NDP plan to provide culturally responsive care for Peel seniors

PEEL — Under an NDP government, seniors in Peel will be able to live safely and comfortably in their own home for longer and access culturally responsive home care and long-term care, if and when the time comes. That’s because Official Opposition Leader Andrea Horwath and Ontario’s New Democrats are promising to embark on an ambitious, eight-year plan to transform home care and long-term care across the province, starting in 2022.

The recently launched NDP plan, Aging Ontarians Deserve the Best, commits to creating 50,000 new long-term care spaces and replacing for-profit care with fully public and not-for-profit care. Horwath visited Peel virtually Thursday with NDP MPPs Gurratan Singh (Brampton East), Sara Singh (Brampton Centre) and Kevin Yarde (Brampton North) to share how the plan would make a difference locally — highlighting the NDP’s commitment to partnering with local communities to help them build long-term care homes for their seniors.

“Seniors and their families deserve to know that they will be able to access long-term care and home care that is responsive to their culture, religion and language,” said Horwath. “And we can help keep people comfortable and supported in their homes for longer by ensuring home care is accessible and reliable.”

Horwath’s plan invests a record amount into home care, and transforms the patchwork, privatized and unreliable system into a new, all public and not-for-profit system. Her plan includes culturally responsive home care, hiring and training staff who can communicate with seniors in their own language, supporting them in a way that respects their own culture.

Long-term care will also look completely different if Horwath becomes premier in 2022. It would make big institution-like long-term care facilities a thing of the past, building small, modern communities in their place. The NDP’s plan includes a commitment to work with local communities to build culturally responsive long-term care homes that feel like home.

“If seniors do need long-term care, it should feel like moving into a new home, not like giving up a home for an institution,” said Horwath. “Liberal and Conservative governments have spent decades privatizing more and more of the home care and long-term care system. That’s led to a revolving door of underpaid, part-time and temp workers, run off their feet in care homes so understaffed that seniors are regularly neglected. Folks sick with dehydration and malnourishment, languishing in gloomy, institution-like facilities that offer one-size-fits-all care in one language alone.

“We can make long-term care public and not-for-profit, so every last dollar goes into better care — including more culturally responsive care — and more peace of mind for families.”

Quote

Baldev Mutta, founder and Chief Executive Officer of the Punjabi Community Health Services
“Finally, someone is recognizing that delivering culturally appropriate homecare is very critical to the well-being of seniors. Obviously, we would like to take care of our seniors for as long as we can in the community and familiar surroundings but when a need arises to place them in LTC facilities, it is equally important to address cultural and linguistic issues for taking care of them. This policy framework is a step in the right direction as it addresses the fundamental issue of providing culturally competent care in a professional manner.”

Background

Currently the Ontario government directly budgets $4.6 billion for long-term care and another $3.2 billion for home care. An estimated $645 million is spent in community supports and it is estimated another $375 million is spent caring for seniors in hospital beds while they wait for home care or long-term care. That is a total of $9 billion dollars.

The NDP plan includes record investment into better care and better living. The total cost of the plan is $750 million per year in each of eight years for one-time capital investments; plus $3 billion in annual operations costs, which represents a 30 per cent increase to the $9 billion currently spent annually for home and long-term care, which will be phased in with annual increases over six years.

The NDP plan includes:

1. Overhauling home care to help people live at home longer
Ending the for-profit, understaffed patchwork of home care companies that make seniors wait and fail to address the inequities. This includes bringing the system into the public and non-profit sectors over eight years, as well as new provincial standards for home care services, and culturally-appropriate resources, training and job-matching.

2. Making all long-term care public and not-for-profit
Ending greedy profit-making at the expense of quality of care. Horwath is committing to phase out for-profit operators within eight years, and increasing financial reporting, transparency and accountability during the transition period.

3. Building small, modern, family-like homes
The gloom of being warehoused in institution-like facilities is over. An NDP government will immediately start building small nursing homes that actually feel like home. Based on best practices from around the world, the NDP will build smaller living spaces shared by groups of six to 10 people. In a small town, it could look like a typical family home. In bigger cities, it could look more like a neighbourhood of villas.

4. Staffing up with full-time, well-paid, well-trained caregivers
Instead of the revolving door of staff run off their feet, the NDP will give personal support workers a permanent wage boost of $5 an hour over their pre-pandemic wages. The NDP will mandate enough staff to guarantee at least 4.1 hours of hands-on care per resident per day, establish a dedicated fund for training personal support workers, and more.

5. Making family caregivers partners
The NDP will treat loved ones like more than just visitors, including creating a provincial Caregiver Benefit Program and ensuring every home has an active family and resident council.

6. Creating culturally responsive, inclusive and affirming care
The NDP will make sure seniors feel at home, surrounded by their language and culture, and make sure 2SLGBTQIA+ seniors can always live with Pride. This includes partnering with communities, Indigenous nations and 2SLGBTQIA+ communities to fund community homes, and more.

7. Clearing the wait list
Clearing the 38,000-person wait list that can mean years waiting for a bed, and even longer for a culturally appropriate home. The NDP will create up to 50,000 spaces and eliminate the wait list within eight years.

8. Guaranteeing new and stronger protections
Comprehensive inspections, a Seniors’ Advocate, and more will ensure care never goes downhill again.