Ontario’s group well being sector is coming collectively to attract consideration to a rising wage hole inflicting unprecedented staffing shortages.
Ten provincial associations representing 200,000 group employees have launched a marketing campaign known as For Us. For You. which is placing stress on the Ontario authorities to search out options for labour challenges in the neighborhood well being sector.
Regardless of their important function, psychological well being workers in organizations like St. Clair Youngster & Youth Providers face a wage hole exceeding $2 billion in comparison with their friends doing comparable work in different sectors, together with hospitals and colleges.
Craig McKenzie, the Government Director of St. Clair Youngster & Youth Providers, is amongst these elevating the alarm. He explains, “the present state of affairs is now not sustainable and may have a direct influence on the companies that our group depends on for youths and their households.”
McKenzie described it as a disaster and “one of the most challenging situations we’ve found ourselves in as an organization.”
The group well being sector contains employees in major care, psychological well being, and addictions organizations, house and group care, long-term care, and different group well being settings. They supply important help work that always retains Ontarians out of busy emergency departments and hospitals.
“Community health workers – from dietitians and physiotherapists to nurses and health promoters, and everyone else who helps make up the primary health care team – are the foundation of our health system,” stated Sarah Hobbs, CEO for Alliance for More healthy Communities. “These folks are the core members of community health organizations, which people in Ontario depend on every single day to stay well and out of the hospital.”
They, like many others, are struggling to maintain up with the excessive value of residing, and although they might love the work they do, many are in search of work elsewhere.
“Community health workers, and the teams they are part of, are being left behind,” stated Hobbs.
“We continue to struggle to fill vacant positions,” stated McKenzie, “and it’s becoming increasingly difficult to retain staff who are often forced to leave the sector for positions where they receive fair compensation. Their peers in other sectors, such as health or education, with the same credentials, same experience, often end up making 15% or 20% more. It has created staff turnover rates that we haven’t seen before.”
Group employees are leaving for positions in well being, training, or non-public follow. Many are additionally taking up further part-time jobs to make ends meet, in keeping with McKenzie.
This disaster has contributed to elevated wait occasions for important psychological well being help. Wait occasions for evaluation, counselling, and remedy proceed to extend. Demand for these companies has additionally elevated, McKenzie defined. “People are coming to us with more complex needs. There are increases across the board in addictions and mental health.”
St. Clair Youngster & Youth Providers operates underneath Youngsters’s Psychological Well being Ontario, one of many ten organizations which have come collectively for the marketing campaign. The opposite associations supporting the marketing campaign are:
Addictions and Psychological Well being Ontario;
AdvantAge Ontario;
Alliance for More healthy Communities;
Affiliation of Household Well being Groups of Ontario;
Canadian Psychological Well being Affiliation Ontario;
Household Service Ontario;
Indigenous Main Well being Care Council;
Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic Affiliation; and
Ontario Group Assist Affiliation.
For Us. For You. needs to work with Ontario’s authorities to:
Make investments over $500 million annually over the subsequent 5 years to shut the wage hole, along with sustainable and ongoing annual will increase in step with projected inflation.
Tackle Invoice 124 shortfalls that proceed to influence the group well being sector. (Invoice 124 capped wage will increase for public sector employees to 1% over three years. It was repealed in February 2024 after it was discovered to be unconstitutional).
Set up a working group with the federal government to develop a sustainable strategy to constructing and supporting the group well being sector workforce.
