(Toronto) – Today, nurses from throughout Ontario gathered at Queen’s Park to protest the government’s nursing cuts. Nurses want the McGuinty government to take action to stop the elimination of nursing positions in our hospitals and commit to funding at least 3,000 nursing positions in their 2009 / 2010 budget.

As the McGuinty government eliminates hundreds of nursing positions, Ontarians are losing thousands of hours of patient care. The Ontario Nurses’ Association indicates that research shows that for every patient added to the workload of an average registered nurse, the rates of complications and patient deaths rise by 7 per cent.  

“This government is taking nurses away from the sickest of the sick,” said Elizabeth Witmer, PC Health Critic. “The McGuinty government has had five years to develop a plan to address hospital deficits and protect patients’ services. The quality of patient care will continue to be reduced as hospitals across the province are forced to cut even more nursing jobs, beds and services,” added Witmer. 

On several occasions Mr. McGuinty has said that he would not cut nursing positions. Yet hospitals across the province are being forced to fire nurses and eliminate nursing positions in order to balance their budgets. Here are a few examples…

• Quinte Health Care will cut 45 nursing positions.
• Cambridge Memorial Hospital will eliminate 30 jobs, most of them in nursing.  
• Niagara Health System will cut 50 nursing positions.

KEY FACTS:

• Although Ontarians are paying more in taxes, they’re losing access to health care providers such as nurses. So far, the McGuinty Health Tax has taken $12.2 billion out of the pockets of hard working families.
• Despite the fact that Ontario has a deficit of nurses and requires 10,000 more nurses to catch up with the rest of Canada, the McGuinty government has broken their 2007 election promise to hire 9,000 more nurses.   

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For further information contact:

Elizabeth Witmer, MPP

(416) 325-1306