NDP accusing Sask. Party of broken promises on continuing care aides

During Saskatchewan’s fall election campaign and in the Throne Speech, there were promises made about hiring continuing care aides.

Whether those promises were broken depends on who you ask.

Speaking to media on Tuesday, Finance Minister Donna Harpauer said the only campaign promise that wasn’t kept in the budget was to balance the budget by 2024-25.

However, in the fall, the Saskatchewan Party also promised to hire 300 continuing care aides.

“A re-elected Saskatchewan Party government will also improve care for seniors living in long-term care facilities as well as those living in their own homes by hiring 300 more continuing care aides,” read a news release.

However, in the budget, there was only about $6 million for 108 new positions.

Matt Love, the NDP’s seniors critic, calls that a broken promise. On Thursday, he brandished a copy of the Sask. Party’s costed platform.

“It’s black and white, there’s no fine print, it’s clear as day, and they’re choosing to break that promise,” Love said.

Everett Hindley, the minister for seniors as well as the minister for rural and remote health, expanded on the numbers, saying 90 of the aides will be hired in Saskatchewan cities with 18 others hired for home care across the province in rural and remote areas.

“It’s our intention to make sure that we try and hire those care aides as quickly as we can — do 108 this year and do (those) remaining care aides as quickly as possible,” said Hindley.

Hindley didn’t quite explain why the full 300 weren’t budgeted for this year, though, just saying that is the full commitment.

The minister did say there is a big demand for all kinds of health-care workers right now and filling even those 108 positions can’t happen overnight.

“That’s something that we’re dealing with as best we can and we’ll try to get the care aides that we’ve committed to in the election as quickly as we can,” said Hindley.

“We think that the 108 is where we need to go for this year. If we’re able to do more than that, we’ll definitely — we’ll try to do that. You know, we want to be able to hire the full 300 as quickly as we can. In this budget year, it’s the $6 million committed to the first 108 positions.”

Love said there certainly is demand for these workers but it’s because there’s a high need. He said this has been a problem in long-term care for years.

“There is high demand, but if the government knew that, then why did they promise something that they couldn’t deliver on? They promised 300 continuing care aides (and) that wasn’t that long ago. They knew the situation then just as well as they know the situation now,” said Love.

The NDP’s health critic, Vicki Mowat, said this highlights some of the bigger problems in health care which leaders in the industry have been bringing up for years. She said there are more than 1,100 health-care jobs posted for Saskatchewan that are not filled, and that number is growing.

Mowat is calling for a health human resource roundtable to be created, including people from health unions, associations, post-secondary institutions and the ministries of health and advanced education.

“So that everyone can get their heads together and figure out why hiring isn’t working in the health sector. And when we see that there are 1,150 jobs that are not filled, that are posted right now … it raises a lot of very serious concerns about the approach to hiring,” said Mowat.