BarrieToday welcomes letters to the editor at [email protected]. Please include your daytime phone number and address (for verification of authorship, not publication). The following letter is from Barrie resident Michael Speers in response to comments Premier Doug Ford made Wednesday, and which were reported in a story titled 'Ford shoots back at claims Ontario should provide sick leave to those impacted by pandemic.'
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On Wednesday, I listened with dismay – but not much surprise – as Premier Doug Ford sat in his position of privilege at Queen’s Park and disparaged the people fighting for paid sick days in Ontario. He said they were “playing politics” with people’s lives and “doing a disservice."
That is complete nonsense. Let’s be clear: the vast majority of the people he was talking about are working people just trying to get by, stay healthy and take care of their family, friends and neighbours. The people fighting for paid sick days are health-care workers, teachers, factory workers, bus drivers, restaurant workers – basically workers of all kinds from all parts of this province.
These workers are fighting for what everyone in this province deserves. Right now in Canada, more than half of our fellow workers do not have permanent paid emergency leave. It’s an even worse situation for workers in low-wage jobs. As a society, we’ve overlooked them long enough.
Premier Ford continues to go on and on about the federal Canada Recovery Sickness Benefit (CRSB) as the reason not to implement paid sick days in Ontario. But the CRSB is inadequate in a number of ways – workers need to lose more than 50 per cent of their work in a week in order to qualify, it takes time to process and it doesn’t cover full wages. It’s also temporary, and there are equality and accessibility concerns.
Legislating permanent, seamlessly accessible and universal paid sick days is the only answer. Without them, we continue to fight against COVID-19 with our collective backs against the wall.
The pandemic has not only shown us how crucial workers are to our economy, it’s also laid bare the inequalities in our system, and the gaping holes in supports and entitlements that so many workers face on a daily basis.
Working people in this country have seen wages stagnate and employer-provided benefits slashed; we are pitted against each other instead of uniting to fight for better working conditions for everyone; the belief that you should “just be happy to have a job” has become more prevalent and has distorted our understanding of what fulfilling work can and should be; full-time positions have disappeared, with contract or gig work often a worker’s only option.
As we witness the arrogance of this premier and this government, my heart breaks for workers and their families. We know that the people who will benefit the most from paid sick days are the same people who are most likely to be exposed to COVID-19 because of their jobs. They are also the people who are stuck in low-paying, precarious work. While many are able to continue working from home, these workers have been forced to put their lives on the line.
These workers deserve better. They deserve paid sick days. And they deserve the respect of their premier.
Michael Speers
Barrie
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