Port Colborne residents to rally at Queen's Park in push to save urgent care services
With petitions in hand and a strong community backing, Port Colborne residents are preparing to travel to Queen's Park next week to demand the province protect local health-care services, including the urgent care centre at the former hospital.
The day of action on May 14 is being organized with support of the Port Colborne Health Coalition and the Niagara Health Coalition. Residents are expected to board buses to Toronto to delivers thousands of petition signatures to the provincial legislature.
At the heart of the campaign is a call for the government to halt cuts to urgent care and diagnostic services, and to support the development of a permanent health-care hub in the community.
'This was a big issue during the election,' said Jeff Burch, the NDP MPP for Niagara Centre, which includes Port Colborne.
'With this new parliament, we're just reinforcing that the voices of people in Port Colborne are heard and that's through petitions and people getting on the bus and letting the government know how strongly the people of Port Colborne feel.'
Concerns have been growing not just in Port Colborne, but across much of Niagara in response to Niagara Health's regional redevelopment plan, which includes consolidating emergency and acute care services at three hospital sites.
These sites would be located in St. Catharines, Welland and Niagara Falls, with the urgent care centres in Port Colborne and Fort Erie being closed.
While Niagara Health has maintained the move is intended to improve efficiency and care, critics, including Burch and local coalitions, argue that it leaves smaller communities behind.
'The people of Port Colborne want to have a health-care hub of services that are there for people in their communities,' Burch said. 'The petitions that we're bringing to Queen's Park is to let the government know what the people want in the health care.'
The City of Port Colborne has conducted consultations and surveys with residents on their thoughts regarding the possible closure of its urgent care centre, and the feedback echoes what Burch has heard throughout his campaign: that health care should be kept local.
The issue also played a role in the recent federal election, which saw Port Colborne become part of the new Niagara South riding. The riding is now represented by Conservative MP Fred Davies, a former regional councillor for Port Colborne.
While health care falls under provincial jurisdiction, Davies has publicly supported keeping the urgent care centre open as has his opponent, Liberal Vance Badawey.
On April 10, at the Niagara South all-candidates forum, Davies voiced his support for the urgent care services to remain open in Fort Erie.
'We can't often get physicians that are your primary physician to be able to work in a hospital, we need to re-evaluate those rules,' he prefaced. 'Once we do that, we can bring more physicians into our community and Fort Erie deserves a 24-7 urgent care.'
Davies' support for urgent care marks a rare point of contrast with his provincial counterparts.
'The federal and provincial Conservatives are not exactly aligned on every issue, so (I am) hoping to have a dialogue with Fred,' Burch said.
'I hope that he would support the urgent care in Port Colborne; the Conservative opponent I ran against in the (provincial) election (Port Colborne Mayor Bill Steele) was in favour of the Niagara Health plan, and I won every poll in Port Colborne.'
Burch said his office is co-ordinating with the Port Colborne and Niagara Health Coalitions to support their efforts at Queen's Park. While the coalitions are organizing independently, he remains a strong supporter of their push to keep emergency services accessible.
'I'm certainly welcoming them to Queen's Park and doing anything that I can to facilitate their visit and if I can help them in any way to meet with ministers, then I'll certainly do that,' he said.
Organizers expect a strong turnout for the May 14 Day of Action and hope it will send a clear message to Queen's Park: communities like Port Colborne deserve access to local, reliable health care.
'The people spoke pretty clearly in the election and they're speaking clearly next week,' Burch said.
'It's about tax dollars, that's what they want, they want health care close to home with their community.'
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