Defend Public Healthcare

Tim Hudak's Progressive Conservatives like to say that there is "a bloated public sector" in Ontario. "We will need to make do with fewer government employees" they proclaim. In fact, we already are. The Ontario broader public sector has shrunk by 47,000 workers over the last year, a 3.5% decline. Comparing the first half of last year with the first four months of this year, we are down just under 48,000. Update: Public Sector Employment July 2015 - Click Here. The public sector has, it is true, grown a total of 1.7% (22,100 workers), over the last six years.  That however falls well short of both population growth and the growth of the working age population.   1976 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 Canadian population 18-64 14,017,709 21,757,146 22,020,729 22,264,899 22,451,338 22,655,895 22,851,645 23,070,545 Ontario population 18-64 5,

The Ontario public sector spends less than almost all other provinces on health care.  And it's falling further behind.   Over the most recent four years per capita spending increased 9.7% across Canada, but only 5.2% in Ontario.  With this, the  Ontario public sector spends less per person than any other province except Quebec.  Ontario and Canadian per capita public sector health care spending in current dollars Ontario public sector spending equaled $3,952 per person in 2013, but the all-Canada average was 6.3% (or $248) higher, at $4,200 per person, according to a new report from the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI).  Heading for the bottom: Quebec, alone, does spend slightly   less than Ontario: $8 per year per person less.  But even that is changing.  In 2010, Quebec spent 7% less than Ontario, now they spend less than a quarter of a percent less.   With  a policy of real cuts in Ontario,  per capita public sector spending on health care has gon