Front-line long-term care workers visit MLAs
EDMONTON – More than 30 front-line health care workers from long-term care facilities accompanied AUPE President Dan MacLennan to the provincial Legislature this afternoon to press for enforceable legislation to ensure adequate staffing levels in Alberta’s continuing-care facilities.
The AUPE members, who work in continuing-care facilities throughout Alberta, met opposition health critics and others to express their concerns about understaffing in the long-term care system. They were joined by supporters from the Greater Edmonton Alliance and religious groups.
“We’re not asking for raises, we’re looking for more money for long-term care,” MacLennan told reporters who covered the visit.
With its “Third Way” plan off the agenda, MacLennan observed, the provincial government should move ahead quickly with needed improvements to the long-term care system. “We’re hoping they’ll speed up some of the investments that need to be made.”
MacLennan noted that it was almost a year ago that Alberta Auditor General Fred Dunn issued a report on seniors’ care and programs that illustrated serious shortfalls in the quality of care received by some of the province’s most vulnerable citizens.
According to that May 2005 report, many facilities examined by the Auditor General were falling seriously short of the existing provincial standards for care.
As a union representing well over 6,000 members at continuing-care facilities, MacLennan said, AUPE remains concerned that staffing levels are too low to deliver the care to residents require and deserve.
The AUPE members arrived at the Legislature at 1 p.m., heard remarks by MLAs, then observed the afternoon Question Period from the Legislature gallery.
Photo: AUPE President Dan MacLennan and more than 30 front-line continuing care members visited the Legislature in Edmonton on April 24.