Jagmeet Singh calls on Liberal government to address the nursing shortage in Hamilton

At Hamilton Health Sciences, 700 critical nursing jobs are vacant – under Justin Trudeau the nursing shortage has gotten five times worse
HAMILTON — Hamilton has 700 vacant nursing jobs — and that shortage of crucial health-care workers has only increased since Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took office. Days before the premiers’ meeting on federal health transfers, Canada’s NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh and NDP MP Matthew Green (Hamilton Centre) called on Trudeau to deliver on his promise to hire more nurses.
“New Democrats envision a public health-care system that’s always ready when and where you need it. When your little one is sick or when your mom needs surgery, we count on nurses being there for us,” said Singh. “But that’s not what’s happening now. Wait times for care are months long when they should be days long. ERs are swamped. The only thing that will solve the health-care crisis is more public health-care workers.”
Justin Trudeau promised to hire thousands of health-care workers — then did the opposite. When the Trudeau Liberals took office in 2015, there were 5,810 vacant nursing jobs. At the end of 2022, vacancies hit a whopping 28,710, according to Statistic Canada.
“Here in Hamilton, people are seeing first-hand how frustrating it is that both provincial and federal governments have failed to hire the nurses and other health care workers we all depend on,” said Green. “Health care is already dramatically understaffed, and Doug Ford’s plan to allow American style, for-profit care will just make things worse by poaching valuable doctors and nurses from the public system — cannibalizing hospitals, forcing people to wait longer in pain.”
“Justin Trudeau has to ensure that we’re training, recruiting, retaining and respecting nurses, so families here in Hamilton, and people all over the country, have the care they need,” added Singh.