This week saw the release of a major report on long-term care and home care from CCPA-Manitoba, authored by Niall Harney. It received excellent coverage, including by Global News and the Winnipeg Free Press.The Manitoba government’s wrong-headed privatization efforts have left home care clients and PCH residents at the mercy of private corporations with a business model based on poaching under-valued staff from the public system.

  • Recommendations from the report include:
  • Hiring 800 health-care aides  
  • 4.5 legislated hours of care in PCHs, per resident, per day
  • Improving working conditions  
  • Helping workers with tuition support
  • Purchasing fleet vehicles for home-care workers  
  • Phasing out for-profit care

As reported by CBC Manitoba, several candidates in this fall's provincial election were served lunch based on different income levels, ranging from an MLA's salary to what someone on employment assistance receives. The lunch was organized by disability and poverty advocates to highlight the challenges Manitobans on employment and disability assistance face.

In the Winnipeg Free Press we learned that the province spent nearly $20 million on overtime for nurses at HSC over a 9-month period:

"Health Sciences Centre nurses worked more than 224,000 hours of overtime in nine months last spring and fall, according to documents obtained by the NDP and publicly released Wednesday.

The NDP said the Progressive Conservative government spent nearly $20 million on nurse overtime during the same time period, from September 2022 to May 2023.

NDP health critic Uzoma Asagwara said under a New Democrat government, overtime would be reduced and nurses would have greater work-life balance."