inspections in Ontario

Ontario PC Critic for Seniors, Long-Term Care & Accessibility Bill Walker made the following statement regarding the government’s decision to scale back nursing home inspections:  

“I’m very troubled that the Liberal government is on the brink of breaking a key promise to Ontario’s 78,000 vulnerable seniors, which is to keep them safe by upholding their rights and protections through annual inspections of the long-term care homes.

Cancelling the comprehensive inspections is reckless and cruel. 

It is the government’s responsibility to address, not suppress the concerns it continues to hear from long-term care residents and their families. These facilities are a home to our parents, a home where they ought to feel safe and treated with dignity and respect they deserve. Abandoning the inspections system is a breach of that trust, and a breach of the founding principle of the government’s own law, the Long-Term Care Homes Act. 

The government’s latest decision is even more troubling given the 2015 report by the Auditor General which found that the backlog of inspections doubled between 2013 and 2015, delaying investigations into critical incidents and high risk complaints for our senior citizens in long-term care homes.   

The Minister of Health and Long-Term Care needs to come clean about why he has decided the protection of our seniors is not a priority. It raises suspicion that this move is about saving money and sadly not the care and health of our valued seniors.

Ontarians want better quality control of the homes, and better accountability and transparency. That’s why the government needs to stand up for seniors and recommit to carrying out proper inspections of our long-term-care homes.”