“For Us, For You!” Campaign launched to increase awareness of the growing wage gaps experienced by frontline workers

BY PAUL JUNOR

The launch of the campaign, “For Us, For You” by ten provincial associations on October 17^th, 2024, is intended to increase awareness of the growing wage gaps for frontline workers. The resultant staffing challenges and impact on patient care are of primary concerns to these organizations. Details of the campaign can be seen on the website of the Canadian Mental Health Association: ontario.cmha.ca. The campaign highlights the need for urgent investments in Ontario’s community health sector to ensure crucial services and support remain available to meet the needs of Ontarians of all ages.

The campaign indicates that there are currently more than 200,000 workers that are working in various fields in the community health sector. These include primary care, mental health, addiction organization, home and community care, long-term care and other community health settings. In addition, there is an accumulated wage gap of over two billion that these workers are shortchanged compared to their counterparts who worked in hospitals and schools. They play essential roles in emergency departments and hospitals as they are the first ones the public meet.

There has been attention focused on the effect of significant staffing shortages on the patient care of Ontarians. The results from a survey show that:

• 94% of community health organizations identify compensation as the biggest challenge with hiring and keeping staff
• Over 80% are seeing wait times for services and supports continue to grow

The “For Us, For You,” campaign hopes to work with the Ontario government so that it can:

• Invest over $500 million each year over the next five years to close the wage gap, in addition to sustainable and ongoing increase in line with projected inflation.
• Address Bill 124 shortfall that continues to impact the community health care sector.
• Establish a working group with the government to develop a sustainable approach to building and supporting the community health care workforce.

The names of the ten organizations involved in the “For Us, For You” campaign are:

• Addictions and Mental Health Ontario
• AdvantAge Ontario
• Alliance for Healthier Communities
• Association of Family Health Teams of Ontario
• Canadian Mental Health Association of Ontario
• Children Mental Health Ontario
• Family Service Ontario
• Indigenous Primary Health Care Council
• Nurse Practitioner-Led Clinic Association
• Ontario Community Support Association

Leaders related with these organizations released statements for the campaign.

Tatum Wilson, CEO of Children’s Mental Health Ontario states, “By addressing wage disparity, we can strengthen the entire system and ensure that Ontarians have access to the comprehensive care they need, when and where they need it.”

Sarah Hobbs, CEO of Alliance for Healthier Communities states, “Primary care teams are experiencing ongoing recruitment and retention challenges, driven by wage disparities and inability to offer competitive compensation. These staffing shortages result in fewer professionals available to provide the care patients need, leading to delays and reduced access to services. Addressing pay parity is a practical and necessary step to ensure we can attract and retain the skilled professionals required to maintain consistent, high-quality primary care for all Ontarians.”

Dr. Kevin Samson, President of the Association of Family Health Team of Ontario states, “The community mental health and addictions workforce continues to struggle with staff retention and difficulty attracting new workers at a time when there is a surge in demand for our services. Meanwhile, the wage gap for the community health sector continues to grow. Our staff deserves to be paid an equivalent living wage as that of their counterparts in health and other sectors so that they can focus on providing quality care for Ontarians.”

Camille Quennevile, CEO of the Canadian Mental Health Association states, “There is a crisis in child and youth mental health that we can’t solve without addressing workforce shortages. Too many families are turning to hospitals in distress because of long wait times and a lack of treatment availability at community-based child and youth mental health centres. This is further exacerbated by frontline vacancies and high turnover because our wages can’t compete with hospitals and schools.”